Part 3

Thus said the master; and he turned me himself, and did not keep to my hands, that I had not yet closed with his own.

O you who have sound intellects, consider the doctrine that lies hidden beneath the veil of the strange verses.

And now there came up through the turbid waves a crash of sound, full of dread, at which both shores trembled, not otherwise than from an impetuous wind, born of opposing heats, that smites the forest and, with no restraint, rends the branches, casts them down and bears them off; before it goes proudly in a cloud of dust, and makes the beasts and shepherds flee.

He loosed my eyes and said: “Now direct the nerve of your sight upon that ancient foam, there where the smoke is bitterest.”

As the frogs before the hostile snake scatter through the water, all of them, till each one shrinks to the ground, even so I saw more than a thousand ruined souls flee thus before one who passed the Styx with feet dry upon the wave. He drew aside that gross air from his face, ever moving his left hand before him; and only from that anguish seemed he weary. Well I perceived he was sent from Heaven, and turned me to the master; and he made sign that I should be still and bow to him.

Ah, how full of disdain he seemed to me! He came to the gate, and with a little wand opened it, for there was no resistance. “O cast out from Heaven, reprobate folk,” he began upon the horrible threshold, “whence is this insolence indulged in you? Why kick against that will whose end can never be cut short, and which has more than once increased your grief? What avails it to butt at the fates? Your Cerberus, if you remember well, still bears his chin and gullet stripped for it.”

Then he turned back along the foul road, and spoke no word to us, but wore the look of one whom other care stings and bites than that of him who is before him; and we moved our feet toward the land, secure after his holy words.

We entered without any strife; and I, who had desire to look about, the condition of that stronghold which it shuts in, as soon as I was within sent my eye around: and I see on every side a great plain, full of woe and cruel torment. Even as at Arles, where the Rhone stagnates, even as at Pola, near the Quarnaro that bounds Italy and bathes its confines, the sepulchres make all the place uneven, so did they here on every side, save that the fashion was more bitter; for among the tombs were scattered flames, by which they were so wholly heated that no art of iron asks more. All their covers were raised, and from them came forth such grievous laments that they seemed indeed of the wretched and the wronged.

And I: “Master, who are those folk who, buried within those chests, make themselves heard with doleful sighs?” And he to me: “Here are the heretic archbishops with their followers, of every sect, and far more than you believe are the tombs laden. Like with like is buried here, and the monuments are more or less hot.” And then having turned to the right hand, we passed between the torments and the high ramparts.

Inferno Canto X

Now he goes by a secret path, between the wall of the earth and the torments, my master, and I after his shoulders. “O supreme virtue, who through the impious circles turnest me,” I began, “as pleases thee, speak to me, and satisfy my desires. The folk that lie among the sepulchres, could they be seen? already all the covers are lifted, and they keep no guard.” And he to me: “All shall be shut when from Jehoshaphat they return hither with the bodies which they left up there. Their cemetery they have on this side, with Epicurus and all his followers, who make the soul dead with the body. Therefore to the question you put me satisfaction shall be given herewithin, and to the desire too which you hide from me.” And I: “Good leader, I keep not my heart closed from you save to say little, and you have but now disposed me thereto.”

“O Tuscan, who through the city of fire goest alive thus speaking courteously, may it please you to stay in this place. Your speech makes manifest to me that noble native land of yours, to which perchance I was too hostile.” Suddenly this sound issued from one of the tombs; wherefore I drew a little nearer, fearing, to my leader. And he said to me: “Turn! what do you? See there Farinata who has risen upright: from the belt upward you shall see him all.” I had already fixed my face upon his; and he rose with breast and brow as if he held hell in great disdain. And the bold and ready hands of the leader thrust me between the sepulchres to him, saying: “Let your words be measured.”

When I was at the foot of his tomb, he looked at me a little, and then, as if disdainful, asked me: “Who were your ancestors?” I, desirous to obey, hid it not from him, but opened all to him; whereupon he raised his brows a little upward; then said: “Fiercely were they adverse to me and to my forefathers and to my party, so that twice I scattered them.” “If they were driven out, they returned from every side,” I answered him, “both the one and the other time; but yours learned not well that art.”

Then uprose to the open sight, along by this one, a shade, up to the chin: I think he had raised himself on his knees. He looked around me, as if he had wish to see if any other were with me; and when all his suspicion was extinguished, weeping he said: “If through this blind prison you go by height of genius, where is my son, and why is he not with you?” And I to him: “Of myself I come not: he who waits there leads me here by this way, perhaps whom your Guido held in disdain.” His words and the mode of his punishment had already read me the name of this man; therefore my answer was thus full. Suddenly upright he cried: “How? you said ‘he held’? lives he not still? does not the sweet light strike his eyes?” When he perceived some delay that I made before the answer, he fell supine again and appeared no more outside.

