The Portable Dante (47 page)
Read The Portable Dante Online
Authors: Dante Alighieri
Adhaesit pavimento anima mea. | 75 |
“O souls elect of God, whose sufferings Justice and Hope make easier to bear, tell us the way to reach the higher stairs. ” | 78 |
“If you have been exempt from lying prone, and wish to find the quickest way to go, be sure to keep your right side to the edge. ” | 81 |
Thus did the poet ask, and thus I heard, from somewhere close in front of us—so close, I could make out the hidden face that spoke. | 84 |
I fixed my eyes upon my master’s eyes, and there I saw the joy of his consent to the desire he saw in mine. And then, | 87 |
once free to do exactly as I wished, I walked ahead and stood above that soul whose voice caught my attention earlier; | 90 |
I said, “Spirit in whom weeping makes ripe that without which no one returns to God, I beg you, interrupt your greater task | 93 |
a moment: tell me who you were and why you all lie prone. Is there some way that I can help you in the world I left alive?” | 96 |
“Why Heaven has made us turn our backs to Heaven, ” the spirit said, “you soon shall know, but first:
scias quod ego fui successor Petri.
99
73. “My soul cleaveth unto the dust”: The Fifth Terrace opens with a prayer taken from Psalm 119:25.
99. “Know that I was a successor of Peter”: The speaker is Pope Adrian V (Ottobuono de’ Fieschi of Genoa), a nephew of Innocent IV, who succeeded Innocent V on July 11, 1276, and died thirty-eight days later, on August 18.
Between Sestri and Chiaveri descends a lovely stream, and. from its name derives the noble title of my family. | 102 |
In hardly more than one month’s time I learned how the Great Mantle weighs on him who wants to keep it clean—all else is feather weight! | 105 |
I was, alas, converted very late: only when I became Shepherd of Rome, did I perceive the falseness of the world. | 108 |
Man’s heart, I saw, could never rest down there; nor in that life could greater heights be reached, and so, I came to love the other life. | 111 |
Until that time I was a wretched soul, servant of Avarice, cut off from God; here, I am punished for it, as you see. | 114 |
What Avarice does is declared in this purgation as conversion to the ground— the mountain knows no harsher penalty. | 117 |
Just as our eyes, attached to worldly goods, would never leave the earth to look above, so Justice, here, has forced them to the ground. | 120 |
Since Avarice quenched all our love of good, without which all our labors were in vain, so here the force of Justice holds us fast, | 123 |
our feet and hands bound tight within its grip; as long as it shall please the righteous Lord, so long shall we lie stretched out, motionless. ” | 126 |
I was by then already on my knees; I started speaking; he, at my first words, guessed from their tone the form of my respect. | 129 |
101. The “stream” is the river Lavagna, flowing between Sestri and Chiavari, coastal towns near Genoa. Adrian was of the line of the counts of Lavagna. | 132 |
“Up on your feet, my brother, ” he replied. “You should not kneel: I am a servant, too, with you and all the others, of One Power. | 135 |
If you have ever understood the words sounded by holy gospel: | 138 |
Do not stay any longer. Leave me now; your presence here prevents the flow of tears that ripens what you spoke about before. | 141 |
I have a niece on earth, by name Alagia, a good girl—may she not be led astray by all the bad examples of our house— | 144 |
and she is all I have left in the world. ” |
A
S THE PILGRIM
and Virgil pick their way through the prostrate souls of the Avaricious, someone ahead of them begins to call out the exempla of the virtue opposed to Avarice. He proclaims the poverty of Mary, evidenced by the place where she gave birth to her son; he then cites the Roman consul Fabricius, who preferred virtuous poverty to the luxury of vice, and finally, St. Nicholas, whose generosity saved the three maidens from lives of shame. The speaker is Hugh Capet, who estab
137. The words
“Neque nubent”
begin the quotation “They neither marry nor are given in marriage, ” which can be found in the gospels of Matthew (22:23-30), Mark (12:18-25), and Luke (20:27-35).
