THE SON OF GOD, ARCHETYPAL BEAUTY.
My heart's voice is to thee, my Lord and Eternal King, Christ Jesus. The work of Thy hand dares to address Thee with loving boldness, for it yearns after Thy beauty, and longs to hear Thy voice. O Thou, my heart's desired One, how long must I bear Thy absence! How long must I sigh after Thee, and my eyes drop tears? O Lord, all love, all loveable, where dwellest Thou? Where is the place of Thy rest, where Thou reposest all joyful among Thy favorite ones, and satisfiest them with the revelations of Thy glory? How happy, how bright, how holy, how ardently to be longed for, is that place of perennial joys! My eye has never reached far enough, nor my heart soared high enough, to know the multitude of the sweetnesses which Thou hast stored up in it for Thy children. And yet I am supported by their fragrance, though I am far away from them. The breath of Thy sweetness comes to me from afar—a sweetness which to me exceeds the odour of balsam, and the breath of frankincense and myrrh, and every kind of sweet smell.—S. Anselm.
DANTE'S PURGATORIO.
CANTO ELEVENTH.
In the Ninth Canto Virgil declares to Dante: Tu sei omai al Purgatorio giunto-"Thou hast arrived at Purgatory now!" and it is not until the next Canto that the gate of Purgatory proper is unfolded to the poet. The first nine Cantos being preliminary, are by Italian critics called the Ante-Purgatorio.
In the first cornice of the true Purgatory, "La, dove 'l Purgatorio ha dritto inizio," Dante meets a procession of spirits crouching under great burdens of stone, in expiation of their sin of pride. As this Tenth Canto, however, is mostly occupied with an elaborate description of certain sculptures around the cornice, illustrative of the same deadly sin, and might be less interesting to the readers of The Catholic World, we proceed to the Eleventh, where we are introduced to the spirits of Omberto Aldobrandeschi, Oderisi the illuminator, and Provenzan Salvani, lord of Sienna. In Omberto the pride of birth is especially reproved; and in Salvani the pride of place, the arrogance of power. The sin of Oderisi is of the æsthetic order common to a period of larger culture. Himself an artist, whose fault was pride of art, he inveighs against the vanity of painters and of poets, and the emptiness of a present reputation.
PRAYER OF THE PROUD SPIRITS—A PARAPHRASE OF THE LORD'S PRAYER.
"O thou, our Father, dwelling there in heaven!
Not circumscribed, save by the larger love
Which to thy love's first offspring must be given,
Who from the first have dwelt with thee above!
By every creature hallowed be thy name
And praised thy goodness, as for man was meant
To render thanks to thy benignant flame:
May to our souls thy kingdom's peace be lent,
For of ourselves we could not come thereto
With all our intellect, unless 'twere sent:
And even as of their will thine Angels do
(Chanting Hosanna) sacrifice to thee,
So to Thy Will may men their own subdue:
Our daily manna give to us this day,
Without which help, through this rough wilderness,
Who strives to go falls backward on his way.
And even as we forbear us to redress
The wrong from others which we have to brook
Pardon thou us, benignant One! and less
On our deserving than our weakness look:
Try not our virtue, ever prone to yield,
'Gainst the old enemy who spurs it so;
Deliver us from him and be our shield:
This last petition, dearest Lord! we know
We have no need of;—but for them we plead
Who after us amid temptation go."
Thus praying for themselves and us God-speed,
Those weary shadows, underneath a load
Like that we sometimes dream that we endure,
Toiled in unequal anguish[65] o'er the road
Round the first cornice, all becoming pure
From the world's tarnish. O if alway there
For us they say such gracious words! for them
What might be here performed in act or prayer
By souls whose will is a sound-rooted stem:
Well might we help them wash whatever stain
They bore from this world, that sublimed and fair
They to the starry circles might attain.
VIRGIL.
"Ah so may pity soon, and justice spare
You souls this load, that you may move the wing
That lifts you upward to celestial air!
Show us which way most speedily may bring
Us towards the ascent. If more than one there be,
Point us that pass the least precipitous;
Since he who comes and fain would climb with me
Through flesh of Adam is encumbered thus."
Who made their answer to these words which he
Whom I was following unto them addrest
Was not discernible, but this was said:
OMBERTO.
"To the right hand, along the bank, 'tis best
You come with us. This way to living tread
The pass is possible that you request:
And were I not impeded by the stone
Which my proud neck so masters with its weight,
That I perforce must hold my visage down,
This man who liveth, and who doth not state
What name he bears, I would look up to see
If I do know, and make compassionate
His heart for this huge load that bendeth me.
William Aldobrandeschi was the name
Of a great Tuscan; I was born his son,
Of Latin race: whether his title came
To your ears ever, knowledge have I none.
Mine ancestors, their ancient blood, and what
They wrought by prowess, rendered me so high
In arrogance, that never taking thought
About our common Mother, all men I
So scorned, that as the Siennese all know,
I to my death at last was brought thereby,
And every child in Campagnatico
Knows how I there did perish for my sin.
I am Omberto, and not me alone
Hath pride done damage to, but all my kin
Hath it dragged hither with myself to groan,
And I who living never bowed my head,
Till God be satisfied, and mercy shown,
Must bear this burden here among the dead."
