The Divine Comedy

by Dante Alighieri

  131. bearing right: Through all of Hell the Poets bear left in their descent with only two exceptions, the first in their approach to the Heretics, the second in their approach to Geryon, the monster of fraud (see note XVII, 29 below). Note that both these exceptions occur at a major division of the Inferno. There is no satisfactory explanation of Dante’s allegorical intent in making these exceptions.

  Canto X

  CIRCLE SIX

  The Heretics

  As the Poets pass on, one of the damned hears Dante speaking, recognizes him as a Tuscan, and calls to him from one of the fiery tombs. A moment later he appears. He is FARINATA DEGLI UBERTI, a great war-chief of the Tuscan Ghibellines. The majesty and power of his bearing seem to diminish Hell itself. He asks Dante’s lineage and recognizes him as an enemy. They begin to talk politics, but are interrupted by another shade, who rises from the same tomb.

  This one is CAVALCANTE DEI CAVALCANTI, father of Guido Cavalcanti, a contemporary poet. If it is genius that leads Dante on his great journey, the shade asks, why is Guido not with him? Can Dante presume to a greater genius than Guido’s? Dante replies that he comes this way only with the aid of powers Guido has not sought. His reply is a classic example of many-leveled symbolism as well as an overt criticism of a rival poet. The senior Cavalcanti mistakenly infers from Dante’s reply that Guido is dead, and swoons back into the flames.

  Farinata, who has not deigned to notice his fellow-sinner, continues from the exact point at which he had been interrupted. It is as if he refuses to recognize the flames in which he is shrouded. He proceeds to prophesy Dante’s banishment from Florence, he defends his part in Florentine politics, and then, in answer to Dante’s question, he explains how it is that the damned can foresee the future but have no knowledge of the present. He then names others who share his tomb, and Dante takes his leave with considerable respect for his great enemy, pausing only long enough to leave word for Cavalcanti that Guido is still alive.

  We go by a secret path along the rim

  of the dark city, between the wall and the torments.

  My Master leads me and I follow him.

  “Supreme Virtue, who through this impious land

  wheel me at will down these dark gyres,” I said,

  “speak to me, for I wish to understand.

  Tell me, Master, is it permitted to see

  the souls within these tombs? The lids are raised,

  and no one stands on guard.” And he to me:

  “All shall be sealed forever on the day

  these souls return here from Jehosaphat

  with the bodies they have given once to clay.

  In this dark corner of the morgue of wrath

  lie Epicurus and his followers,

  who make the soul share in the body’s death.

  And here you shall be granted presently

  not only your spoken wish, but that other as well,

  which you had thought perhaps to hide from me.”

  And I: “Except to speak my thoughts in few

  and modest words, as I learned from your example,

  dear Guide, I do not hide my heart from you.”

  “O Tuscan, who go living through this place

  speaking so decorously, may it please you pause

  a moment on your way, for by the grace

  of that high speech in which I hear your birth,

  I know you for a son of that noble city

  which perhaps I vexed too much in my time on earth.”

  These words broke without warning from inside

  one of the burning arks. Caught by surprise,

  I turned in fear and drew close to my Guide.

  And he: “Turn around. What are you doing? Look there:

  it is Farinata rising from the flames.

  From the waist up his shade will be made clear.”

  My eyes were fixed on him already. Erect,

  he rose above the flame, great chest, great brow;

  he seemed to hold all Hell in disrespect.

  My Guide’s prompt hands urged me among the dim

  and smoking sepulchres to that great figure,

  and he said to me: “Mind how you speak to him.”

  And when I stood alone at the foot of the tomb,

  the great soul stared almost contemptuously,

  before he asked: “Of what line do you come?”

  Because I wished to obey, I did not hide

  anything from him: whereupon, as he listened,

  he raised his brows a little, then replied:

  “Bitter enemies were they to me,

  to my fathers, and to my party, so that twice

  I sent them scattering from high Italy.”

  “If they were scattered, still from every part

  they formed again and returned both times,” I answered,

  “but yours have not yet wholly learned that art.”

  At this another shade rose gradually,

  visible to the chin. It had raised itself,

  I think, upon its knees, and it looked around me

  as if it expected to find through that black air

  that blew about me, another traveler.

  And weeping when it found no other there,

  turned back. “And if,” it cried, “you travel through

  this dungeon of the blind by power of genius,

  where is my son? why is he not with you?”

  And I to him: “Not by myself am I borne

  this terrible way. I am led by him who waits there,

  and whom perhaps your Guido held in scorn.”

  For by his words and the manner of his torment

  I knew his name already, and could, therefore,

  answer both what he asked and what he meant.

  Instantly he rose to his full height:

  “He held? What is it you say? Is he dead, then?