But the other, magnanimous, for whom I had remained, changed not his aspect, nor moved his neck, nor bent his side; and continuing with his first speech, “If they have that art ill learned,” said he, “that torments me more than this bed. But not fifty times shall be rekindled the face of the lady who reigns here, ere you shall know how that art weighs. And if ever you return to the sweet world, tell me: why is that people so impious against mine in every law of theirs?” Wherefore I to him: “The slaughter and the great havoc which the Arbia made red, cause such prayer to be made in our temple.” After he had, sighing, moved his head, “To that was I not alone,” said he, “nor surely without cause should I have moved with the others. But I was alone, there where it was endured by each to take away Florence, I who defended her with open face.”

“Ah, if ever your seed repose,” I prayed him, “solve me that knot which has here entangled my judgment. It seems that you see, if I hear well, beforehand that which time brings with it, and in the present hold another mode.” “We see, as one who has evil light, the things,” said he, “that are remote from us; so much still shines on us of the supreme Duke. When they draw near or are, all our intellect is vain; and if another bring us not word, we know nothing of your human state. Therefore you can comprehend that all dead shall be our knowledge from that moment when the door of the future shall be closed.”

Then, as if pierced with compunction for my fault, I said: “Now therefore you shall tell that fallen one that his son is still joined with the living; and if I was, a while ago, mute to the answer, make him know that I was so because already thinking on the error which you have solved for me.” And now my master was calling me back; wherefore I prayed the spirit more quickly to tell me who was with him. He said to me: “Here I lie with more than a thousand: here within is the second Frederick, and the Cardinal; and of the others I am silent.” Then he hid himself; and I turned my steps toward the ancient poet, thinking again on that speech which seemed hostile to me. He moved; and then, as we went thus, he said to me: “Why are you so bewildered?” And I satisfied him of his question. “Let your mind keep that which you have heard against you,” that sage commanded me; “and now attend here,” and he pointed his finger: “when you shall be before the sweet ray of her whose fair eye sees all, from her you shall know the journey of your life.”

Thereafter he moved his foot to the left: we left the wall and went toward the middle by a path which strikes into a valley, which up to there above made its foul stench disagreeable.

Inferno Canto XI

Upon the extremity of a high bank which great broken stones made in a circle, we came above a more cruel throng; and there, because of the horrible excess of the stench which the deep abyss casts forth, we drew back, close to the cover of a great tomb, where I saw a writing which said: ‘I guard Pope Anastasius, who was drawn by Photinus from the straight way.’ “Our descent must be slow, so that the sense may first accustom itself a little to the grievous air; and then no delay shall be.” Thus the master; and I, “Some expedient,” said I to him, “find that time pass not lost.” And he: “See that to this I think.”

“My son, within these stones,” then he began to say, “are three little circles, grade by grade, like those that lie below. All are full of accursed spirits; but because the sight alone may suffice you, understand how and why they are confined. Of all malice which acquires hate in heaven, injury is the end, and every such end either by force or by fraud afflicts another. But because fraud is man’s proper evil, it displeases God more; and therefore the fraudulent dwell below, and more pain assails them. The whole first circle is of the violent; but because force is done to three persons, it is distinguished and constructed in three rings. To God, to self, to neighbor one may do force, I mean in them and in their things, as you shall hear with open reason. Death by force and grievous wounds are given to the neighbor, and in his possessions ruins, burnings, and harmful takings; wherefore murderers and each who smites ill, wasters and robbers, all are tormented in the first ring in diverse bands. A man may have violent hand against himself and his goods; and therefore in the second ring it behooves that without avail he repent, whoever deprives himself of your world, games and squanders his substance, and weeps there where he should be glad. Force may be done upon the deity, by denying and blaspheming it in the heart, and scorning nature and its goodness; and therefore the lowest ring seals with its sign Sodom and Cahors and him who, scorning God in heart, speaks. Fraud, wherewith every conscience is bitten, a man may use against him who trusts in him, and against him who entrusts not. This mode behind seems to cut only the bond of love which nature makes; wherefore in the second circle nest hypocrisy, flattery, and who enchants, falsehood, theft, and simony, pimps, barrators, and like filth. By the other mode that love is forgotten which nature makes, and that which is added after, whereof special faith is created; wherefore in the smallest circle, where is the point of the universe upon which Dis sits, whoever betrays is consumed eternally.”

