Jersusalem Delivered

by Torquato Tasso

"Great pains, great travel, lords, you have begun,

  And of a cunning guide great need you stand,

  Far off, alas! is great Bertoldo's son,

  Imprisoned in a waste and desert land,

  What soil remains by which you must not run,

  What promontory, rock, sea, shore or sand

  Your search must stretch before the prince be found,

  Beyond our world, beyond our half of ground!

  "But yet vouchsafe to see my cell I pray,

  In hidden caves and vaults though builded low,

  Great wonders there, strange things I will bewray,

  Things good for you to hear, and fit to know:"

  This said, he bids the river make them way,

  The flood retired, and backward gan to flow,

  And here and there two crystal mountains rise,

  So fled the Red Sea once, and Jordan thrice.

  He took their hands, and led them headlong down

  Under the flood, through vast and hollow deeps,

  Such light they had as when through shadows brown

  Of thickest deserts feeble Cynthia peeps,

  Their spacious caves they saw all overflown,

  There all his waters pure great Neptune keeps,

  And thence to moisten all the earth he brings

  Seas, rivers, floods, lakes, fountains, wells and springs:

  Whence Ganges, Indus, Volga, Ister, Po,

  Whence Euphrates, whence Tigris' spring they view,

  Whence Tanais, whence Nilus comes also,

  Although his head till then no creature knew,

  But under these a wealthy stream doth go,

  That sulphur yields and ore, rich, quick and new,

  Which the sunbeams doth polish, purge and fine,

  And makes it silver pure, and gold divine.

  And all his banks the rich and wealthy stream

  Hath fair beset with pearl and precious stone

  Like stars in sky or lamps on stage that seem,

  The darkness there was day, the night was gone,

  There sparkled, clothéd in his azure-beam,

  The heavenly sapphire, there the jacinth shone,

  The carbuncle there flamed, the diamond sheen,

  There glistered bright, there smiled the emerald green.

  Amazed the knights amid these wonders passed,

  And fixed so deep the marvels in their thought,

  That not one word they uttered, till at last

  Ubaldo spake, and thus his guide besought:

  "O father, tell me by what skill thou hast

  These wonders done? and to what place us brought?

  For well I know not if I wake or sleep,

  My heart is drowned in such amazement deep."

  "You are within the hollow womb," quoth he,

  "Of fertile earth, the nurse of all things made,

  And but you brought and guided are by me,

  Her sacred entrails could no wight invade;

  My palace shortly shall you splendent see,

  With glorious light, though built in night and shade.

  A Pagan was I born, but yet the Lord

  To grace, by baptism, hath my soul restored.

  "Nor yet by help of devil, or aid from hell,

  I do this uncouth work and wondrous feat,

  The Lord forbid I use or charm or spell

  To raise foul Dis from his infernal seat:

  But of all herbs, of every spring and well,

  The hidden power I know and virtue great,

  And all that kind hath hid from mortal sight,

  And all the stars, their motions, and their might.

  "For in these caves I dwell not buried still

  From sight of Heaven, but often I resort

  To tops of Lebanon or Carmel hill,

  And there in liquid air myself disport,

  There Mars and Venus I behold at will

  As bare as erst when Vulcan took them short,

  And how the rest roll, glide and move, I see,

  How their aspects benign or froward be.

  "And underneath my feet the clouds I view,

  Now thick, now thin, now bright with Iris' bow,

  The frost and snow, the rain, the hail, the dew,

  The winds, from whence they come and whence they blow,

  How Jove his thunder makes and lightning new,

  How with the bolt he strikes the earth below,

  How comate, crinite, caudate stars are framed

  I knew; my skill with pride my heart inflamed.

  "So learned, cunning, wise, myself I thought,

  That I supposed my wit so high might climb

  To know all things that God had framed or wrought,

  Fire, air, sea, earth, man, beast, sprite, place and time;

  But when your hermit me to baptism brought,

  And from my soul had washed the sin and crime,

  Then I perceived my sight was blindness still,

  My wit was folly, ignorance my skill.

  "Then saw I, that like owls in shining sun,

  So against the beams of truth our souls are blind,

  And at myself to smile I then begun,

  And at my heart, puffed up with folly's wind,

  Yet still these arts, as I before had done,

  I practiséd, such was the hermit's mind:

  Thus hath he changed my thoughts, my heart, my will,

  And rules mine art, my knowledge, and my skill.