  Do his eyes no longer fill with that sweet light?”

  And when he saw that I delayed a bit

  in answering his question, he fell backwards

  into the flame, and rose no more from it.

  But that majestic spirit at whose call

  I had first paused there, did not change expression,

  nor so much as turn his face to watch him fall.

  “And if,” going on from his last words, he said,

  “men of my line have yet to learn that art,

  that burns me deeper than this flaming bed.

  But the face of her who reigns in Hell shall not

  be fifty times rekindled in its course

  before you learn what griefs attend that art.

  And as you hope to find the world again,

  tell me: why is that populace so savage

  in the edicts they pronounce against my strain?”

  And I to him: “The havoc and the carnage

  that dyed the Arbia red at Montaperti

  have caused these angry cries in our assemblage.”

  He sighed and shook his head. “I was not alone

  in that affair,” he said, “nor certainly

  would I have joined the rest without good reason.

  But I was alone at that time when every other

  consented to the death of Florence; I

  alone with open face defended her.”

  “Ah, so may your soul sometime have rest,”

  I begged him, “solve the riddle that pursues me

  through this dark place and leaves my mind perplexed:

  you seem to see in advance all time’s intent,

  if I have heard and understood correctly;

  but you seem to lack all knowledge of the present.”

  “We see asquint, like those whose twisted sight

  can make out only the far-off,” he said,

  “for the King of All still grants us that much light.

  When things draw near, or happen, we perceive

  nothing of them. Except what others bring us

  we have no news of th
ose who are alive.

  So may you understand that all we know

  will be dead forever from that day and hour

  when the Portal of the Future is swung to.”

  Then, as if stricken by regret, I said:

  “Now, therefore, will you tell that fallen one

  who asked about his son, that he is not dead,

  and that, if I did not reply more quickly,

  it was because my mind was occupied

  with this confusion you have solved for me.”

  And now my Guide was calling me. In haste,

  therefore, I begged that mighty shade to name

  the others who lay with him in that chest.

  And he: “More than a thousand cram this tomb.

  The second Frederick is here, and the Cardinal

  of the Ubaldini. Of the rest let us be dumb.”

  And he disappeared without more said, and I

  turned back and made my way to the ancient Poet,

  pondering the words of the dark prophecy.

  He moved along, and then, when we had started,

  he turned and said to me, “What troubles you?

  Why do you look so vacant and downhearted?”

  And I told him. And he replied: “Well may you bear

  those words in mind.” Then, pausing, raised a finger:

  “Now pay attention to what I tell you here:

  when finally you stand before the ray

  of that Sweet Lady whose bright eye sees all,

  from her you will learn the turnings of your way.”

  So saying, he bore left, turning his back

  on the flaming walls, and we passed deeper yet

  into the city of pain, along a track

  that plunged down like a scar into a sink

  which sickened us already with its stink.

  NOTES

  11. Jehosaphat: A valley outside Jerusalem. The popular belief that it would serve as the scene of the Last Judgment was based on Joel, iii, 2, 12.

  14. Epicurus: The Greek philosopher. The central aim of his philosophy was to achieve happiness, which he defined as the absence of pain. For Dante this doctrine meant the denial of the Eternal life, since the whole aim of the Epicurean was temporal happiness.

  17. not only your spoken wish, but that other as well: “All knowing” Virgil is frequently presented as being able to read Dante’s mind. The “other wish” is almost certainly Dante’s desire to speak to someone from Florence with whom he could discuss politics. Many prominent Florentines were Epicureans.

  22. Tuscan: Florence lies in the province of Tuscany. Italian, to an extent unknown in America, is a language of dialects, all of them readily identifiable even when they are not well understood by the hearer. Dante’s native Tuscan has become the main source of modern official Italian. Two very common sayings still current in Italy are: “Lingua toscana, lingua di Dio” (the Tuscan tongue is the language of God) and—to express the perfection of Italian speech—“Lingua toscana in bocca romana” (the Tuscan tongue in a Roman mouth).

  26. that noble city: Florence.

  32-51. Farinata: Farinata degli Uberti (DEH-lyee Oob-EHR-tee) was head of the ancient noble house of the Uberti. He became leader of the Ghibellines of Florence in 1239, and played a large part in expelling the Guelphs in 1248. The Guelphs returned in 1251, but Farinata remained. His arrogant desire to rule singlehanded led to difficulties, however, and he was expelled in 1258. With the aid of the Manfredi of Siena, he gathered a large force and defeated the Guelphs at Montaperti on the River Arbia in 1260. Re-entering Florence in triumph, he again expelled the Guelphs, but at the Diet of Empoli, held by the victors after the battle of Montaperti, he alone rose in open counsel to resist the general sentiment that Florence should be razed. He died in Florence in 1264. In 1266 the Guelphs once more returned and crushed forever the power of the Uberti, destroying their palaces and issuing special decrees against persons of the Uberti line. In 1283 a decree of heresy was published against Farinata.

