Heavy with death unto the ground, yet made
His eyes, unfolded upward, gates to heaven,
Praying forgiveness of the Almighty Sire,
Amidst that cruel conflict, on his foes,
With looks that win compassion to their aim.
Soon as my spirit, from her airy flight
Returning, sought again the things whose truth
Depends not on her shaping, I observed

She had not roved to falsehood in her dreams.
Meanwhile the leader, who might see I moved
As one who struggles to shake off his sleep,
Exclaim'd: "What ails thee, that thou canst not hold
Thy footing firm; but more than half a league
Hast travell'd with closed eyes and tottering gait,
Like to a man by wine or sleep o'ercharged?"
"Beloved father! so thou deign," said I,

"To listen, I will tell thee what appear'd
Before me, when so fail'd my sinking steps."

He thus: "Not if thy countenance were mask'd
With hundred visors could a thought of thine,
How small soe'er, elude me. What thou saw'st
Was shown, that freely thou mightst ope thy heart
To the waters of peace, that flow diffused
From their eternal fountain. I not ask'd,
What ails thee? for such cause as he doth, who
Looks only with that eye, which sees no more,
When spiritless the body lies; but ask'd,
To give fresh vigor to thy foot. Such goads,
The slow and loitering need; that they be found
Not wanting when their hour of watch returns."

So on we journey'd, through the evening sky
Gazing intent, far onward as our eyes,
With level view, could stretch against the bright
Vespertine ray: and lo! by slow degrees
Gathering, a fog made toward us, dark as night.
There was no room for 'scaping; and that mist
Bereft us, both of sight and the pure air.

CANTO XVI

Argument.—As they proceed through the mist, they hear the voices of spirits praying. Marco Lombardo, one of these, points out to Dante the error of such as impute our actions to necessity; explains to him that man is endued with free will; and shows that much of human depravity results from the undue mixture of spiritual and temporal authority in rulers.

ELL'S dunnest gloom, or night unlustrous, dark,

HE

Of every planet '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. Entering its shade,
Mine eye endured not with unclosed lids;
Which marking, near me drew the faithful guide,
Offering me his shoulder for a stay.

As the blind man behind his leader walks,
Lest he should err, or stumble unawares
On what might harm him or perhaps destroy;
I journey'd through that bitter air and foul,
Still listening to my escort's warning voice,

"Look that from me thou part not." Straight I heard Voices, and each one seem'd to pray for peace,

And for compassion, to the Lamb of God
That taketh sins away. Their prelude still
Was " Agnus Dei "; and through all the quire,
One voice, one measure ran, that perfect seem'd
The concord of their song.
66 Are these I hear
Spirits, O master?" I exclaim'd; and he,

"Thou aim'st aright: these loose the bonds of wrath."

"Now who art thou, that through our smoke dost cleave, And speak'st of us, as thou thyself e'en yet Dividest time by calends?" So one voice Bespake me; whence my master said, "Reply; And ask, if upward hence the passage lead."

"O being! who dost make thee pure, to stand Beautiful once more in thy Maker's sight; Along with me: and thou shalt hear and wonder." Thus I, whereto the spirit answering spake : "Long as 'tis lawful for me, shall my steps

Follow on thine; and since the cloudy smoke
Forbids the seeing, hearing in its stead

Shall keep us join'd." I then forthwith began:
"Yet in my mortal swathing, I ascend
To higher regions; and am hither come
Through the fearful agony of Hell.

And, if so largely God hath doled his grace,
That, clean beside all modern precedent,
He wills me to behold his kingly state;
From me conceal not who thou wast, ere death
Had loosed thee; but instruct me: and instruct
If rightly to the pass I tend; thy words
The way directing, as a safe escort."

"I was of Lombardy, and Marco call'd:1
Not inexperienced of the world, that worth
I still affected, from which all have turn'd
The nerveless bow aside. Thy course tends right
Unto the summit:" and, replying thus,
He added, "I beseech thee pray for me,
When thou shalt come aloft." And I to him:
"Accept my faith for pledge I will perform
What thou requirest. Yet one doubt remains,
That wrings me sorely, if I solve it not.
Singly before it urged me, doubled now
By thine opinion, when I couple that

With one elsewhere declared; each strengthening other.
The world indeed is even so forlorn

Of all good, as thou speak'st it, and so swarms

With every evil. Yet, beseech thee, point
The cause out to me, that myself may see,
And unto others show it: for in heaven
One places it, and one on earth below."

