Divine Comedy: Purgatory | Page 5

figure, regards him as
one who, before the coming of Christ, practised the virtues which are
required to liberate the soul from sin, and who, as be says in the De

Monarchia (ii. 5), "that he might kindle the love of liberty in the world,
showed how precious it was, by preferring death with liberty to life
without it." This liberty is the type of that spiritual freedom which
Dante is seeking, and which, being the perfect conformity of the human
will to the will of God, is the aim and fruition of nil redeemed souls.
In the region of Purgatory outside the gate, the souls have not yet
attained this freedom; they are on the way to it, and Cato is
allegorically fit to warn and spur them on.
"Who are ye that counter to the blind stream have fled from the eternal
prison?" said he, moving those venerable plumes. "Who has guided you?
Or who was a lamp to you, issuing forth from the deep night that ever
makes the infernal valley black? Are the laws of the abyss thus broken?
or is a new design changed in heaven that, being damned, ye come unto
my rocks?"
My Leader then took hold of me, and with words, and with hands, and
with signs, made my legs and my brow reverent. Then he
answered

him, "Of myself I came not; a Lady descended from
Heaven, through
whose prayers I succored this man with my
company. But since it is
thy will that more of our condition be unfolded to thee as it truly is,
mine cannot be that to thee this be denied. This man has not seen his
last evening, but through his folly was so near thereto that very little
time there was to turn. Even as I have said, I was sent to him to rescue
him, and there was no other way than this, along which I have set
myself. I have shown to him all the guilty people; and now I intend to
show him those spirits that purge themselves under thy ward. How I
have led him, it would be long to tell thee; from on high descends
power that aids me to conduct him to see thee and to hear thee. Now
may it please thee to approve his coming. He goes seeking liberty,
which is so dear, as he knows who for her
refuses life. Thou knowest
it, for death for her sake was not hitter to thee in Utica, where thou
didst leave the garment that on the great day shall he so bright. The
eternal edicts are not violated by us, for this one is alive, and Minos
does not bind me; but I am of the circle where are the chaste eyes of thy
Marcia, who in her look still prays thee, O holy breast, that for thine
own thou hold her. For her love, then, incline thyself to us; let us go on
through thy seven realms.[1] Thanks unto thee will I carry back to her,
if to be mentioned there below thou deign."
[1] The seven circles of Purgatory.
"Marcia so pleased my eyes while I was on earth," said he then, "that
whatsoever grace she wished from me I did it; now, that on the other
side of the evil stream she dwells, she can no more move me, by that
law which was made when thence I issued
forth.[1] But if a Lady of
heaven move and direct thee, as thou sayest, there is no need of flattery;
suffice it fully to thee that for her sake thou askest me. Go then, and see
thou gird this one with a smooth rush, and that thou wash his face so
that thou remove all sully from it, for it were not befitting to go with
eye overcast by any cloud before the first minister that is of those of
Paradise. This little island, round about at its base, down there yonder
where the wave heats it, bears rushes upon its soft ooze. No plant of
other kind, that might put forth leaf or grow hard, can there have life,
because it yields not to the shocks. Thereafter let not your return be this

way; the Sun which now is rising will show you to take the mountain
by easier
ascent."
[1] The law that the redeemed cannot be touched by other than
heavenly affections.
So he disappeared, and I rose up, without speaking, and drew me close
to my Leader, and turned my eyes to him. He began, "Son, follow my
steps; let us turn back, for this plain slopes that way to its low limits."
The dawn was vanquishing the matin hour which fled before it, so that
from afar I discerned the trembling of the sea. We set forth over the
solitary