The Vision of Dante Alighiere or Hell, Purgatory and Paradise

by Dante Alighieri

spectacle which now presented itself.

  v. 86. The name of that fair flower.] The name of the Virgin.

  v. 92. A cresset.] The angel Gabriel.

  v. 98. That lyre.] By synecdoche, the lyre is put for the angel

  v. 99. The goodliest sapphire.] The Virgin

  v. 126. Those rich-laden coffers.] Those spirits who, having

  sown the seed of good works on earth, now contain the fruit of

  their pious endeavours.

  v. 129. In the Babylonian exile.] During their abode in this

  world.

  v. 133. He.] St. Peter, with the other holy men of the Old and

  New testament.

  CANTO XXIV

  v. 28. Such folds.] Pindar has the same bold image:

  [GREEK HERE?]

  On which Hayne strangely remarks: Ad ambitus stropharum vldetur

  v. 65. Faith.] Hebrews, c. xi. 1. So Marino, in one of his

  sonnets, which calls Divozioni:

  Fede e sustanza di sperate cose,

  E delle non visioili argomento.

  v. 82. Current.] "The answer thou hast made is right; but let

  me know if thy inward persuasion is conformable to thy

  profession."

  v. 91. The ancient bond and new.] The Old and New Testament.

  v. 114. That Worthy.] Quel Baron.

  In the next Canto, St. James is called "Barone." So in

  Boccaccio, G. vi. N. 10, we find "Baron Messer Santo Antonio."

  v. 124. As to outstrip.] Venturi insists that the Poet has

  here, "made a slip;" for that John came first to the sepulchre,

  though Peter was the first to enter it. But let Dante have leave

  to explain his own meaning, in a passage from his third book De

  Monarchia: "Dicit etiam Johannes ipsum (scilicet Petrum)

  introiisse SUBITO, cum venit in monumentum, videns allum

  discipulum cunctantem ad ostium." Opere de Dante, Ven. 1793. T.

  ii. P. 146.

  CANTO XXV

  v. 6. The fair sheep-fold.] Florence, whence he was banished.

  v. 13. For its sake.] For the sake of that faith.

  v. 20. Galicia throng'd with visitants.] See Mariana, Hist. 1.

  xi.

  v. 13. "En el tiempo," &c. "At the time that the sepulchre of

  the apostle St. James was discovered, the devotion for that place

  extended itself not only over all Spain, but even round about to

  foreign nations. Multitudes from all parts of the world came to

  visit it. Many others were deterred by the difficulty for the

  journey, by the roughness and barrenness of those parts, and by

  the incursions of the Moors, who made captives many of the

  pilgrims. The canons of St. Eloy afterwards (the precise time is

  not known), with a desire of remedying these evils, built, in

  many places, along the whole read, which reached as far as to

  France, hospitals for the reception of the pilgrims."

  v. 31. Who.] The Epistle of St. James is here attributed to the

  elder apostle of that name, whose shrine was at Compostella, in

  Galicia. Which of the two was the author of it is yet doubtful.

  The learned and candid Michaelis contends very forcibly for its

  having been written by James the Elder. Lardner rejects that

  opinion as absurd; while Benson argues against it, but is well

  answered by Michaelis, who after all, is obliged to leave the

  question undecided. See his Introduction to the New Testament,

  translated by Dr. Marsh, ed. Cambridge, 1793. V. iv. c. 26. -

  1, 2, 3.

  v. 35. As Jesus.] In the transfiguration on Mount Tabor.

  v. 39. The second flame.] St. James.

  v. 40. I lifted up.] "I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills,

  from whence cometh my help." Ps. Cxxi. 1.

  v. 59. From Egypt to Jerusalem.] From the lower world to

  heaven.

  v. 67. Hope.] This is from the Sentences of Petrus Lombardus.

  "Est autem spes virtus, qua spiritualia et aeterna bona speratam,

  id est, beatitudinem aeternam. Sine meritis enim aliquid

  sperare non spes, sed praesumptio, dici potest." Pet. Lomb.

  Sent. 1. Iii. Dist. 26. Ed. Bas. 1486. Fol.

  v. 74. His anthem.] Psalm ix. 10.

  v. 90. Isaias ] Chap. lxi. 10.

  v. 94. Thy brother.] St. John in the Revelation, c. vii. 9.

  v. 101. Winter's month.] "If a luminary, like that which now

  appeared, were to shine throughout the month following the winter

  solstice during which the constellation Cancer appears in the

  east at the setting of the sun, there would be no interruption to

  the light, but the whole month would be as a single day."

  v. 112. This.] St. John, who reclined on the bosom of our

  Saviour, and to whose charge Jesus recommended his mother.

  v. 121. So I.] He looked so earnestly, to descry whether St.

