The whole passage is as beautifully wrought as it is feelingly and truly conceived.
Beatrice,—no longer the soft, frail, and feminine being he had known and loved upon earth, but an admonishing spirit,—rises up in her chariot,
And with a mien
Of that stern majesty which doth surround
A mother's presence to her awe-struck child,
She looked—a flavour of such bitterness
Was mingled with her pity!
Dante then puts into her mouth the most severe yet eloquent accusation against himself: while he stands weeping by, bowed down by shame and anguish. She accuses him before the listening angels for his neglected time, his wasted talents, his forgetfulness of her, when she was no longer upon earth to lead him with the light of her "youthful eyes," (gli occhi giovinetti.)
Soon as I had changed
My mortal for immortal, then he left me,
And gave himself to others; when from flesh
To spirit I had risen, and increase
Of beauty and of virtue circled me,
I was less dear to him and valued less!
Purgatory, c. 30.—Carey's Trans.
This praise of herself and stern upbraiding of her lover, would sound harsh from woman's lips, but have a solemnity, and even a sublimity, as uttered by a disembodied and angelic being. When Dante, weeping, falters out a faint excuse—
Thy fair looks withdrawn,
Things present with deceitful pleasures turned
My steps aside,—
she answers by reproaching him with his inconstancy to her memory:—