Jerusalem Delivered | Page 3

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Gerusalemme Liberata
("Jerusalem Delivered")
by
Torquato Tasso
(1544-1595)
Published 1581 in Parma, Italy. Translated by Edward Fairfax
(1560-1635); translation first published in London, 1600.
This electronic edition was edited, proofed, and prepared by Douglas B.
Killings ([email protected]
), November, 1995.

FIRST BOOK
THE ARGUMENT.
God sends his angel to Tortosa down,

Godfrey unites the Christian Peers and Knights;
And all the Lords
and Princes of renown
Choose him their Duke, to rule the wares and
fights.
He mustereth all his host, whose number known,
He sends
them to the fort that Sion hights;
The aged tyrant Juda's land that
guides,
In fear and trouble, to resist provides.
I
The sacred armies, and the godly knight,
That the great sepulchre
of Christ did free,
I sing; much wrought his valor and foresight,

And in that glorious war much suffered he;
In vain 'gainst him did
Hell oppose her might,
In vain the Turks and Morians armed be:

His soldiers wild, to brawls and mutinies prest,
Reduced he to peace,
so Heaven him blest.
II
O heavenly Muse, that not with fading bays
Deckest thy brow by
the Heliconian spring,
But sittest crowned with stars' immortal rays

In Heaven, where legions of bright angels sing;
Inspire life in my wit,
my thoughts upraise,
My verse ennoble, and forgive the thing,
If
fictions light I mix with truth divine,
And fill these lines with other
praise than thine.

III
Thither thou know'st the world is best inclined
Where luring
Parnass most his sweet imparts,
And truth conveyed in verse of
gentle kind
To read perhaps will move the dullest hearts:
So we, if
children young diseased we find,
Anoint with sweets the vessel's
foremost parts
To make them taste the potions sharp we give;
They
drink deceived, and so deceived, they live.
IV
Ye noble Princes, that protect and save
The Pilgrim Muses, and
their ship defend
From rock of Ignorance and Error's wave,
Your
gracious eyes upon this labor bend:
To you these tales of love and
conquest brave
I dedicate, to you this work I send:
My Muse
hereafter shall perhaps unfold
Your fights, your battles, and your
combats bold.
V
For if the Christian Princes ever strive
To win fair Greece out of
the tyrants' hands,
And those usurping Ismaelites deprive
Of woful
Thrace, which now captived stands,
You must from realms and seas
the Turks forth drive,
As Godfrey chased them from Juda's lands,

And in this legend, all that glorious deed,
Read, whilst you arm you;
arm you, whilst you read.
VI
Six years were run since first in martial guise
The Christian
Lords warraid the eastern land;
Nice by assault, and Antioch by
surprise,
Both fair, both rich, both won, both conquered stand,
And
this defended they in noblest wise
'Gainst Persian knights and many a
valiant band;
Tortosa won, lest winter might them shend,
They
drew to holds, and coming spring attend.
VII
The sullen season now was come and gone,
That forced them
late cease from their noble war,
When God Almighty form his lofty
throne,
Set in those parts of Heaven that purest are
(As far above
the clear stars every one,

As it is hence up to the highest star),

Looked down, and all at once this world beheld,
Each land, each city,
country, town and field.

VIII
All things he viewed, at last in Syria stayed
Upon the
Christian Lords his gracious eye,
That wondrous look wherewith he
oft surveyed
Men's secret thoughts that most concealed lie
He cast
on puissant Godfrey, that assayed
To drive the Turks from Sion's
bulwarks high,
And, full of zeal and faith, esteemed light
All
worldly honor, empire, treasure, might:
IX
In Baldwin next he
spied another thought,
Whom spirits proud to vain ambition move:

Tancred he saw his life's joy set at naught,
So woe-begone was he
with pains of love:
Boemond the conquered folk of Antioch brought,

The gentle yoke of Christian rule to prove:
He taught them laws,
statutes and customs new,
Arts, crafts, obedience, and religion true;
X
And with such care his busy work he plied,
That to naught else
his acting thoughts he bent:
In young Rinaldo fierce desires he spied,

And noble heart of rest impatient;
To wealth or sovereign power he
naught applied
His wits, but all to virtue excellent;
Patterns and
rules of skill, and courage bold,
He took from Guelpho, and his
fathers old.
XI
Thus when the Lord discovered had, and seen
The hidden
secrets of each worthy's breast,
Out of the hierarchies of angels sheen

The gentle Gabriel called he from the rest,
'Twixt God and souls of
men that righteous been
Ambassador is he, forever blest,
The just
commands of Heaven's Eternal King,
'Twixt skies and earth, he up
and down doth bring.
XII
To whom the Lord thus spake: "Godfredo find,
And in my
name ask him, why doth he rest?
Why be his arms to ease and peace
resigned?
Why frees he not Jerusalem distrest?
His peers to counsel
call, each baser mind
Let him stir up; for, chieftain of the rest

I
choose him here, the earth shall him allow,
His fellows late shall be
his subjects now."
XIII
This said, the angel swift himself prepared
To execute the

charge imposed aright,
In form of airy members fair imbared,
His
spirits pure were subject to our sight,
Like