  39. “Mind how you speak to him”: The surface interpretation is clearly that Virgil means Dante to show proper respect to so majestic a soul. (Cf. Canto XVI, 14-15.) But the allegorical level is more interesting here. Virgil (as Human Reason) is urging Dante to go forward on his own. These final words then would be an admonition to Dante to guide his speech according to the highest principles.

  52. another shade: Cavalcante dei Cavalcanti was a famous Epicurean (“like lies with like”). He was the father of Guido Cavalcanti, a poet and friend of Dante. Guido was also Farinata’s son-in-law.

  61. Not by myself: Cavalcanti assumes that the resources of human genius are all that are necessary for such a journey. (It is an assumption that well fits his character as an Epicurean.) Dante replies as a man of religion that other aid is necessary.

  63. whom perhaps your Guido held in scorn: This reference has not been satisfactorily explained. Virgil is a symbol on many levels—of Classicism, of religiosity, of Human Reason. Guido might have scorned him on any of these levels, or on all of them. One interpretation might be that Dante wished to present Guido as an example of how skepticism acts as a limitation upon a man of genius. Guido’s skepticism does not permit him to see beyond the temporal. He does not see that Virgil (Human Reason expressed as Poetic Wisdom) exists only to lead one to Divine Love, and therefore he cannot undertake the final journey on which Dante has embarked.

  70. and when he saw that I delayed: Dante’s delay is explained in lines 112-114.

  79. her who reigns in Hell: Hecate or Proserpine. She is also the moon goddess. The sense of this prophecy, therefore, is that Dante will be exiled within fifty full moons. Dante was banished from Florence in 1302, well within the fifty months of the prophecy.

  83. that populace: The Florentines.

  97-108. THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE DAMNED. Dante notes with surprise that Farinata can foresee the future, but that Cavalcanti does not know whether his son is presently dead or alive. Farinata explains by outlining a most ingenious detail of the Divine Plan: the damned can see far into the future, but nothing of what is present or of what has happened. Thus, after Judgment, when there is no longer any Future, the intellects of the damned will be void.

  119. the second Frederick: The Emperor Frederick II. In Canto XIII Dante has Pier delle Vigne speak of him as one worthy of honor, but he was commonly reputed to be an Epicurean.

  119-120. the Cardinal of the Ubaldini: In the original Dante refers to him simply as “il Cardinale.” Ottaviano degli Ubaldini (born circa 1209, died 1273) became a Cardinal in 1245, but his energies seem to have been directed exclusively to money and political intrigue. When he was refused an important loan by the Ghibellines, he is reported by many historians as having remarked: “I may say that if I have a soul, I have lost it in the cause of the Ghibellines, and no one of them will help me now.” The words “If I have a soul” would be enough to make him guilty in Dante’s eyes of the charge of heresy.

  131. that Sweet Lady: Beatrice.

  Canto XI

  CIRCLE SIX

  The Heretics

  The Poets reach the inner edge of the SIXTH CIRCLE and find a great jumble of rocks that had once been a cliff, but which has fallen into rubble as the result of the great earthquake that shook Hell when Christ died. Below them lies the SEVENTH CIRCLE, and so fetid is the air that arises from it that the Poets cower for shelter behind a great tomb until their breaths can grow accustomed to the stench.

  Dante finds an inscription on the lid of the tomb labeling it as the place in Hell of POPE ANASTASIUS.

  Virgil takes advantage of the delay to outline in detail THE DIVISION OF THE LOWER HELL, a theological discourse based on The Ethics and The Physics of Aristotle with subsequent medieval interpretations. Virgil explains also why it is that the Incontinent are not punished within the walls of Dis, and rather ingeniously sets forth the reasons why Usury is an act of Violence against Art, which is the child of Nature and hence the Grandchild o
f God. (By “Art,” Dante means the arts and crafts by which man draws from nature, i.e., Industry.)

  As he concludes he rises and urges Dante on. By means known only to Virgil, he is aware of the motion of the stars and from them he sees that it is about two hours before Sunrise of Holy Saturday.

  We came to the edge of an enormous sink

  rimmed by a circle of great broken boulders.

  Here we found ghastlier gangs. And here the stink

  thrown up by the abyss so overpowered us

  that we drew back, cowering behind the wall

  of one of the great tombs; and standing thus,

  I saw an inscription in the stone, and read:

  “I guard Anastasius, once Pope,

  he whom Photinus led from the straight road.”

  “Before we travel on to that blind pit

  we must delay until our sense grows used

  to its foul breath, and then we will not mind it,”