Then heaving forth a deep and audible sigh,
"Brother!" he thus began," the world is blind;

1"I was of Lombardy, and Marco call'd." A Venetian gentleman. "Lombardo," both was his surname and denoted the country to which he belonged. G. Villani, lib. vii. cap. cxx. terms him "a wise and worthy courtier." Benvenuto da Imola, says Landino, relates of him, that being imprisoned and not able to pay the price of his ransom, he applied by letter to his friend Riccardo

da Camino, lord of Trevigi, for relief. Riccardo set on foot a contribution among several nobles of Lombardy for the purpose; of which when Marco was informed, he wrote back with much in dignation to Riccardo, that he had rather die than remain under obligations to so many benefactors. It is added that Riccardo then paid the whole out of his own purse.

And thou in truth comest from it. Ye, who live,

Do so each cause refer to Heaven above,

E'en as its motion, of necessity,

Drew with it all that moves. If this were so,

Free choice in you were none; nor justice would
There should be joy for virtue, woe for ill.

Your movements have their primal bent from heaven;
Not all yet said I 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 Heaven'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
The reasoning mind uninfluenced of the stars.
If then the present race of mankind err,

Seek in yourselves the cause, and find it there.
Herein 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
To whate'er yields her joy. Of some slight good
The flavor soon she tastes; and, snared by that,
With fondness she pursues it; if no guide
Recall, no rein direct her wandering course.
Hence it behoved, the law should be a curb;
A sovereign hence behooved, whose piercing view
Might mark at least the fortress 2 and main tower
Of the true city. Laws indeed there are:
But who is he who observes them?

"The fortress." Justice, the most necessary virtue in the chief magistrate, as the commentators for the most part explain it and it appears manifest from all our Poet says in his first book De Monarchiâ, concerning the authority of the temporal Monarch and concerning Justice, that they are right. Yet Lom

None; not he,

bardi understands the law here spoken of to be the law of God; the sovereign," a spiritual ruler, and "the true city," the society of true believers; so that "the fortress," according to him, denotes the principal parts of Christian duty.

Who goes before, the shepherd of the flock,
Who chews the cud but doth not cleave the hoof.
Therefore the multitude, who see their guide
Strike at the very good they covet most,

Feed there and look no further. Thus the cause

Is not corrupted nature in yourselves,

But ill-conducting, that hath turn'd the world
To evil. Rome, that turn'd it unto good,

Was wont to boast two suns, whose several beams
Cast light on either way, the world's and God's.
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, unawed
By fear of other. If thou doubt me, mark
The blade: each herb is judged of by its seed.
That land, through which Adice and the Po
Their waters roll, was once the residence

6

Of courtesy and valor, ere the day
That frown'd on Frederick; now secure may pass
Those limits, whosoe'er hath left, for same,

To talk with good men, or come near their haunts.
Three aged ones are still found there, in whom
The old time chides the new: these deem it long
Ere God restore them to a better world:

The good Gherardo; of Plazzo he,
Conrad; and Guido of Castello, named

In Gallic phrase more fitly the plain Lombard.
On this at last conclude. The church of Rome,
Mixing two governments that ill assort,
Hath miss'd her footing, fallen into the mire,
And there herself and burden much defiled."

"Who." He compares the Pope, on account of the union of the temporal with the spiritual power in his person, to an unclean beast in the Levitical law. "The camel, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you." Levit. xi. 4.

"Two suns." The Emperor and the Bishop of Rome.

"That land." Lombardy.

"Ere the day." Before the Emperor Frederick II was defeated before Parma, in 1248.

7" The good Gherardo." Gherardo da Camino, of Trevigi. He is honorably mentioned in our Poet's "Convito," p.

173. "Let us suppose that Gherardo da Camino had been the grandson of the meanest hind that ever drank of the Sile or the Cagnano, and that his grandfather was not yet forgotten; who will dare to say that Gherardo da Camino was a mean man, and who will not agree with me in calling him noble? Certainly one, however presumptuous, will deny this; for such he was, and as such let him ever be remembered."

no

8" Conrad." Currado da Palazzo, a gentleman of Brescia.

"Guido of Castello." Of Reggio. All the Italians were called Lombards by the French.