The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri

CANTO vni. Dante ascends with Beatrice to the sphere of the planet Venns. Amongst the troop of spirits who greet him here he converses with Charles Martel, King of Hungry, who, after discoursing on the prospects of his descendants then ahve, explains to him how the influence oi the stars was used by God as a means for the advantage of human poli^. The while the world in pagan error strayed It thought that on her epicycle rolled Fair Venus o'er the world her false love raved. Therefore to her not only did they hold Their sacrifices, and their votive cry, * That ancient people in their error old, But Cupid and I^one honoured high, The last her mother, and the first her son. And said that he in Dido's lap did He. And eke from her, with whom my strain's begun, '° They took the appellation of the star Which leading now, now following, wooes the sun. Of my ascent to it I was not 'ware ; But of my entrance gave me certainty My lady, where I saw her grow more fair. ^* And as within the flame a spark we see, And as in voices joined a voice we hear. If one the tenour keeps, one ranges free, Line 2. The epicycle in the Ptolemaic system is the smaller circle in which «ach planet revolves of its own motion, independent of the greater circle of the spheres, derived from the primum mobile. Line 12. Venus being alternately the morning and evening star. " Sweet Hesper-Phosphor, double name, for what is one.** Tennyson.

Canto VIII. PARADISE. 289

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So in tliat light did other lights appear, Who in their circle, less or larger, keep, According to the eternal light they share. From a cold cloud the winds would never sweep, Or visible or not so to the ejne, But slow and hindered they would seem to creep To one who had beheld those lights divine ^* Coming towards us, as they leave the wheel Begun before, 'midst higher seraphim : And after them who first appeared did peal Hosanna, so that ever since to hear That sound again the yearnin'g do I feel. Thence one amongst them unto us drew near, And thus began alone : " To your desire We all are ready for your joyaunce here. We turn with heavenly princedoms in our choir, With them one circling motion, one resolve. To whom you in the world did tune your lyre ; You, who with knowledge the third Heaven revolve : We are so full of love, for your delight Some pause no less of sweetness will involve." After my eyes with reverence did invite Permission of my lady, who replied With look that gave them certainty of right. They turned unto the light who such a wide Promise had offered, and, " Who are you, say !" With great affection by my voice was cried. Brighter and clearer did I see him ray By the new joyousness which o'er him grew When to his joyousness I thus did say : Embellished thus he told me, " Years but few The world possessed me ; had they longer been Much ill hfi.d been not which must now accrue. It is my gla4ness which conceals my mien, And hides me from you as it rays around. Like creature swathed in its own silken sheen. Line 21. As each, according to his deserts, shares more or less of the Divine vision. Line 37. *'Voi ch* intendendo il terzo oiel movete." The first line in Dante's first canzone in the '' Convito." Line 40. The speaker is Charles Martel, crowned King of Hungary, and son of Charles 11. , King of Naples and Sicily, before whom he died. His brother Bobert succeeded to his father, whose evil reign Charles Martel's longer life Avonld have prevented. He visited Florence in 1295, where he appears to have won the goodwill of Dante, and his present place in Paradise. U

290 PARADISE. Cauto vm. Well did you love me, and for this had ground . " Had I lived longer, I to you had shown More than the leaves, how much did love abound. That country on the left, laved by the Ehone When mingled with the Sorza it does hie, Looked for the time when I should mount its throne : * And fair Ausonia's horn, where studded lie Bari, Ghieta, and Orotona's town, From where the TrentS to the sea does fly. Already shone upon my brow the crown O* the country where the Danube slips away ^ When from its German banks 'tis glided down ; And fair Trinacria, which above the bay Betwixt Pachinus and Pelorus, (where Eurus for ever holds his stormy sway,) Glooms with the steaming sulphur in the air, Not by Typhosus, still would kings await Sprung from my loins, to Charles and Eodolph heir. If evil ruling, which makes desperate The subject people, had not roused the cry Of Death still Death, within Palermo's gate. ^^ And if my brother would but this descry. To save his people from the biting greed Of Catalonian harpies he would fly^: For truly it behoves him to heed, By him or others, that his vessel's freight ^ With load on load be not sunk down indeed. His nature from free stock degenerate Has need of such a ministry, whose zeal Would never strive full coffers to create." ** Since I believe the gladness which I feel ** Your speech, my lord, within me sheds abroad, Where there begins and ceases every weal Line 58. Provence, and in the next terzina Naples, to which kingdom he was heir. Line 67. Sicily, called after its three promontories of Pachinns, Peloms, and Lilibeus. Etna was supposed to be the burial-place of the giant Typhoeas, from which he vomited forth fire and smoke, Ovid, 5 Met£un. Eums per Siculas equitavit undas. Horace, Odes iv., 14, 44. Line 75. Alluding to the Sicilian Yesi)er8, where the line of kings descending from Charles I. of Naples, Charles Martel's grandfather, was overthrown. Line 82. Charles Martel accuses his brother Robert of avarice, though the son of a liberal father; that father, Charles II. of Naples, was contemptuously branded with the same vice by Hugh Capet, in Canto XX. of " Purgatory," when he accused him of selling his daughter like a pirate his captives. Line 85. The joy your speech causes me is greater, in that then seest it in God, the mirror of truth, and even more in that you seest it there.