Who had me near him on that part where lies
Whose mighty worth mov’d Gregory to earn
The heart of man. My sight forthwith I turn’d
His mighty conquest, Trajan th’ Emperor.
And mark’d, behind the virgin mother’s form,
A widow at his bridle stood, attir’d
Upon that side, where he, that mov’d me, stood,
In tears and mourning. Round about them troop’d
Another story graven on the rock.
Full throng of knights, and overhead in gold
I passed athwart the bard, and drew me near,
The eagles floated, struggling with the wind.
That it might stand more aptly for my view.
The wretch appear’d amid all these to say:
There in the self-same marble were engrav’d
“Grant vengeance, sire! for, woe beshrew this heart The cart and kine, drawing the sacred ark,
My son is murder’d.” He replying seem’d;
That from unbidden office awes mankind.
“Wait now till I return.” And she, as one
Before it came much people; and the whole
Made hasty by her grief; “O sire, if thou
Parted in seven quires. One sense cried, “Nay,”
Dost not return?”—”Where I am, who then is,
Another, “Yes, they sing.” Like doubt arose
May right thee.”—” What to thee is other’s good,
Betwixt the eye and smell, from the curl’d fume
If thou neglect thy own?”—”Now comfort thee,”
Of incense breathing up the well-wrought toil.
At length he answers. “It beseemeth well
29
The Divine Comedy of Dante - Purgatory My duty be perform’d, ere I move hence:
What underneath those stones approacheth: now,
So justice wills; and pity bids me stay.”
E’en now, mayst thou discern the pangs of each.”
He, whose ken nothing new surveys, produc’d
Christians and proud! O poor and wretched ones!
That visible speaking, new to us and strange
That feeble in the mind’s eye, lean your trust
The like not found on earth. Fondly I gaz’d
Upon unstaid perverseness! Know ye not
Upon those patterns of meek humbleness,
That we are worms, yet made at last to form
Shapes yet more precious for their artist’s sake,
The winged insect, imp’d with angel plumes
When “Lo,” the poet whisper’d, “where this way
That to heaven’s justice unobstructed soars?
(But slack their pace), a multitude advance.
Why buoy ye up aloft your unfleg’d souls?
These to the lofty steps shall guide us on.”
Abortive then and shapeless ye remain,
Mine eyes, though bent on view of novel sights Like the untimely embryon of a worm!
Their lov’d allurement, were not slow to turn.
As, to support incumbent floor or roof,
Reader! I would not that amaz’d thou miss
For corbel is a figure sometimes seen,
Of thy good purpose, hearing how just God
That crumples up its knees unto its breast,
Decrees our debts be cancel’d. Ponder not
With the feign’d posture stirring ruth unfeign’d
The form of suff’ring. Think on what succeeds,
In the beholder’s fancy; so I saw
Think that at worst beyond the mighty doom
These fashion’d, when I noted well their guise.
It cannot pass. “Instructor,” I began,
Each, as his back was laden, came indeed
“What I see hither tending, bears no trace
Or more or less contract; but it appear’d
Of human semblance, nor of aught beside
As he, who show’d most patience in his look,
That my foil’d sight can guess.” He answering thus: Wailing exclaim’d: “I can endure no more.”
“So courb’d to earth, beneath their heavy teems
Of torment stoop they, that mine eye at first
CANTO XI
Struggled as thine. But look intently thither,
O thou Almighty Father, who dost make
An disentangle with thy lab’ring view,
30
The Divine Comedy of Dante - Purgatory The heavens thy dwelling, not in bounds confin’d,
Not for ourselves, since that were needless now,
But that with love intenser there thou view’st
But for their sakes who after us remain.”
Thy primal effluence, hallow’d be thy name:
Thus for themselves and us good speed imploring, Join each created being to extol
Those spirits went beneath a weight like that
Thy might, for worthy humblest thanks and praise
We sometimes feel in dreams, all, sore beset,
Is thy blest Spirit. May thy kingdom’s peace
But with unequal anguish, wearied all,
Come unto us; for we, unless it come,
Round the first circuit, purging as they go,
With all our striving thither tend in vain.
The world’s gross darkness off: In our behalf
As of their will the angels unto thee
If there vows still be offer’d, what can here
Tender meet sacrifice, circling thy throne
For them be vow’d and done by such, whose wills
With loud hosannas, so of theirs be done
Have root of goodness in them? Well beseems
By saintly men on earth. Grant us this day
That we should help them wash away the stains
Our daily manna, without which he roams
They carried hence, that so made pure and light,
Through this rough desert retrograde, who most
They may spring upward to the starry spheres.
Toils to advance his steps. As we to each
“Ah! so may mercy-temper’d justice rid
Pardon the evil done us, pardon thou
Your burdens speedily, that ye have power
Benign, and of our merit take no count.
