Purgatorio

Canto XXXI

Reproaches of Beatrice and confession of Dante—The passage of Lethe.

“O thou who art beyond the sacred river,”¹Turning to me the point of her discourse,²That edgewise even had seemed to me so keen,She recommenced, continuing without pause,“Say, say if this be true; to such a charge,Thy own confession needs must be conjoined.”My faculties were in so great confusion,That the voice moved, but sooner was extinctThan by its organs it was set at large.Awhile she waited; then she said: “What thinkest?Answer me; for the mournful memoriesIn thee not yet are by the waters injured.”Confusion and dismay together mingledForced such a Yes! from out my mouth, that sightWas needful to the understanding of it.Even as a cross-bow breaks, when ’tis dischargedToo tensely drawn the bowstring and the bow,And with less force the arrow hits the mark,So I gave way beneath that heavy burden,Outpouring in a torrent tears and sighs,And the voice flagged upon its passage forth.Whence she to me: “In those desires of mineWhich led thee to the loving of that good,Beyond which there is nothing to aspire to,What trenches lying traverse or what chains³Didst thou discover, that of passing onwardThou shouldst have thus despoiled thee of the hope?And what allurements or what vantagesUpon the forehead of the others showed,That thou shouldst turn thy footsteps unto them?”⁴After the heaving of a bitter sigh,Hardly had I the voice to make response,And with fatigue my lips did fashion it.Weeping I said: “The things that present wereWith their false pleasure turned aside my steps,Soon as your countenance concealed itself.”And she: “Shouldst thou be silent, or denyWhat thou confessest, not less manifestWould be thy fault, by such a Judge ’tis known.But when from one’s own cheeks comes bursting forthThe accusal of the sin, in our tribunalAgainst the edge the wheel doth turn itself.⁵But still, that thou mayst feel a greater shameFor thy transgression, and another timeHearing the Sirens thou mayst be more strong,Cast down the seed of weeping and attend;⁶So shalt thou hear, how in an opposite wayMy buried flesh should have directed thee.Never to thee presented art or naturePleasure so great as the fair limbs whereinI was enclosed, which scattered are in earth.And if the highest pleasure thus did fail theeBy reason of my death, what mortal thingShould then have drawn thee into its desire?Thou oughtest verily at the first shaftOf things fallacious to have risen upTo follow me, who was no longer such.Thou oughtest not to have stooped thy pinions downwardTo wait for further blows, or little girl,⁷Or other vanity of such brief use.The callow birdlet waits for two or three,But to the eyes of those already fledged,In vain the net is spread or shaft is shot.”⁸Even as children silent in their shameStand listening with their eyes upon the ground,And conscious of their fault, and penitent;So was I standing; and she said: “If thouIn hearing sufferest pain, lift up thy beardAnd thou shalt feel a greater pain in seeing.”With less resistance is a robust holmUprooted, either by a native windOr else by that from regions of Iarbas,⁹Than I upraised at her command my chin;And when she by the beard the face demanded,Well I perceived the venom of her meaning.And as my countenance was lifted up,Mine eye perceived those creatures beautiful¹⁰Had rested from the strewing of the flowers;And, still but little reassured, mine eyesSaw Beatrice turned round towards the monster,That is one person only in two natures.Beneath her veil, beyond the margent green,She seemed to me far more her ancient selfTo excel, than others here, when she was here.So pricked me then the thorn of penitence,That of all other things the one which turned meMost to its love became the most my foe.Such self-conviction stung me at the heartO’erpowered I fell, and what I then becameShe knoweth who had furnished me the cause.Then, when the heart restored my outward sense,The lady I had found alone, above me¹¹I saw, and she was saying, “Hold me, hold me.”Up to my throat she in the stream had drawn me,And, dragging me behind her, she was moving¹²Upon the water lightly as a shuttle.When I was near unto the blessed shore,“Asperges me,” I heard so sweetly sung,¹³Remember it I cannot, much less write it.The beautiful lady opened wide her arms,Embraced my head, and plunged me underneath,Where I was forced to swallow of the water.Then forth she drew me, and all dripping broughtInto the dance of the four beautiful,¹⁴And each one with her arm did cover me.“We here are Nymphs, and in the Heaven are stars;¹⁵Ere Beatrice descended to the world,We as her handmaids were appointed her.We’ll lead thee to her eyes; but for the pleasantLight that within them is, shall sharpen thineThe three beyond, who more profoundly look.”¹⁶Thus singing they began; and afterwardsUnto the Griffin’s breast they led me with them,Where Beatrice was standing, turned towards us.¹⁷“See that thou dost not spare thine eyes,” they said;“Before the emeralds have we stationed thee,¹⁸Whence Love aforetime drew for thee his weapons.”A thousand longings, hotter than the flame,Fastened mine eyes upon those eyes relucent,That still upon the Griffin steadfast stayed.As in a glass the sun, not otherwiseWithin them was the twofold monster shining,¹⁹Now with the one, now with the other nature.²⁰Think, Reader, if within myself I marvelled,When I beheld the thing itself stand still,And in its image it transformed itself.While with amazement filled and jubilant,My soul was tasting of the food, that whileIt satisfies us makes us hunger for it,Themselves revealing of the highest rankIn bearing, did the other three advance,Singing to their angelic saraband.²¹“Turn, Beatrice, O turn thy holy eyes,”Such was their song, “unto thy faithful one,Who has to see thee ta’en so many steps.In grace do us the grace that thou unveilThy face to him, so that he may discernThe second beauty which thou dost conceal.”O splendor of the living light eternal!Who underneath the shadow of ParnassusHas grown so pale, or drunk so at its cistern,He would not seem to have his mind encumberedStriving to paint thee as thou didst appear,Where the harmonious heaven o’ershadowed thee,When in the open air thou didst unveil?

In this canto Dante, having made confession of his sins, is drawn by Matilda through the river Lethe. ↩
Hitherto Beatrice has directed her discourse to her attendant handmaidens around the chariot. Now she speaks directly to Dante. ↩
As in a castle or fortress. ↩
As one fascinated and enamored with them. ↩
The sword of justice is dulled by the wheel being turned against its edge. This is the usual interpretation; but a friend suggests that the allusion may be to the wheel of St. Catherine, which is studded with sword-blades. ↩
The grief which is the cause of your weeping. ↩
There is a good deal of gossiping among the commentators about this little girl or Pargoletta. Some suppose it to be the same as the Gentucca of Canto XXIV 37, and the Pargoletta of one of the poems in the Canzoniere, which in Mr. Lyell’s translation runs as follows:— “Ladies, behold a maiden fair, and young; / To you I come heaven’s beauty to display, / And manifest the place from whence I am. / In heaven I dwelt, and thither shall return, / Joy to impart to angels with my light. / He who shall me behold nor be enamored, / Of Love shall never comprehend the charm; / For every pleasing gift was freely given, / When Nature sought the grant of me from him / Who willed that your companion I should be. / Each star upon my eyes its influence sheds, / And with its light and virtue I am blest: / Beauties are mine the world hath never seen, / For I obtained them in the realms above; / And ever must their essence rest unknown, / Unless through consciousness of him in whom / Love shall abide through pleasure of another. / These words a youthful angel bore inscribed / Upon her brow, whose vision we beheld; / And I, who to find safety gazed on her, / A risk incur that it may cost my life; / For I received a wound so deep and wide / From one I saw entrenched within her eyes, / That still I weep, nor peace I since have known.” Others think the allusion is general. The Ottimo says:— “Neither that young woman, whom in his ‘Rime’ he called Pargoletta, nor that Lisetta, nor that other mountain maiden, nor this one, nor that other.” He might have added the lady of Bologna, of whom Dante sings in one of his sonnets:— “And I may say / That in an evil hour I saw Bologna, / And that fair lady whom I looked upon.” Buti gives a different interpretation of the word pargoletta, making it the same as pargultà or pargolezza, “childishness or indiscretion of youth.” In all this unnecessary confusion one thing is quite evident. As Beatrice is speaking of the past, she could not possibly allude to Gentucca, who is spoken of as one who would make Lucca pleasant to Dante at some future time:— “ ‘A maid is born, and wears not yet the veil,’ / Began he, ‘who to thee shall pleasant make / My city, howsoever men may blame it.’ ” Upon the whole, the interpretation of the Ottimo is the most satisfactory, or at all events the least open to objection. ↩
Proverbs 1:17:— “Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird.” ↩
Iarbas, king of Gaetulia, from whom Dido bought the land for building Carthage. ↩
The angels described in Canto XXX 20, as “Scattering flowers above and round about.” ↩
Matilda, described in Canto XXVIII 40:— “A lady all alone, who went along / Singing and culling floweret after floweret, / With which her pathway was all painted over.” ↩
Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress, the river without a bridge:— “Now I further saw that betwixt them and the gate was a river; but there was no bridge to go over: the river was very deep. At the sight therefore of this river, the pilgrims were much stunned; but the men that went with them said, ‘You must go through, or you cannot come at the gate.’ … “They then addressed themselves to the water, and, entering. Christian began to sink, and crying out to his good friend Hopeful, he said, ‘I sink in deep waters; the billows go over my head, all his waves go over me. Selah.’ … “Now upon the bank of the river, on the other side, they saw the two shining men again, who there waited for them. Wherefore being come out of the river, they saluted them, saying, ‘We are ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for those that shall be heirs of salvation.’ ” ↩
Psalms 51:7:— “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.” ↩
The four attendant Nymphs on the left of the triumphal chariot. See Canto XXIX 130:— “Upon the left hand four made holiday / Vested in purple.” ↩
See note 537. ↩
These four Cardinal Virtues lead to Divine Wisdom, but the three Evangelical Virtues quicken the sight to penetrate more deeply into it. ↩
Standing upon the chariot still; she does not alight till line 36 of the next canto. ↩
The color of Beatrice’s eyes has not been passed over in silence by the commentators. Lani, in his “Annotazioni,” says:— “They were of a greenish blue, like the color of the sea.” Mechior Messirini, who thought he had discovered a portrait of Beatrice as old as the fourteenth century, affirms that she had “splendid brown eyes.” Dante here calls them emeralds; upon which the Ottimo comments thus:— “Dante very happily introduces this precious stone, considering its properties, and considering that griffins watch over emeralds. The emerald is the prince of all green stones; no gem nor herb has greater greenness; it reflects an image like a mirror; increases wealth; is useful in litigation and to orators; is good for convulsions and epilepsy; preserves and strengthens the sight; restrains lust; restores memory; is powerful against phantoms and demons; calms tempests; stanches blood, and is useful to soothsayers.” The beauty of green eyes, ojuelos verdes, is extolled by Spanish poets; and is not left unsung by poets of other countries. Lycophron in his “tenebrous poem” of “Cassandra,” says of Achilles:— “Lo! the warlike eagle come, / Green of eye, and black of plume.” And in one of the old French Mysteries, Hist. Théat. Franç., I 176, Joseph describes the child Jesus as having “Les yeulx vers, la chair blanche et tendre / Les cheveulx blonds.” ↩
Monster is here used in the sense of marvel or prodigy. ↩
Now as an eagle, now as a lion. The two natures, divine and human, of Christ are reflected in Theology, or Divine Wisdom. Didron, who thinks the Griffin a symbol of the Pope, applies this to his spiritual and temporal power:— “As priest he is the eagle floating in the air; as king he is a lion walking on the earth.” ↩
The Italian Caribo, like the English Carol or Roundelay, is both song and dance. Some editions read in this line “singing,” instead of “dancing.” ↩