The Divine Comedy

by Dante Alighieri

  waited, in due course, to become my own;

  as did that horn of Italy that lies

  south of the Tronto and Verde, within which

  Bari, Gaeta, and Catona rise.

  Already on my brow there shone the crown

  of the land the Danube bathes when it has left

  its German banks. And though not yet my own,

  beautiful Sicily, the darkened coast

  between the Capes of Faro and Passero,

  there on the gulf that Eurus lashes most,

  (not dimmed by Typhoeus, as mythology

  would have men think, but by its rising sulfur)

  would yet have looked to have its kings, through me,

  from Charles and Rudolph, but that the bitter breath

  of a populace subjected to misrule

  cried out through all Palermo’s streets ‘Death! Death!’

  And could Robert have foreseen how tyranny

  will drive men mad, he would have fled in fear

  from Catalonia’s greedy poverty.

  For some provision surely must be made,

  by him or by another, lest on his ship,

  already heavy laden, more be laid.

  His nature, born to avarice from the loins

  of a liberal sire, would have required lieutenants

  who cared for more than filling chests with coins.”

  —“Sire, I hold dearer this felicity

  that fills me when you speak, believing it

  as visible to you as it is to me,

  there where every good begins and ends.

  And this, too, I hold dear—that you discern it

  in looking on Him from whom all love descends.

  You have given me joy. Now it is in your power

  to give me light. For your words leave me in doubt:

  how, if the seed is sweet, may the fruit be sour?”

  Thus I. And he: “Could I make you recognize

  one truth of what you ask, then what is now

  behind your back, would be before your eyes.

  The Good by which this kingdom you now climb

  is turned and gladdened, makes its foresight shine

  as powers of these great bodies to all time.

  Not only does that Perfect Mind provide

  for the diversities of every nature

  but for their good and harmony beside.

  And thus whatever arrow takes its arc

  from this bow flies to a determined end,

  it being aimed unerringly to its mark.

  Else would these heavens you now move across

  give rise to their effect in such a way

  that there would be not harmony, but chaos.

  This cannot be unless the intellects

  that move these stars are flawed, and flawed the first,

  which, having made them, gave them such defects.

  —Should I expound this further?” he said to me.

  And I: “There is no need, for now I know

  nature cannot fall short of what must be.”

  And he: “Would man be worse off than he is,

  there on earth, without a social order?”

  “Yes!” I replied. “Nor need I proof of this.”

  “And can that be, unless men there below

  lived variously to serve their various functions?

  Your master, if he knows, answers you ‘no.’ ”

  So point by point that radiant soul disputes.

  Now he concludes: “Your various aptitudes,

  it follows, therefore, must have various roots,

  So one man is born Xerxes, another Solon;

  one Melchizedek, and another he

  who, flying through the air, lost his own son.

  That ever-revolving nature whose seal is pressed

  into our mortal wax does its work well,

  but takes no heed of where it comes to rest.

  So Esau parted from Jacob in the seed;

  and Romulus was born of such humble stock

  that Mars became his father, as men agreed.

  Begotten and begetter, but for the force

  of overruling providence, the son’s nature

  would always follow in the father’s course.

  —And now what was behind shines out before.

  But to make you understand how much you please me,

  I would wrap you in one corollary more:

  what Nature gives a man Fortune must nourish

  concordantly, or nature, like any seed

  out of its proper climate, cannot flourish.

  If the world below would learn to heed the plan

  of nature’s firm foundation, and build on that,

  it then would have the best from every man.

  But into holy orders you deflect

  the man born to strap on a sword and shield;

  and make a king of one whose intellect

  is given to writing sermons. And in this way

  your footprints leave the road and go astray.”

  NOTES

  1. to its own jeopardy: Because in so believing it risked the wrath that has often descended upon the idolatrous.

  2. epicycle: Not to be confused with “sphere.” The epicycle of Venus turns around the center line of the Third Sphere. Thus the planet keeps appearing in various positions around the Sun, “now shining at its nape” (behind it, hence Venus as evening star), “now at its brow” (before it, hence Venus as morning star) as Dante says in line 12 below. In line 96 this epicyclic motion becomes allegorically significant. In line 135 this image theme is brought to rest. This sweetly managed development is a fine example of Dante’s way with imagery.

  3. rayed down love-madness: The rays of Venus, the pagans believed, drove men and women mad with love.

  7. Dione: One legend has it that Venus was the daughter of Dione and Zeus. Cupid: He has many mythological manifestations. Dante is here taking him as the son of Venus by Mars or, more probably, by Mercury.

  8-9. had sat on Dido’s lap: When she was smitten by love for Aeneas, the passion that led to her death. (See Inferno, V, 61, 86.) Line 9 is my own rhyme-forced addition and does not occur in Dante.