And I: “Master, very clear proceeds your reason, and very well distinguishes this gulf and the people it possesses. But tell me: those of the fat marsh, who are driven by the wind, and whom the rain beats, and who encounter with such bitter tongues, why are they not punished within the red city, if God has them in ire? and if he has not, why are they in such fashion?” And he to me: “Why does your wit wander so from that which it is wont? or where else does the mind look? Do you not remember those words with which your Ethics treats the three dispositions which heaven wills not, incontinence, malice, and mad bestiality? and how incontinence offends God less and draws less blame? If you regard well this sentence, and bring to mind who they are that above outside sustain penance, you shall see well why from these felons they are separated, and why less angered the divine vengeance scourges them.”

“O sun that healest every troubled sight, you content me so when you solve, that not less than knowing, doubting pleases me. Turn back a little yet,” said I, “there where you say that usury offends the divine goodness, and untie the knot.” “Philosophy,” he said to me, “to him who understands, is known, not in one only part, how nature takes its course from the divine intellect and its art; and if you note well your Physics, you shall find, not after many pages, that your art, as far as it can, follows it, as the disciple does the master; so that your art is almost God’s grandchild. From these two, if you bring to mind the Genesis from the beginning, it behooves man to take his life and advance the people; and because the usurer takes another way, he scorns nature in itself and in its follower, since he puts his hope in something else. But follow me now, for the going pleases me; for the Fishes quiver upon the horizon, and the Wain lies all above the Corus, and the crag descends yonder beyond.”

Inferno Canto XII

The place where we came to descend the bank was rugged, and, for what was there still, such that every sight would shrink from it. Such is that ruin which on the flank this side of Trent the Adige smote, either by earthquake or for failing support, that from the top of the mountain whence it moved, to the plain the rock is so precipitous, that it would give some way to one above: such was the descent of that chasm; and upon the point of the broken cliff was extended the infamy of Crete, who was conceived in the false cow; and when he saw us, he bit himself, like one whom anger breaks within. My sage cried to him: “Perhaps you think that here is the Duke of Athens, who in the world above gave you death? Away, beast, for this one comes not taught by your sister, but goes to see your punishments.”

As that bull which looses itself in that fashion which has already received the mortal blow, and can not go, but leaps hither and thither, even so I saw the Minotaur do; and he, aware, cried: “Run to the pass; while he rages, it is well that you descend.” Thus we took our way down through the heap of those stones, which often moved beneath my feet because of the new weight. I was thinking; and he said: “You think perhaps of this ruin, which is guarded by that bestial wrath which I just now quenched. Now I would have you know that the other time I descended here below into the low hell, this rock was not yet fallen. But certainly a little before, if I discern well, that He came who took the great prey from Dis of the upper circle, from all sides the deep valley trembled so, that I thought the universe felt love, through which is he who believes the world has many times been turned to chaos; and in that moment this old rock, here and elsewhere, made such overturning. But fix your eyes below, for the river of blood approaches in which boils whoever harms another by violence.”

O blind cupidity and mad anger, that so spur us in the short life, and in the eternal then so ill immerse us! I saw a wide fosse in a crooked arch, as that which embraces all the plain, according to what my guide had said; and between the foot of the bank and it, in file, ran centaurs, armed with arrows, as they were wont in the world to go hunting. Seeing us descend, each stopped, and of the band three parted with bows and shafts first chosen; and one cried from afar: “To what torment come you who descend the slope? Tell it from there; if not, I shoot the bow.” My master said: “The answer we will give to Chiron here close; ill was your will always so hasty.” Then he touched me, and said: “That is Nessus, who died for the fair Deianira, and of himself took vengeance. And that middle one, who looks to his breast, is the great Chiron, who nursed Achilles; the other is Pholus, who was so full of wrath.” Around the moat they go by thousands, shooting at whatever soul draws itself from the blood more than its guilt allots.

We drew near to those swift beasts: Chiron took an arrow, and with the notch drew his beard back upon his jaws. When he had uncovered his great mouth, he said to his companions: “Are you aware that he who is behind moves that which he touches? So the feet of the dead are not wont to do.” And my good leader, who was now at his breast, where the two natures are joined, answered: “He is indeed alive, and so alone must I show him the dark valley; necessity induces me, not pleasure. Such a one departed from singing alleluia who committed to me this new office: he is no thief, nor I a fugitive soul. But by that virtue through which I move my steps along so wild a road, give us one of yours, to whom we may be proved, and who may show us where one wades, and who may bear this man upon his back, for he is no spirit that goes through the air.” Chiron turned upon his right flank, and said to Nessus: “Return, and so guide them, and make them avoid if other band meet you.”