142. Adrian’s niece is Alagia de’ Fieschi, daughter of Niccolò de’ Fieschi, the imperial vicar in Italy, and the wife of Morello Malaspina, Dante’s friend, by whom she had three sons.
lished the Capetian dynasty. Addressed by the Pilgrim, he identifies himself and goes on to denounce his descendants for their avarice. Hugh explains that as long as daylight lasts, all the souls, with greater or lesser force, recite the exempla of virtue, and that during the night, they cry out condemnations of Avarice: they cite the greed of Pygmalion, Midas, Achan, Sapphira, Heliodorus, Polymnestor, and Crassus. As the Pilgrim and his guide take leave of Hugh, they suddenly feel the entire mountain tremble, and they hear shouts of
Gloria in excelsis Deo.
Anxious to know what has happened, and puzzled, they continue their journey in silence.
The lesser will yields to the greater will: to satisfy him, I, unsatisfied, withdrew my sponge unfilled, and turned away. | 3 |
My master moved ahead close to the cliff, wherever there was space—as one who walks along the ramparts hugs the battlements: | 6 |
the mass of souls whose eyes were, drop by drop, shedding the sin which occupies our world left little room along the terrace edge. | 9 |
God damn you, ageless She-Wolf, you whose greed, whose never-sated appetite, has claimed more victims than all other beasts of prey! | 12 |
You heavens, whose revolutions, some men think, determine human fate—when will he come, he before whom that beast shall have to flee? | 15 |
Slowly we moved along with cautious steps, and I could think of nothing but those shades who grieved and sobbed so piteously there. | 18 |
Then, somewhere up ahead of us, I heard a voice wailing, “Sweet Mary!” and the cry was like that of a woman giving birth; | 21 |
20-21. The soul who calls out in praise of the Virgin is none other than the Hugh who gave birth to the Capetian line of kings, famous for their avarice. | 24 |
I heard: “O good Fabricius, you who chose to live with virtue in your poverty, rather than live in luxury with vice. ” | 27 |
Those words pleased me so much I rushed ahead to where I thought the voice was coming from, eager to know that spirit who just spoke; | 30 |
he kept on speaking—now, of the largesse bestowed by Nicholas on the three girls that they might live their young lives virtuously. | 33 |
“O soul, ” I said, “who speaks of so much good, tell me who you were, and why no one else joins in to praise the praiseworthy with you. | 36 |
Your answer will not go without reward, if I return to finish the short road of life that races on to its quick end. ” | 39 |
“I’ll answer you, ” he said, “not out of hope for any help from your world, but because God’s grace shines in your living presence here. | 42 |
22-24. The first example of a virtue opposed to the sin of Avarice apparently extols poverty—the poverty that Mary accepted without complaint when she gave birth to her glorious son in a stable.
25. The second example of the virtue opposing Avarice has to do with poverty as the result of asceticism, deliberate self-denial. Fabricius Caius Luscinus, consul of Rome in 282 and 278 B.C., censor in 275 B.C., refused throughout his public career to accept bribes, as was the custom of his day. He also resisted the greed and luxury of the Romans, so much so that he died a pauper and had to be buried by the state.
32. Here the virtue praised is that of generosity. St. Nicholas, bishop of Myra in Lycia, Asia Minor, who lived under Constantine and was present at the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325, is venerated. Dante alludes to the legend in which Nicholas, to prevent an impoverished local nobleman from prostituting his daughters, threw a bag of gold, on three different nights, through the nobleman’s window as dowries for the girls.
I was the root of that malignant tree which overshadows all of Christendom, so that good fruit is seldom gathered there; | 45 |
but if Douai and Lille and Ghent and Bruges were strong enough, vengeance would soon be theirs— and that it may, I beg of God the Judge! | 48 |
On earth beyond I was called Hugh Capet; from me have sprung the Louises and Philips, rulers of France up to the present day. | 51 |
My father was a Paris cattle man. When the old line of kings had all died out, except for him who wore a monk’s gray robe, | 54 |
I found I held the reins of government in my firm grip, and that all my new wealth gave me such power, made me so rich in friends, | 57 |
that for the widowed crown of France my own son’s head was chosen, and it was from him that those anointed bones were to descend. | 60 |
43. The “malignant tree” is the Capetian monarchy. Dante confused Hugh I with Hugh II in this passage, or combined the history of both.
