The Divine Comedy | Page 7

came unto the place?Where I was sitting with the ancient Rachel.
"Beatrice" said she, "the true praise of God,?Why succourest thou not him, who loved thee so,?For thee he issued from the vulgar herd?
Dost thou not hear the pity of his plaint??Dost thou not see the death that combats him?Beside that flood, where ocean has no vaunt?"
Never were persons in the world so swift?To work their weal and to escape their woe,?As I, after such words as these were uttered,
Came hither downward from my blessed seat,?Confiding in thy dignified discourse,?Which honours thee, and those who've listened to it.'
After she thus had spoken unto me,?Weeping, her shining eyes she turned away;?Whereby she made me swifter in my coming;
And unto thee I came, as she desired;?I have delivered thee from that wild beast,?Which barred the beautiful mountain's short ascent.
What is it, then? Why, why dost thou delay??Why is such baseness bedded in thy heart??Daring and hardihood why hast thou not,
Seeing that three such Ladies benedight?Are caring for thee in the court of Heaven,?And so much good my speech doth promise thee?"
Even as the flowerets, by nocturnal chill,?Bowed down and closed, when the sun whitens them,?Uplift themselves all open on their stems;
Such I became with my exhausted strength,?And such good courage to my heart there coursed,?That I began, like an intrepid person:
"O she compassionate, who succoured me,?And courteous thou, who hast obeyed so soon?The words of truth which she addressed to thee!
Thou hast my heart so with desire disposed?To the adventure, with these words of thine,?That to my first intent I have returned.
Now go, for one sole will is in us both,?Thou Leader, and thou Lord, and Master thou."?Thus said I to him; and when he had moved,
I entered on the deep and savage way.
Inferno: Canto III
"Through me the way is to the city dolent;?Through me the way is to eternal dole;?Through me the way among the people lost.
Justice incited my sublime Creator;?Created me divine Omnipotence,?The highest Wisdom and the primal Love.
Before me there were no created things,?Only eterne, and I eternal last.?All hope abandon, ye who enter in!"
These words in sombre colour I beheld?Written upon the summit of a gate;?Whence I: "Their sense is, Master, hard to me!"
And he to me, as one experienced:?"Here all suspicion needs must be abandoned,?All cowardice must needs be here extinct.
We to the place have come, where I have told thee?Thou shalt behold the people dolorous?Who have foregone the good of intellect."
And after he had laid his hand on mine?With joyful mien, whence I was comforted,?He led me in among the secret things.
There sighs, complaints, and ululations loud?Resounded through the air without a star,?Whence I, at the beginning, wept thereat.
Languages diverse, horrible dialects,?Accents of anger, words of agony,?And voices high and hoarse, with sound of hands,
Made up a tumult that goes whirling on?For ever in that air for ever black,?Even as the sand doth, when the whirlwind breathes.
And I, who had my head with horror bound,?Said: "Master, what is this which now I hear??What folk is this, which seems by pain so vanquished?"
And he to me: "This miserable mode?Maintain the melancholy souls of those?Who lived withouten infamy or praise.
Commingled are they with that caitiff choir?Of Angels, who have not rebellious been,?Nor faithful were to God, but were for self.
The heavens expelled them, not to be less fair;?Nor them the nethermore abyss receives,?For glory none the damned would have from them."
And I: "O Master, what so grievous is?To these, that maketh them lament so sore?"?He answered: "I will tell thee very briefly.
These have no longer any hope of death;?And this blind life of theirs is so debased,?They envious are of every other fate.
No fame of them the world permits to be;?Misericord and Justice both disdain them.?Let us not speak of them, but look, and pass."
And I, who looked again, beheld a banner,?Which, whirling round, ran on so rapidly,?That of all pause it seemed to me indignant;
And after it there came so long a train?Of people, that I ne'er would have believed?That ever Death so many had undone.
When some among them I had recognised,?I looked, and I beheld the shade of him?Who made through cowardice the great refusal.
Forthwith I comprehended, and was certain,?That this the sect was of the caitiff wretches?Hateful to God and to his enemies.
These miscreants, who never were alive,?Were naked, and were stung exceedingly?By gadflies and by hornets that were there.
These did their faces irrigate with blood,?Which, with their tears commingled, at their feet?By the disgusting worms was gathered up.
And when to gazing farther I betook me.?People I saw on a great river's bank;?Whence said I: "Master, now vouchsafe to me,
That I may know who these are, and what law?Makes them appear so ready to pass over,?As I discern athwart the dusky light."
And he to me: "These things shall all be known?To thee, as soon as we