Now we moved with the faithful escort along the brink of the vermilion boiling, where the boiled made loud cries. I saw folk beneath up to the brow; and the great centaur said: “These are tyrants who laid hands on blood and wealth. Here are bewailed the pitiless harms; here is Alexander, and fierce Dionysius who made Sicily have sorrowful years. And that brow which has hair so black is Ezzelino; and the other who is blond is Obizzo of Este, who in truth was slain by his stepson up in the world.” Then I turned to the poet, and he said: “Let this one be first to you, and I second.”

A little farther the centaur stopped above a folk who up to the throat seemed to issue from that boiling. He showed us a shade on one side only, saying: “He who cleft in the heart of God the heart which still drips upon the Thames.” Then I saw folk who kept head and all the chest outside the river; and of these I recognized many. Thus lower and lower became that blood, so that it boiled only the feet; and thence was our passage of the moat. “As on this side you see the boiling which ever diminishes,” said the centaur, “I would have you believe that on this other it presses lower and lower its bottom, until it joins where tyranny must groan. The divine justice stings here that Attila who was a scourge on earth, and Pyrrhus and Sextus; and eternally milks the tears, which the boiling unlocks, from Rinieri of Corneto, from Rinieri Pazzo, who made so much war on the roads.” Then he turned and repassed the ford.

Inferno Canto XIII

Not yet was Nessus arrived beyond, when we put ourselves into a wood which was marked by no path. Not green leaf, but of dusky color; not straight branches, but knotted and warped; not apples were there, but thorns with poison. Not so rough nor so thick are the brakes which the wild beasts that hate the tilled places between Cecina and Corneto. Here the ugly Harpies make their nests, who drove the Trojans from the Strophades with sad announcement of future harm. They have broad wings, and necks and human faces, feet with claws, and feathered the great belly; they make lament upon the strange trees. And the good master, “Before you enter further, know that you are in the second ring,” began to say to me, “and shall be while you come into the horrible sand. Therefore look well; so you shall see things which would take faith from my discourse.”

I heard from every part draw groans, and saw no person who made them; wherefore all bewildered I stopped. I think he thought that I thought that so many voices issued, among those trunks, from folk who hid themselves from us. Wherefore the master said: “If you break some little twig from one of these plants, your thoughts shall all be made maimed.” Then I put my hand a little forward and plucked a small branch from a great thorn; and its trunk cried: “Why do you rend me?” When it had thereafter become dark with blood, it began again to say: “Why do you tear me? have you no spirit of pity? Men we were, and now are made stumps: well ought your hand to be more pious, if we had been souls of serpents.”

As from a green brand burnt at one of its ends, which from the other drips and hisses for the wind that goes away, so from the broken splinter issued together words and blood; wherefore I let the tip fall, and stood like a man who fears. “If he could have believed at first,” answered my sage, “soul wounded, that which he has seen only through my rhyme, he would not have stretched his hand on you; but the incredible thing made me induce him to a work which weighs on me myself. But tell him who you were, so that in place of some amends your fame may be refreshed in the world above, where it is permitted to return.” And the trunk: “So with sweet speech you allure me, that I cannot be silent; and let it not grieve you that I entangle myself a little in discourse. I am he who held both the keys of the heart of Frederick, and who turned them, locking and unlocking, so softly, that from his secret almost every man I withdrew; I bore faith to the glorious office, so much that I lost therefor sleep and pulse. The harlot who never turned her strumpet eyes from Caesar’s household, common death and vice of courts, inflamed all minds against me; and the inflamed inflamed Augustus so, that the glad honors returned to sad mourning. My soul, through disdainful taste, believing by death to flee disdain, unjust made me against myself just. By the new roots of this tree I swear to you that never did I break faith to my lord, who was so worthy of honor. And if any of you return into the world, comfort my memory, which still lies from the blow that envy gave it.”

He attended a little, and then, “Since he is silent,” said the poet to me, “lose not the hour; but speak, and ask of him, if more it pleases you.” Wherefore I to him: “Ask him again of that which you think satisfies me; for I could not, so much does pity oppress me.” Therefore he began again: “If the man freely grant you that which your speech asks, imprisoned spirit, may it please you also to tell us how the soul is bound in these knots; and tell us, if you can, if any ever unfolds from such members.”

Then the trunk blew strongly, and then converted that wind into such voice: “Briefly shall be answered to you. When the fierce soul departs from the body whence it has itself untwined, Minos sends it to the seventh mouth. It falls into the wood, and no part is chosen for it; but there where fortune hurls it, there it sprouts like grain of spelt. It rises in shoot and in wild plant: the Harpies, feeding then on its leaves, make pain, and to the pain a window. As the others we shall come for our spoils, but not therefore that any be reclothed, for it is not just to have that which one takes from himself. Here we shall drag them, and through the mournful wood our bodies shall be hung, each to the thorn of his grievous shade.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”