  John were present there in body, or in spirit only, having had

  his doubts raised by that saying of our Saviour's: "If I will,

  that he tarry till I come what is that to thee."

  v. 127. The two.] Christ and Mary, whom he has described, in

  the last Canto but one, as rising above his sight

  CANTO XXVI

  v. 2. The beamy flame.] St. John.

  v. 13. Ananias' hand.] Who, by putting his hand on St. Paul,

  restored his sight. Acts, c. ix. 17.

  v. 36. From him.] Some suppose that Plato is here meant, who,

  in his Banquet, makes Phaedrus say: "Love is confessedly amongst

  the eldest of beings, and, being the eldest, is the cause to us

  of the greatest goods " Plat. Op. t. x. p. 177. Bip. ed. Others

  have understood it of Aristotle, and others, of the writer who

  goes by the name of Dionysius the Areopagite, referred to in the

  twenty-eighth Canto.

  v. 40. I will make.] Exodus, c. xxxiii. 19.

  v. 42. At the outset.] John, c. i. 1. &c.

  v. 51. The eagle of our Lord.] St. John

  v. 62. The leaves.] Created beings.

  v. 82. The first living soul.] Adam.

  v. 107. Parhelion.] Who enlightens and comprehends all things;

  but is himself enlightened and comprehended by none.

  v. 117. Whence.] That is, from Limbo. See Hell, Canto II. 53.

  Adam says that 5232 years elapsed from his creation to the time

  of his deliverance, which followed the death of Christ.

  v. 133. EL] Some read UN, "One," instead of EL: but the latter

  of these readings is confirmed by a passage from Dante's Treatise

  De Vulg. Eloq. 1. i. cap. 4. "Quod prius vox primi loquentis

  sonaverit, viro sanae mentis in promptu esse non dubito ipsum

  fuisse quod Deus est, videlicet El." St. Isidore in the

  Origines, 1. vii. c. 1. had said, "Primum apud Hebraeos Dei

  nomen El dicitur."

  v. 135. Use.] From Horace, Ars. Poet. 62.

  v. 138. All my life.] "I remained in the terrestrial Paradise

  only tothe seventh hour." In the Historia Scolastica of Petrus

  Comestor, it is said of our first parents: Quidam tradunt eos

  fuisse in Paradiso septem horae." I. 9. ed. Par. 1513. 4to.

  CANTO XXVII

  v. 1. Four torches.] St. Peter, St. James, St. John, and Adam.

  v. 11. That.] St. Peter' who looked as the planet Jupiter

  would, if it assumed the sanguine appearance of liars.

  v. 20. He.] Boniface VIII.

  v.
26. such colour.]

  Qui color infectis adversi solis ab ietu

  Nubibus esse solet; aut purpureae Aurorae.

  Ovid, Met. 1. iii. 184.

  v. 37. Of Linus and of Cletus.] Bishops of Rome in the first

  century.

  v. 40. Did Sextus, Pius, and Callixtus bleed

  And Urban.]

  The former two, bishops of the same see, in the second; and the

  others, in the fourth century.

  v. 42. No purpose was of ours.] "We did not intend that our

  successors should take any part in the political divisions among

  Christians, or that my figure (the seal of St. Peter) should

  serve as a mark to authorize iniquitous grants and privileges."

  v. 51. Wolves.] Compare Milton, P. L. b. xii. 508, &c.

  v. 53. Cahorsines and Gascons.] He alludes to Jacques d'Ossa, a

  native of Cahors, who filled the papal chair in 1316, after it

  had been two years vacant, and assumed the name of John XXII.,

  and to Clement V, a Gascon, of whom see Hell, Canto XIX. 86, and

  Note.

  v. 63. The she-goat.] When the sun is in Capricorn.

  v. 72. From the hour.] Since he had last looked (see Canto

  XXII.) he perceived that he had passed from the meridian circle

  to the eastern horizon, the half of our hemisphere, and a quarter

  of the heaven.

  v. 76. From Gades.] See Hell, Canto XXVI. 106

  v. 78. The shore.] Phoenicia, where Europa, the daughter of

  Agenor mounted on the back of Jupiter, in his shape of a bull.

  v. 80. The sun.] Dante was in the constellation Gemini, and the

  sun in Aries. There was, therefore, part of those two

  constellations, and the whole of Taurus, between them.

  v. 93. The fair nest of Leda.] "From the Gemini;" thus called,

  because Leda was the mother of the twins, Castor and Pollux

  v. 112. Time's roots.] "Here," says Beatrice, "are the roots,

  from whence time springs: for the parts, into which it is

  divided, the other heavens must be considered." And she then

  breaks out into an exclamation on the degeneracy of human nature,

  which does not lift itself to the contemplation of divine things.

  v. 126. The fair child of him.] So she calls human nature.