  10. her: Venus.

  11-12. that woos the Sun: The apparent motion of Venus is from one side of the Sun to the other. See note to line 2, above.

  19 ff. THE AMOROUS. These lights are the souls of the Amorous; not the pagan distortion of love-madness, but the Christian and divine radiance of caritas. Like all the souls of Heaven, they manifest themselves (at will) in their appropriate sphere, but they have their true place in the Empyrean among the Seraphim. They have been dancing there in their eternal joy when they become aware of Dante and Beatrice and, in a passion of caritas, descend to them at inconceivable speeds, still dancing and singing Hosannah.

  22-24. blast from cold clouds, etc: Hot dry vapors colliding with cold wet clouds were believed to discharge visible or invisible blasts of wind at great speeds. Lightning was believed to be a blast of wind moving so fast that the friction of its motion caused it to ignite. But even such a rate of descent would have seemed laggard as compared to the descent of these souls when they see Dante and Beatrice. below: In earth’s atmosphere.

  31. Then one of them: Charles Martel (see below). He explains that all the souls of this sphere dance in perpetual bliss in the Empyrean, but that they are all so full of love and so eager to give joy to others, that to pause from bliss a while in order to give joy to others will seem no less bliss.

  34. In one thirst: For God’s love. and one spiraling: In one eternal circling of God’s throne. and one sphere: In a round with the angels and powers of this third Heaven.

  35-37. those High Principalities: The third heaven, we are to understand, is moved by Principalities (angels of a certain rank), or so Dante himself once addressed them in the words here quoted (from the Convivio). In IX, 61, however (see note), that function is assigned to Thrones. For the orders of angels see XXVII
I.

  40-84. CHARLES MARTEL. Born 1271, the first son of Charles II (The Lame) of Anjou. Crowned King of Hungary (though in title only) 1290. Died 1295. His conversation indicates that he and Dante had met on earth, probably when Charles visited Florence in 1294, and that Charles had intended to be Dante’s royal patron. This Charles Martel must not be confused with the better known Charles Martel (Charles the Hammer), King of the Franks, who lived circa 688-741. The following dates may offer some useful points of reference in the maze of intrigue that marked the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies:

  1268 Charles I of Anjou (French) defeats Conradin (German) at Tagliacozzo. (See Inferno, XXVIII, 17.)

  1271 Charles Martel (grandson of Charles I) born.

  1282 The Sicilian Vespers (Easter Day) in which most of the French (rulers of Sicily) were massacred in a popular uprising. In October of the same year Peter III of Aragon (Spanish) invaded Sicily and captured Messina, last French strongpoint. The House of Anjou is not totally driven from Sicily but retains the Kingdom of Naples (it and Sicily being the “Two Sicilies”). Soon after Peter’s invasion, Pope Martin IV, anxious to defend the temporal rights of the Church in Sicily, declares a crusade against Aragon.

  1284 Charles II (the Lame), father of Charles Martel, is captured in the Bay of Naples by the forces of Peter III of Aragon, and is held for ransom in Spain.

  1286 Charles I dies while Charles II is still captive, and Charles Martel becomes regent at age 15.

  1288 Charles II is released and takes over the rule of Naples. (Robert, Lodovico, and John, younger brothers of Charles Martel . . . are surrendered to Peter of Aragon as hostages for Charles’ ransom, and they remain in Spain until 1295.)

  1290 Charles Martel becomes titular King of Hungary.

  1295 Charles Martel dies (before his father).

  The warfare that followed the Sicilian Vespers continued for thirty years, spurred constantly by the Vatican, and involved not only the powers of Anjou and of Aragon, but of Valois and of Sicily, and of the Papal States, in various shifting alliances.

  In lines 50-51, Charles points out that he died young, but declares that had he lived longer he might have averted the great evils of this long warfare by establishing harmony among the contesting forces. As becomes heavenly souls, Charles is a bit of an optimist: the intrigues of the various Popes who ruled from 1282 to 1303, and of their various secular allies, could hardly have been combed smooth by a stripling, but Charles seems to have had generous intentions toward Dante, and Dante repays him even more generously.

  43. the radiance that had made: Charles. In line 33 he had promised to give Dante what would make him joyous.

  48. adding new delight to its delight: Love of others is the delight and radiance of these souls. The thought of being able to give pleasure to Dante by answering his question makes the light of loving bliss swell and burn even more brightly.

  51. yet to be: Charles is talking, of course, as of 1300. There were yet to be more than two years of war before the defeat of Charles of Valois in Sicily and the peace of 1303.

  54. The silkworm in its cocoon was a common symbol of transfiguring rebirth. Note that the Sphere of Venus is the last in which the souls suggest any trace of human form or lineaments. The spirits higher up appear only as flames, until, in the Empyrean, something like their human forms reappears but mystically transfigured.