To stretch your wing, which e’en to your desire
‘Gainst the old adversary prove thou not
Shall lift you, as ye show us on which hand
Our virtue easily subdu’d; but free
Toward the ladder leads the shortest way.
From his incitements and defeat his wiles.
And if there be more passages than one,
This last petition, dearest Lord! is made
Instruct us of that easiest to ascend;
For this man who comes with me, and bears yet
The charge of fleshly raiment Adam left him,
Despite his better will but slowly mounts.”
From whom the answer came unto these words,
31
The Divine Comedy of Dante - Purgatory Which my guide spake, appear’d not; but ’twas said
List’ning I bent my visage down: and one
“Along the bank to rightward come with us,
(Not he who spake) twisted beneath the weight
And ye shall find a pass that mocks not toil
That urg’d him, saw me, knew me straight, and
Of living man to climb: and were it not
call’d,
That I am hinder’d by the rock, wherewith
Holding his eyes With difficulty fix’d
This arrogant neck is tam’d, whence needs I stoop
Intent upon me, stooping as I went
My visage to the ground, him, who yet lives,
Companion of their way. “O!” I exclaim’d,
Whose name thou speak’st not him I fain would view.
“Art thou not Oderigi, art not tho
u
To mark if e’er I knew him? and to crave
Agobbio’s glory, glory of that art
His pity for the fardel that I bear.
Which they of Paris call the limmer’s skill?”
I was of Latiun, of a Tuscan horn
“Brother!” said he, “with tints that gayer smile, A mighty one: Aldobranlesco’s name
Bolognian Franco’s pencil lines the leaves.
My sire’s, I know not if ye e’er have heard.
His all the honour now; mine borrow’d light.
My old blood and forefathers’ gallant deeds
In truth I had not been thus courteous to him,
Made me so haughty, that I clean forgot
The whilst I liv’d, through eagerness of zeal
The common mother, and to such excess,
For that pre-eminence my heart was bent on.
Wax’d in my scorn of all men, that I fell,
Here of such pride the forfeiture is paid.
Fell therefore; by what fate Sienna’s sons,
Nor were I even here; if, able still
Each child in Campagnatico, can tell.
To sin, I had not turn’d me unto God.
I am Omberto; not me only pride
O powers of man! how vain your glory, nipp’d
Hath injur’d, but my kindred all involv’d
E’en in its height of verdure, if an age
In mischief with her. Here my lot ordains
Less bright succeed not! Cimabue thought
Under this weight to groan, till I appease
To lord it over painting’s field; and now
God’s angry justice, since I did it not
The cry is Giotto’s, and his name eclips’d.
Amongst the living, here amongst the dead.”
Thus hath one Guido from the other snatch’d
32
The Divine Comedy of Dante - Purgatory The letter’d prize: and he perhaps is born,
“Is Provenzano. He is here, because
Who shall drive either from their nest. The noise
He reach’d, with grasp presumptuous, at the sway
Of worldly fame is but a blast of wind,
Of all Sienna. Thus he still hath gone,
That blows from divers points, and shifts its name
Thus goeth never-resting, since he died.
Shifting the point it blows from. Shalt thou more
Such is th’ acquittance render’d back of him,
Live in the mouths of mankind, if thy flesh
Who, beyond measure, dar’d on earth.” I then:
Part shrivel’d from thee, than if thou hadst died,
“If soul that to the verge of life delays
Before the coral and the pap were left,
Repentance, linger in that lower space,
Or ere some thousand years have passed? and that
Nor hither mount, unless good prayers befriend,
Is, to eternity compar’d, a space,
How chanc’d admittance was vouchsaf’d to him?”
Briefer than is the twinkling of an eye
“When at his glory’s topmost height,” said he, To the heaven’s slowest orb. He there who treads
“Respect of dignity all cast aside,
So leisurely before me, far and wide
Freely He fix’d him on Sienna’s plain,
Through Tuscany resounded once; and now
A suitor to redeem his suff’ring friend,
Is in Sienna scarce with whispers nam’d:
Who languish’d in the prison-house of Charles,
There was he sov’reign, when destruction caught
Nor for his sake refus’d through every vein
The madd’ning rage of Florence, in that day
To tremble. More I will not say; and dark,
Proud as she now is loathsome. Your renown
I know, my words are, but thy neighbours soon
Is as the herb, whose hue doth come and go,
Shall help thee to a comment on the text.
And his might withers it, by whom it sprang
This is the work, that from these limits freed him.”
