The Divine Comedy (Illustrated Edition). Dante Alighieri

complain,

      Now mayst thou know the import of his words.”

      This said, the gloomy region trembling shook

      So terribly, that yet with clammy dews

      Fear chills my brow. The sad earth gave a blast,

      That, lightening, shot forth a vermilion flame,

      Which all my senses conquer’d quite, and I

      Down dropp’d, as one with sudden slumber seiz’d.

      Footnotes

1 “Power,” Wisdom,” “Love,” the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity.

2 This is commonly understood of Celestine V, who abdicated the papal power in 1249. Venturi mentions a work written by Innocenzio Barcellini, of the Celestine order, and printed at Milan in 1701, in which an attempt is made to put a different interpretation on this passage. Lombardi would apply it to some one of Dante’s fellow-citizens, who, refusing, through avarice or want of spirit, to support the party of the Bianchi at Florence, had been the main occasion of the miseries that befell them. But the testimony of Fazio degli Uberti, who lived so near the time of our author, seems almost decisive on this point. He expressly speaks of the Pope Celestine as being in Hell.

3 “As a falcon at his call.” This is Vellutello’s explanation, and seems preferable to that commonly given: “as a bird that is enticed to the cage by the call of another.”

      Canto IV

       Table of Contents

      ARGUMENT.—The Poet, being roused by a clap of thunder, and following his guide onward, descends into Limbo, which is the first circle of Hell, where he finds the souls of those, who although they have lived virtuously and have not to suffer for great sins, nevertheless, through lack of baptism, merit not the bliss of Paradise. Hence he is led on by Virgil to descend into the second circle.

      BROKE the deep slumber in my brain a crash

      Of heavy thunder, that I shook myself,

      As one by main force rous’d. Risen upright,

      My rested eyes I mov’d around, and search’d

      With fixed ken to know what place it was,

      Wherein I stood. For certain on the brink

      I found me of the lamentable vale,

      The dread abyss, that joins a thund’rous sound

      Of plaints innumerable. Dark and deep,

      And thick with clouds o’erspread, mine eye in vain

      Explor’d its bottom, nor could aught discern.

      “Now let us to the blind world there beneath

      Descend;” the bard began all pale of look:

      “I go the first, and thou shalt follow next.”

      Then I his alter’d hue perceiving, thus:

      “How may I speed, if thou yieldest to dread,

      Who still art wont to comfort me in doubt?”

      He then: “The anguish of that race below

      With pity stains my cheek, which thou for fear

      Mistakest. Let us on. Our length of way

      Urges to haste.” Onward, this said, he mov’d;

      And ent’ring led me with him on the bounds

      Of the first circle, that surrounds th’ abyss.

      Here, as mine ear could note, no plaint was heard

      Except of sighs, that made th’ eternal air

      Tremble, not caus’d by tortures, but from grief

      Felt by those multitudes, many and vast,

      Of men, women, and infants. Then to me

      The gentle guide: “Inquir’st thou not what spirits

      Are these, which thou beholdest? Ere thou pass

      Farther, I would thou know, that these of sin

      Were blameless; and if aught they merited,

      It profits not, since baptism was not theirs,

The portal1 to thy faith. If they before

      The Gospel liv’d, they serv’d not God aright;

      And among such am I. For these defects,

      And for no other evil, we are lost;

      Only so far afflicted, that we live

      Desiring without hope.” So grief assail’d

      My heart at hearing this, for well I knew

      Suspended in that Limbo many a soul

      Of mighty worth. “O tell me, sire rever’d!

      Tell me, my master!” I began through wish

      Of full assurance in that holy faith,

      Which vanquishes all error; “say, did e’er

      Any, or through his own or other’s merit,

      Come forth from thence, whom afterward was blest?”

Piercing the secret purport2 of my speech,

      He answer’d: “I was new to that estate,

When I beheld a puissant one3 arrive

      Amongst us, with victorious trophy crown’d.

      He forth the shade of our first parent drew,

      Abel his child, and Noah righteous man,

      Of Moses lawgiver for faith approv’d,

      Of patriarch Abraham, and David king,

      Israel with his sire and with his sons,

      Nor without Rachel whom so hard he won,

      And others many more, whom he to bliss

      Exalted. Before these, be thou assur’d,

      No spirit of human kind was ever sav’d.”

      We, while he spake, ceas’d not our onward road,

      Still passing through the wood; for so I name

      Those spirits thick beset. We were not far

      On this side from the summit, when I kenn’d

      A flame, that o’er the darken’d hemisphere

      Prevailing shin’d. Yet we a little space

      Were distant, not so far but I in part

      Discover’d, that a tribe in honour high

      That place possess’d. “O thou, who every art

      And science valu’st! who are these,