  57. more than the green leaves: Charles stayed in Florence for three weeks on his visit of 1294, was warmly received by the Florentines, and responded warmly. Dante seems to have struck up a friendship with Charles and seems to have been promised Charles’s love and patronage. Had Charles lived, Dante would have seen more than the promise (the green leaves) of Charles’s love; he would have seen the fruit of it (active patronage).

  58-60. The left bank, etc.: The land so marked was Provence. Charles I (King of Naples and brother of the King of France) acquired it by marriage. It thus became attached to the crown of Naples, was passed on to Charles II, and would have passed on to Charles Martel as the firstborn son.

  61. that horn of Italy: The territory so described was the former Kingdom of Naples, to which Charles was also heir. The Tronto and the Verde (now called the Garigliano) draw a nearly complete line across Italy. Together they were the main boundary between the Papal States to the north and the Kingdom of Naples to the south.

  64-66. The Danube rises in Germany and flows east through Hungary. Charles Martel had the glow of the Hungarian crown on his brow, but the throne was occupied by Andreas III of Venice. Charles was King in title only. In 1310 Charles Robert, son of Charles Martel, became King of Hungary in fact as well as in title.

  66-75. And though not yet my own: The passage is in Dante’s denser style and complicated by the strange parenthesis about Typhoeus, a Titan associated with the fires and smokes of the earth’s interior. He rose against Zeus, who (in the legend Dante follows) hurled him deep into the earth and piled Aetna upon him. Dante, in his paradisal freedom from the errors of mythology, explains that the smoke shrouds of Sicily are caused not by Typhoeus but by the burning sulfur of volcanoes.

  The parenthesis understood, the gist of the rest of the passage is that Charles Martel, but for the overthrow of the French in the Sicilian Vespers, would have ruled Sicily and so continued in his sons the bloodlines of Anjou (on his side) and of Rudolph of Hapsburg (on his wife’s side). Faro: Cape Faro, the northeast tip of Sicily. Passero: Cape Passero, the southeast tip. Dante calls them Pelorus and Pachynus. Eurus: The east wind. the bitter breath . . . Palermo’s streets: The Sicilian Vespers. misrule: Of Charles I of Anjou.

  76-78. Robert: Became King of Naples in 1309. He was one of the younger brothers of Charles Martel who remained in Spain from 1288 to 1295 as hostages for Charles II. In Catalonia, Robert made friends among the Spanish, who later became powerful in his government of Naples and who, in the greed of their poverty, oppressed the people. Charles is prophesying that Robert, a weak man, will reap a bad harvest from the seeds of misrule he has sown.

  80. on his ship: Charles Martel may mean the “ship” of Robert’s soul, already wallowing under the load of Catalonian avarice he has permitted, and which may damn him too; or he may mean the “ship” of state of abused Naples, once destined to be his own kingdom.

  85-90. The sense of this difficult passage depends on the reader’s awareness of “there where every good begins and ends.” I believe “there” is best understood as “the Empyrean” (the true seat of these souls whose manifestations appear in the various heavens). With “there” so understood, the passage may be paraphrased: “Because I believe this felicity I feel is as clear to you up ‘there’ as it is to me, it is the dearer to me. And it is also dear to me that you discern my felicity (up ‘there’) by looking directly upon God (to whom my joy is known) rather than by looking merely into my heart.”

  93 ff. THE VARIATIONS OF PERSONAL ENDOWMENT. Dante asks how sweet seed can bear sour fruit, i.e., how a noble father can beget a mean son. Charles explains the central truth whereby what is now behind Dante’s back (hence, unseen) will reveal itself to his eyes.

  Obviously it would not be just for one family or bloodline to inherit all the high qualities of mankind, as would be the case if the sons of great fathers always inherited greatness. God does not will it so.

  Yet such would be the case were the qualities of the father (the active male principle as discussed in Purgatorio, XXV, 37 ff.) transmitted to the children without any external force affecting the transmission. That external force is the influence of the stars bearing on the hour of the individual’s birth in order to serve God’s just and harmonious ends. For God created man as a social being, and since society requires many different talents, God assigns to the spheres the power to generate this necessary diversity.

  99. these great bodies: The heavenly bodies. Their influences on mankind are powers granted them by God’s providence. (Note that Dante uses “providence” always in the sense of “prevision,” i.e., foresight.)
>
  109-111. The argument here is reductio ad absurdum. The heavenly bodies could produce chaos instead of harmony only if the Intelligences that move each sphere were imperfect, and if the First Intelligence (God) were also imperfect, having created defective agents. Since these things cannot be, the argument is false, and one must conclude that only harmony can flow from the order of God’s creation, all things interplaying to His ordained ends.