  Pindar by a more easy figure, terms the day, "child of the sun."

  v. 129. None.] Because, as has been before said, the shepherds

  are become wolves.

  v. 131. Before the date.] "Before many ages are past, before

  those fractions, which are drops in the reckoning of every year,

  shall amount to so large a portion of time, that January shall be

  no more a winter month." By this periphrasis is meant " in a

  short time," as we say familiarly, such a thing will happen

  before a thousand years are over when we mean, it will happen

  soon.

  v. 135. Fortune shall be fain.] The commentators in general

  suppose that our Poet here augurs that great reform, which he

  vainly hoped would follow on the arrival of the Emperor Henry

  VII. in Italy. Lombardi refers the prognostication to Can Grande

  della Scala: and, when we consider that this Canto was not

  finished till after the death of Henry, as appears from the

  mention that is made of John XXII, it cannot be denied but the

  conjecture is probable.

  CANTO XXVIII

  v. 36. Heav'n, and all nature, hangs upon that point.] [GREEK

  HERE]

  Aristot. Metaph. 1. xii. c. 7. "From that beginning depend

  heaven and nature."

  v. 43. Such diff'rence.] The material world and the

  intelligential (the copy and the pattern) appear to Dante to

  differ in this respect, that the orbits of the latter are more

  swift, the nearer they are to the centre, whereas the contrary is

  the case with the orbits of the former. The seeming contradiction

  is thus accounted for by Beatrice. In the material world, the

  more ample the body is, the greater is the good of which itis

  capable supposing all the parts to be equally perfect. But in the

  intelligential world, the circles are more excellent and

  powerful, the more they approximate to the central point, which

  is God. Thus the first circle, that of the seraphim, corresponds

  to the ninth sphere, or primum mobile, the second, that of the

  cherubim, to the eighth sphere, or heaven of fixed stars; the

  third, or circle of thrones, to the seventh sphere, or planet of

  Saturn; and in like manner throughout the two other trines of

  circles and spheres.

  In orbs

  Of circuit inexpressible they stood,

  Orb within orb

  Milton, P. L. b. v. 596.

  v. 70. The sturdy north.] Compare Homer, II. b. v. 524.

  v. 82. In number.] The sparkles exceeded the number which would

  be produced by the sixty-four squares of a chess-board, if for

  the first we reckoned one, for the next, two; for the third,

  four; and so went on doubling to the end of the account.

  v. 106. Fearless of bruising from the nightly ram.] Not

  injured, like the productions of our spring, by the influence of

  autumn, when the constellation Aries rises at sunset.

  v. 110. Dominations.]

  Hear all ye angels, progeny of light,

  Thrones, domination's, princedoms, virtues, powers.

  Milton, P. L. b. v. 601.

  v. 119. Dionysius.] The Areopagite, in his book De Caelesti

  Hierarchia.

  v. 124. Gregory.] Gregory the Great. "Novem vero angelorum

  ordines diximus, quia videlicet esse, testante sacro eloquio,

  scimus: Angelos, archangelos, virtutes, potestates, principatus,

  dominationae, thronos, cherubin atque seraphin." Divi Gregorii,

  Hom. xxxiv. f. 125. ed. Par. 1518. fol.

  v. 126. He had learnt.] Dionysius, he says, had learnt from St.

  Paul. It is almost unnecessary to add, that the book, above

  referred to, which goes under his name, was the production of a

  later age.

  CANTO XXIX

  v. 1. No longer.] As short a space, as the sun and moon are in

  changing hemispheres, when they are opposite to one another, the

  one under the sign of Aries, and the other under that of Libra,

  and both hang for a moment, noised as it were in the hand of the

  zenith.

  v. 22. For, not in process of before or aft.] There was neither

  "before nor after," no distinction, that is, of time, till the

  creation of the world.

  v. 30. His threefold operation.] He seems to mean that

  spiritual beings, brute matter, and the intermediate part of the

  creation, which participates both of spirit and matter, were

  produced at once.

  v. 38. On Jerome's pages.] St. Jerome had described the angels

  as created before the rest of the universe: an opinion which

  Thomas Aquinas controverted; and the latter, as Dante thinks,

  had Scripture on his side.

  v. 51. Pent.] See Hell, Canto XXXIV. 105.

  v. 111. Of Bindi and of Lapi.] Common names of men at Florence

  v. 112. The sheep.] So Milton, Lycidas.

  The hungry sheep look up and are not fed,

  But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,

  Rot inwardly.

  v. 121. The preacher.] Thus Cowper, T
ask, b. ii.

  'Tis pitiful

  To court a grin, when you should woo a soul, &c.

  v. 131. Saint Anthony.

  Fattens with this his swine.]

  On the sale of these blessings, the brothers of St. Anthony

  supported themselves and their paramours. From behind the swine

  of St. Anthony, our Poet levels a blow at the object of his

  inveterate enmity, Boniface VIII, from whom, "in 1297, they

  obtained the dignity and privileges of an independent

  congregation." See Mosheim's Eccles. History in Dr. Maclaine's

  Translation, v. ii. cent. xi. p. 2. c. 2. - 28.

  v. 140. Daniel.] "Thousand thousands ministered unto him, and

  ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him." Dan. c. vii.

  10.

  CANTO XXX

  v. 1. Six thousand miles.] He compares the vanishing of the

  vision to the fading away of the stars at dawn, when it is

  noon-day six thousand miles off, and the shadow, formed by the

  earth over the part of it inhabited by the Poet, is about to

  disappear.

  v. 13. Engirt.] " ppearing to be encompassed by these angelic

  bands, which are in reality encompassed by it."

  v. 18. This turn.] Questa vice.

  Hence perhaps Milton, P. L. b. viii. 491.

  This turn hath made amends.

  v. 39. Forth.] From the ninth sphere to the empyrean, which is

  more light.

  v. 44. Either mighty host.] Of angels, that remained faithful,

  and of beatified souls, the latter in that form which they will

  have at the last day.

  v. 61. Light flowing.] "And he showed me a pure river of water

  of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God

  and of the Lamb." Rev. cxxii. I.

  --underneath a bright sea flow'd

  Of jasper, or of liquid pearl.

  Milton, P. L. b. iii. 518.

  v. 80. Shadowy of the truth.]

  Son di lor vero ombriferi prefazii.

  So Mr. Coleridge, in his Religious Musings, v. 406.

  Life is a vision shadowy of truth.

  v. 88. --the eves

  Of mine eyelids.]

  Thus Shakespeare calls the eyelids "penthouse lids." Macbeth, a,

  1. s, 3.

  v. 108. As some cliff.]

  A lake

  That to the fringed bank with myrtle crown'd

  Her crystal mirror holds.

  Milton, P. L. b. iv. 263.

  v. 118. My view with ease.]

  Far and wide his eye commands

  For sight no obstacle found here, nor shade, But all sunshine.

  Milton, P. l. b. iii. 616.

  v. 135. Of the great Harry.] The Emperor Henry VII, who died in

  1313.

  v. 141. He.] Pope Clement V. See Canto XXVII. 53.

  v. 145. Alagna's priest.] Pope Boniface VIII. Hell, Canto XIX.

  79.

  CANTO XXXI

  v. 6. Bees.] Compare Homer, Iliad, ii. 87. Virg. Aen. I. 430,

  and Milton, P. L. b. 1. 768.

  v. 29. Helice.] Callisto, and her son Arcas, changed into the

  constellations of the Greater Bear and Arctophylax, or Bootes.

  See Ovid, Met. l. ii. fab. v. vi.

  v. 93. Bernard.] St. Bernard, the venerable abbot of Clairvaux,

  and the great promoter of the second crusade, who died A.D. 1153,

  in his sixty-third year. His sermons are called by Henault,

  "chefs~d'oeuvres de sentiment et de force." Abrege Chron. de

  l'Hist. de Fr. 1145. They have even been preferred to al1 the

  productions of the ancients, and the author has been termed the

  last of the fathers of the church. It is uncertain whether they

  were not delivered originally in the French tongue.

  That the part he acts in the present Poem should be assigned to

  him. appears somewhat remarkable, when we consider that he

  severely censured the new festival established in honour of the

  Immaculate Conception of the virgin, and opposed the doctrine

  itself with the greatest vigour, as it supposed her being

  honoured with a privilegewhich belonged to Christ Alone Dr.

  Maclaine's Mosheim, v. iii. cent. xii. p. ii. c. 3 - 19.

  v. 95. Our Veronica ] The holy handkerchief, then preserved at