"The Divine Comedy: Purgatory" by Dante Alighieri, Canto XVI-Canto XXI

celerity four
CANTO XVI
Hell’s dunnest gloom, or night unlustrous, dark,
Of every planes ’reft, and pall’d in clouds,
Did never spread before the sight a veil
In thickness like that fog, nor to the sense
So palpable and gross.

...all; what then ensues? Light have ye still to follow evil or good, And of the will free power, which, if it stand Firm and unwearied in Heav’n’s first assay, Conquers at last, so it be cherish’d well, Triumphant over all. To mightier force, To better nature subject, ye abide Free, not constrain’d by that, which forms in you...

...thou shalt confess me no false spy. “Forth from his plastic hand, who charm’d beholds Her image ere she yet exist, the soul Comes like a babe, that wantons sportively Weeping and laughing in its wayward moods, As artless and as ignorant of aught, Save that her Maker being one who dwells With gladness ever, willingly she turns...

One since hath quench’d the other; and the sword
Is grafted on the crook; and so conjoin’d
Each must perforce decline to worse, unaw’d
By fear of other.

That land, through which Adice and the Po
Their waters roll, was once the residence
Of courtesy and velour, ere the day,
That frown’d on Frederick; now secure may pass
Those limits, whosoe’er hath left, for shame,
To talk with good men, or come near their haunts.

But resolve me this
Who that Gherardo is, that as thou sayst
Is left a sample of the perish’d race,
And for rebuke to this untoward age?”

As of itself
That unsubstantial coinage of the brain
Burst, like a bubble, Which the water fails
That fed it; in my vision straight uprose
A damsel weeping loud, and cried, “O queen!
O mother! wherefore has intemperate ire
Driv’n thee to loath thy being? Not to lose
Lavinia, desp’rate thou hast slain thyself.
Now hast thou lost me. I am she, whose tears
Mourn, ere I fall, a mother’s timeless end.”

He thus to me: “The love of good, whate’er
Wanted of just proportion, here fulfils.
Here plies afresh the oar, that loiter’d ill.
But that thou mayst yet clearlier understand,
Give ear unto my words, and thou shalt cull
Some fruit may please thee well, from this delay.

“C

...soul may rest, the hearts of all Yearn after it, and to that wished bourn All therefore strive to tend. If ye behold Or seek it with a love remiss and lax, This cornice after just repenting lays Its penal torment on ye. Other good There is, where man finds not his happiness: It is not true fruition, not...

But he, true father, mark’d the secret wish
By diffidence restrain’d, and speaking, gave
Me boldness thus to speak: “Master, my Sight
Gathers so lively virtue from thy beams,
That all, thy words convey, distinct is seen.
Wherefore I pray thee, father, whom this heart
Holds dearest! thou wouldst deign by proof t’ unfold
That love, from which as from their source thou bring’st
All good deeds and their opposite.”

...into desire, Which is a spiritual motion, that ne’er rests Before enjoyment of the thing it loves. Enough to show thee, how the truth from those Is hidden, who aver all love a thing Praise-worthy in itself: although perhaps Its substance seem still good. Yet if the wax Be good, it follows not th’ impression must.”

Such cleansing from the taint of avarice
Do spirits converted need.

—“Compunction,” I rejoin’d.

Inveterate wolf! whose gorge ingluts more prey,
Than every beast beside, yet is not fill’d!

Yet it spake the gift
Of Nicholas, which on the maidens he
Bounteous bestow’d, to save their youthful prime
Unblemish’d.

Till the great dower of Provence had remov’d
The stains, that yet obscur’d our lowly blood,
Its sway indeed was narrow, but howe’er
It wrought no evil: there, with force and lies,
Began its rapine; after, for amends,
Poitou it seiz’d, Navarre and Gascony.

No increase
Of territory hence, but sin and shame
Shall be his guerdon, and so much the more
As he more lightly deems of such foul wrong.

But sithence she, whose wheel
Spins day and night, for him not yet had drawn
That yarn, which, on the fatal distaff pil’d,
Clotho apportions to each wight that breathes,
His soul, that sister is to mine and thine,
Not of herself could mount, for not like ours
Her ken: whence I, from forth the ample gulf
Of hell was ta’en, to lead him, and will lead
Far as my lore avails.

That questioning so tallied with my wish,
The thirst did feel abatement of its edge
E’en from expectance.

To have liv’d
Coeval with the Mantuan, I would bide
The revolution of another sun
Beyond my stated years in banishment.”