Crude from the lap of earth.” I thus to him:
“True are thy sayings: to my heart they breathe
CANTO XII
The kindly spirit of meekness, and allay
With equal pace as oxen in the yoke,
What tumours rankle there. But who is he
I with that laden spirit journey’d on
Of whom thou spak’st but now?”—”This,” he replied,
33
The Divine Comedy of Dante - Purgatory Long as the mild instructor suffer’d me;
With Mars, I saw, and Pallas, round their sire,
But when he bade me quit him, and proceed
Arm’d still, and gazing on the giant’s limbs
(For “here,” said he, “behooves with sail and oars
Strewn o’er th’ ethereal field. Nimrod I saw:
Each man, as best he may, push on his bark”),
At foot of the stupendous work he stood,
Upright, as one dispos’d for speed, I rais’d
As if bewilder’d, looking on the crowd
My body, still in thought submissive bow’d.
Leagued in his proud attempt on Sennaar’s plain.
I now my leader’s track not loth pursued;
O Niobe! in what a trance of woe
And each had shown how light we far’d along
Thee I beheld, upon that highway drawn,
When thus he warn’d me: “Bend thine eyesight
Sev’n sons on either side thee slain! O Saul!
down:
How ghastly didst thou look! on thine own sword
For thou to ease the way shall find it good
Expiring in Gilboa, from that hour
To ruminate the bed beneath thy feet.”
Ne’er visited with rain from heav’n or dew!
As in memorial of the buried, drawn
O fond Arachne! thee I also saw
Upon earth-level tombs, the sculptur’d form
Half spider now in anguish crawling up
Of what was once, appears (at sight whereof
Th’ unfinish’d web thou weaved’st to thy bane!
Tears often stream forth by remembrance wak’d,
O Rehoboam! here thy shape doth seem
Whose sacred stings the piteous only feel),
Louring no more defiance! but fear-smote
So saw I there, but with more curious skill
With none to chase him in his chariot whirl’d.
Of portraiture o’erwrought, whate’er of space
Was shown beside upon the solid floor
From forth the mountain stretches. On one part
How dear Alcmaeon forc’d his mother rate
Him I beheld, above all creatures erst
That ornament in evil hour receiv’d:
Created noblest, light’ning fall from heaven:
How in the temple on Sennacherib fell
On th’ other side with bolt celestial pierc’d
His sons, and how a corpse they left him there.
Briareus: cumb’ring earth he lay through dint
Was shown the scath and cruel mangling made
Of mortal ice-stroke. The Thymbraean god
By Tomyris on Cyrus, when she cried:
34
The Divine Comedy of Dante - Purgatory
“Blood thou didst thirst for, take thy fill of blood!”
That gladly he may forward us aloft.
Was shown how routed in the battle fled
Consider that this day ne’er dawns again.”
Th’ Assyrians, Holofernes slain, and e’en
Time’s loss he had so often warn’d me ‘gainst, The relics of the carnage. Troy I mark’d
I could not miss the scope at which he aim’d.
In ashes and in caverns
. Oh! how fall’n,
The goodly shape approach’d us, snowy white
How abject, Ilion, was thy semblance there!
In vesture, and with visage casting streams
What master of the pencil or the style
Of tremulous lustre like the matin star.
Had trac’d the shades and lines, that might have made His arms he open’d, then his wings; and spake:
The subtlest workman wonder? Dead the dead,
“Onward: the steps, behold! are near; and now
The living seem’d alive; with clearer view
Th’ ascent is without difficulty gain’d.”
His eye beheld not who beheld the truth,
A scanty few are they, who when they hear
Than mine what I did tread on, while I went
Such tidings, hasten. O ye race of men
Low bending. Now swell out; and with stiff necks
Though born to soar, why suffer ye a wind
Pass on, ye sons of Eve! veil not your looks,
So slight to baffle ye? He led us on
Lest they descry the evil of your path!
Where the rock parted; here against my front
I noted not (so busied was my thought)
Did beat his wings, then promis’d I should fare
How much we now had circled of the mount,
In safety on my way. As to ascend
And of his course yet more the sun had spent,
That steep, upon whose brow the chapel stands
When he, who with still wakeful caution went,
(O’er Rubaconte, looking lordly down
Admonish’d: “Raise thou up thy head: for know
On the well-guided city,) up the right
Time is not now for slow suspense. Behold
Th’ impetuous rise is broken by the steps
That way an angel hasting towards us! Lo
Carv’d in that old and simple age, when still
Where duly the sixth handmaid doth return
The registry and label rested safe;
From service on the day. Wear thou in look
Thus is th’ acclivity reliev’d, which here
And gesture seemly grace of reverent awe,
Precipitous from the other circuit falls:
35
The Divine Comedy of Dante - Purgatory But on each hand the tall cliff presses close.
Six only of the letters, which his sword
As ent’ring there we turn’d, voices, in strain Who bare the keys had trac’d upon my brow.
Ineffable, sang: “Blessed are the poor
The leader, as he mark’d mine action, smil’d.
In spirit.” Ah how far unlike to these
The straits of hell; here songs to usher us,
CANTO XIII
There shrieks of woe! We climb the holy stairs: