The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri

200 PURGATORY. Cakto XVIII. Since from without to us is love applied, And in no other mode the spirit strajs. Or right, or wrong, all merit is denied." ** And he to me : '^ As &r as reason sees Can I explain, beyond that, you must wait On Beatrix alone, 'tis work of faith. The soul, substantial form, which separate From matter, yet with it is linked as one, ^ Does in itself specific power collate, Which without operation is not known. Nor shows itself except by its effect. As by green leaves the life of plants is shown : But from what place there cometib intellect ^ Of primal notions, that man nothing sees, Nor what the primal appetites affect, Which are in you, as the desire in bees To store up honey : and this primal will Does not deserve itself, or blame, or praise. ^ Unto this end, to which all gathers still, !Reason you have .innate, whose voice should make Counsel with due assent to guard the sill. This then we find the source, from whence you take Eeason of merit in you, as you keep ^ Love good or evil, and the husks outshake. Those, who in reasoning pierced unto the deep, Accorded all this innate liberty : Hence left their morals for the world to reap. Whence we assert, that of necessity ^® All love does rise, which in you lights its flame, To keep it in restraint, the power's in you. The noble virtue Beatrix does name Free Will, remember therefore of the maze This key, if e'er she speak upon this theme." " The moon, which now till midnight near delays, Quenching the starlight with its brilliancies, Bose like a rounded bucket, all ablaze. 'O-ainst the sky's course it moved, through those degrees In which the sun flames, when at Bome its fall ^ Is seen 'twixt Oorsican and Sardic seas. And he, the gentle shade, through whom we call Pictola more than any Mantuan town. Had borne the burden of my questionings all. Line 68. The moral philosophers of the old world. Line 79.. The moon rose against the course of the Heavens, in the constellation of Scorpion, in which the son is, when by those at Bome it is seen to set between the islands of Corsica and Sardinia. Line 83. Pictola, formerly called Andes, was the birthplace of Virgil.

Canto XVIII. PURGATORY. 201 Whence J, who of the doubtings I had known ** A clear and fall solution had received, Was like a man who stands in sleepy swoune. But from all trace of sleepiness relieved, I was aroused by people from behind. Who seemed to reach us almost ere perceived. ^^ Such as Ismenus and Asopus find Along their banks, the furious rout at night, What time the Thebans needed Bacchus kind ; So round that circle, urge their whirling flight, Those who towards us coming I descried, ®^ Spurred onwards by good will, and love of right. Soon they had reached us, for with eager stride, AU that great crowd. stiU forwards racing, strain ; And two in front of them with weeping, cried, " Mary with haste unto the mountain ran ;** ^^ '' And CsBsar, too, Ilerda to subdue. Attacked Marseilles, and hurried into Spain." " Faster, yet faster, lose not time anew Through lack of love," the others shouted near, " Grace grows green through zeal good acts to do." ^^^ " O people, in the whom keen fervour here Makes up perchance for negligent delay. And your lukewarmness in a former sphere ; This one who lives (and certes truth I say). Would mount above, when shines again th^ sun, "® So tell us where does nearest lie the way." Such were the words my leader said : and one Amongst those spirits told us, " Follow you Behind us, and the opening will be won. We are so full of the desire to flee "^ That rest we cannot : think it not dishonour Since justice drives, and grant us pardon free. 1 was San Zeno's abbot in Verona, Under good Barbarossa's empire suave. Of whom Milan still weeps his hand upon her. ^^ And one has now a foot within the grave, Who through that monastery soon will mourn In sadness, that he used it as his slave. Line 91. Rivers near Thebes. Line 100. When she went into the hill conntry to visit Elizabeth. Lnke i. 39. Line 101. CsBsar, in the war with Pompey, left Bmtus to complete the siege of Marseilles, and himself harried into Spain, and defeated tne genends of Pompey at Lerida. Line 119. The Emperor Frederic I., who reduced Milan to ashes in 1162. Line 121. Alberto della Scala, lord of Verona, who had forced his natnral son, a deformed person, on the monastery as its abbot.

202 PURGATORY. Cakto XIX.

p. 125

Because he placed his son, to evil bom, Misshaped in body, and in mind more vile, In place of its true pastor hence uptom." I know not if he spake more or grew still, So far from us ere then his course did speed, But this I heard, and I retained the while. And he, who was my help in every need, ^^ Said, ** Turn you hither, and behold two more Chiding the sin of sloth, as on they speed." In rear of all they said ; " All those, before Whom the Red Sea its pathway opened, died, Ere their descendants saw the Jordan's shore." ^^ " And those who all the labours could not bide Unto the end, with good Anchises* son. Doomed by themselves, a life inglorious tried." Thereaffcer, when so far from us had run Those shadows, that they vanished from our sight, Within my mind new thought its course begun. Whence many more aU diverse rose in might. And I so raved o'er one and the other theme That there my eyes I closM in delight, And changed my fancy's vision to a dream. ^** Line 136. Those Trojans who remained with A-cestes in Sicily, rather than accompany Eneas in his farther travels and toils, "^neid," book ▼.

p. 140