Listening I held my visage down intent,
And one of them, but not the same that spoke,
Writhing looked up, beneath his burden bent,
And recognized, and called me; still his look
With strained eyes fixing upon me who went
All bowed beside them. "O!" exclaimed I then,
"Art thou not Oderisi, Gubbio's pride,
And honor also of that art which men
In Paris name illuming?" He replied:
ODERISI.
"Brother! those leaves with hues more smiling shine
Touched by the pencil of the Bolognese
Franco, whose whole fame was but partly mine.
Haply in life such courteous words as these
I had not spoken, so my heart was set
All others to excel. For such poor pride
Here I must pay the penalty; nor yet
Should I be here, but that before I died
I turned to God, still having power to sin.
O thou vain-glory of man's boasted powers!
How little while thy summit keeps its green,
Unless gross ages come that yield no flowers!
Once Cimabuè thought to keep the crown
In painting's field; now all cry Giotto best,
So that the former hath but dim renown:
Thus could one Guido from the other wrest
The glory of language, and perchance is born
He that shall drive out either from his nest.
Naught is the world's voice but a breath of morn
Coming this way and that, and changing name
Even as it shifteth side: what more shalt thou,
If old thou cast thy flesh, enjoy of fame
Than if death's hand had touched thy baby brow
Whilst thou wert babbling, ere a thousand years
Have past? which unto God's eternity
A space more insignificant appears
Than would the twinkle of an eyelid be
To the least rapid of the heavenly spheres.
Yon soul before me, moving on so slow,
Once through all Tuscany was noised for great,
Now scarce Sienna breathes his name, although
He was her sovereign, when the infuriate
Spirit of Florence met such overthrow;
For she, now vile, swelled then in proud estate.
Men's reputation is the fleeting hue
Of grass, that comes and goes! even that whereby
Fresh from the soil its tender verdure grew,
The sun, discolors it and leaveth dry."
DANTE.
And I: "Thy truthful words teach me to seek
Goodness in humbleness, and quell my pride.
But who is he of whom thou just didst speak?"
ODERISI.
"That's Provenzan Salvani," he replied;
"And he goes here because he so presumed
In bringing all Sienna 'neath his sway:
Thus ever since he died hath he been doomed,
Without repose, to walk his weary way.
Who dares too much there in such coin pays back."
DANTE.
I then: "If every soul who doth delay
Repentance till the limit of life's track,
Must wait below, nor be up here received
Unless good prayers assist him on his road,
Before as much time pass as he hath lived,
How comes this largess upon him bestowed?"
ODERISI.
The spirit replied: "When he was living still
In the full glory of his most high state,
All shame subduing, of his own free will
Amid Sienna's public square he sate,
And there his friend to ransom from the pain,
Which Charles had doomed him, of his dungeon's grate,
Did that which made him tremble in each vein.[66]
I say no more and know I darkly teach
But in short while thy neighbors unto thee
Will so conduct that thou mayst gloss my speech:
Him from those confines did this act set free."
NOTE.
In the translation of Canto VII., published in the April No. of The Catholic World, I proposed a new rendering of the 74th verse, namely,
India's rich wood, heaven's lucid blue serene,
for
Indico legno, lucido e sereno,
which line I would then have read,
Indico legno, lucido sereno,
without the conjunction. I had not found this reading in any edition which fell to my hands, and it was merely a suggestion of my own to make intelligible what seemed to be unsatisfactory to the sense.
In a late No. (June 14) of the London Athenæum, Dr. H. C. Barlow, a very learned Dantean, confirms my reading by one of the older texts in his library, and also adds that, "in the edition of the Divina Commedia by Paola Costa, we find the reading recently adopted by Mr. Parsons ... which the editor says is an emendation of Biondi, who has defended it with much learned reasoning."
Nevertheless, Dr. Barlow does not accept this amendment; but believes, with Monti, that Dante meant to compare the rich and varied hues of a flower-bed to something like charcoal; to wood, clear and dry; for instance, ebony; and he quotes from Monti this word: "What can be darker than the night? yet when free from clouds we call it serene." The answer whereto is that when the night is free from clouds, and starry, or serene, it is not dark, and many objects in nature are blacker than such a night.
I cannot feel quite so sure of my reading as Dr. Barlow appears to be of his own interpretation, but I have some confidence that Dante did not mean ebony, for the obvious reason that ebony is not a brilliant color such as Dante was describing; and the statement which Dr. Barlow takes such pains to prove, namely, that painters often introduce black for the sake of contrast, does not apply at all to a verbal description—"segnius per aurem," etc.
I am after all inclined to think that the true reading of this much-disputed verse may be
Indico legno, e lucido sereno,
but my mind is not made up entirely, and one object of publishing these Cantos in a periodical is that my version, before it is completed, may have the advantage of critical suggestions, and perhaps elucidation, in doubtful passages, from the learning and ingenuity of such Italian scholars in England as Mr. Haselfoot, Dr. Barlow, and Sir Frederic Pollock.
Translator.
FOOTNOTES:
[65] That is, under loads of divers weight proportioned to their degree of sin.
[66] That is to say he begged: in which act of terrible humiliation to so haughty a spirit Dante is recalling his own bitter experience.