46. Douai, Lille, Ghent, and Bruges are the foremost cities of Flanders and are meant here to represent that region as a whole. The revenge that Hugh seems to long for so eagerly will take place in the year 1302, when the Flemish will defeat the French at the battle of Courtrai.
50. From the year 1060 to the fictional date of the
Comedy
(and even beyond), all the Capetian kings were named either Louis or Philip.
54. When Louis V died in 987, after a brief reign, the only living representative of the Carolingian line was Charles, Duke of Lorraine, son of Louis IV, brother of Lothair and uncle of Louis V. But he did not become a monk. He was put in prison by Hugh, against whom he had armed himself. Many scholars believe that Dante is confusing the last of the Carolingians with the last of the Merovingians, Childeric III, who did become a monk after his deposition in 752.
While my descendants kept their sense of shame, they, though worth little, did no harm. Then came their scheme to get the dowry of Provence. | 63 |
With this bloomed their rapacity, their use of force and fraud. Later, to make amends, they seized Ponthieu, Normandy, Gascony. | 66 |
Charles came to Italy; to make amends he made of Conradin his victim; then, sent Thomas off to Heaven, to make amends. | 69 |
I see a time, and not too far away, when there shall come a second Charles from France, and men shall see what he and his are like. | 72 |
He comes bearing no arms, save for the lance that Judas jousted with and, taking aim, he bursts the guts of Florence with one thrust. | 75 |
From this he gains not land but sin and shame! And worse is that he makes light of the weight of all his crimes, refusing all the blame. | 78 |
63. The kingdom of Provence was annexed to the French crown through the marriage of Charles of Anjou (brother of Louis IX of France) to Beatrice, daughter and heiress of Raymond Bcrenger IV of Provence. Berenger, in giving his daughter to Charles, was breaking his promise to Count Raymond of Toulouse, to whom she had first been betrothed.
66. Normandy was taken from England in 1202 by Philip II; both Ponthieu and Gascony were taken from England in 1295 by Philip the Fair.
67-68. Charles of Anjou, invited by Urban IV to assume the crown of Naples and Sicily, came into Italy in 1265; in 1266 he defeated Manfred at Benevento and was crowned in the same year.
Conradin, the rightful heir (see
Purgatory
III, 112), attempted to wrest the throne from Charles but was defeated at Tagliacozzo in 1268 and executed in Naples in October of the same year.
69. The legend, current in Dante’s time, that Charles had poisoned St. Thomas Aquinas is unfounded. Thomas died in 1274 during a journey to the Council of Lyons, to which he had been summoned by Gregory X.
71. This is Charles of Valois (1270-1325), who was called to Italy by Boniface VIII as a peacemaker (i. e., to destroy those who opposed the papacy).
The third, once hauled a captive from his ship, I see selling his daughter, haggling the price, as pirates do, over their female slaves. | 81 |
O Avarice, what more harm can you do? You have so fascinated all my heirs, they have no care for their own flesh and blood. | 84 |
That past and future crimes may seem as naught, I see the | 87 |
I see the gall and vinegar renewed; I see Him being mocked a second time, killed once again between the living thieves. | 90 |
I see this second Pilate so full of spite that, still unsatisfied, his greedy sails he drives, unchartered, into Holy Temple. | 93 |
O Lord, when shall I have the joy to see that retribution which, now lying hid, makes sweet Thy wrath within Thy secret will? | 96 |
The words that I recited earlier about the one Bride of the Holy Ghost (which brought you to me that I might explain) | 99 |
make up the prayers that we here must recite as long as daylight lasts; when night comes, though, our litany is just the opposite: | 102 |