  "In him I rest, on him my thoughts depend,

  My lord, my teacher, and my guide is he,

  This noble work he strives to bring to end,

  He is the architect, the workmen we,

  The hardy youth home to this camp to send

  From prison strong, my care, my charge shall be;

  So He commands, and me ere this foretold

  Your coming oft, to seek the champion bold."

  While this he said, he brought the champions twain

  Down to a vault, wherein he dwells and lies,

  It was a cave, high, wide, large, ample, plain,

  With goodly rooms, halls, chambers, galleries,

  All what is bred in rich and precious vein

  Of wealthy earth, and hid from mortal eyes,

  There shines, and fair adorned was every part

  With riches grown by kind, not framed by art:

  An hundred grooms, quick, diligent and neat,

  Attendance gave about these strangers bold,

  Against the wall there stood a cupboard great

  Of massive plate, of silver, crystal, gold.

  But when with precious wines and costly meat

  They filléd were, thus spake the wizard old:

  "Now fits the time, sir knights, I tell and show

  What you desire to hear, and long to know.

  "Armida's craft, her sleight and hidden guile

  You partly wot, her acts and arts untrue,

  How to your camp she came, and by what wile

  The greatest lords and princes thence she drew;

  You know she turned them first to monsters vile,

  And kept them since closed up in secret mew,

  Lastly, to Gaza-ward in bonds them sent,

  Whom young Rinaldo rescued as they went.

  "What chancéd since I will at large declare,

  To you unknown, a story strange and true.

  When first her prey, got with such pain and care,

  Escaped and gone the witch perceived and knew,

  Her hands she wrung for grief, her clothes she tare,

  And full of woe these heavy words outthrew:

  'Alas! my knights are slain, my prisoners free,

  Yet of that conquest never boast shall he,

  "'He in their place shall serve me, and sustain

  Their plagues, their torments suffer, sorrows bear,

  And they his absence shall lament in vain,

  And wail his loss and theirs with many
a tear:'

  Thus talking to herself she did ordain

  A false and wicked guile, as you shall hear;

  Thither she hasted where the valiant knight

  Had overcome and slain her men in fight.

  "Rinaldo there had doft and left his own,

  And on his back a Pagan's harness tied,

  Perchance he deeméd so to pass unknown,

  And in those arms less noted false to ride.

  A headless corse in fight late overthrown,

  The witch in his forsaken arms did hide,

  And by a brook exposed it on the sand

  Whither she wished would come a Christian band:

  "Their coming might the dame foreknow right well,

  For secret spies she sent forth thousand ways,

  Which every day news from the camp might tell,

  Who parted thence, booties to search or preys:

  Beside, the sprites conjured by sacred spell,

  All what she asks or doubts, reveals and says,

  The body therefore placed she in that part

  That furthered best her sleight, her craft, and art;

  "And near the corpse a varlet false and sly

  She left, attired in shepherd's homely weed,

  And taught him how to counterfeit and lie

  As time required, and he performed the deed;

  With him your soldiers spoke, of jealousy

  And false suspect mongst them he strewed the seed,

  That since brought forth the fruit of strife and jar,

  Of civil brawls, contention, discord, war.

  "And as she wishéd so the soldiers thought

  By Godfrey's practice that the prince was slain,

  Yet vanished that suspicion false to naught

  When truth spread forth her silver wings again:

  Her false devices thus Armida wrought,

  This was her first deceit, her foremost train;

  What next she practised, shall you hear me tell,

  Against our knight, and what thereof befell.

  "Armida hunted him through wood and plain,

  Till on Orontes' flowery banks he stayed,

  There, where the stream did part and meet again

  And in the midst a gentle island made,

  A pillar fair was pight beside the main,

  Near which a little frigate floating laid,

  The marble white the prince did long behold,

  And this inscription read, there writ in gold:

  "'Whoso thou art whom will or chance doth bring

  With happy steps to flood Orontes' sides,

  Know that the world hath not so strange a thing,

  Twixt east and west, as this small island hides,

  Then pass and see, without more tarrying.'

  The hasty youth to pass the stream provides,

  And for the cogg was narrow, small and strait,

  Alone he rowed, and bade his squires there wait;

  "Landed he stalks about, yet naught he sees

  But verdant groves, sweet shades, and mossy rocks

  With caves and fountains, flowers, herbs and trees,

  So that the words he read he takes for mocks:

  But that green isle was sweet at all degrees,

  Wherewith enticed down sits he and unlocks

  His closéd helm, and bares his visage fair,

  To take sweet breath from cool and gentle air.

  "A rumbling sound amid the waters deep

  Meanwhile he heard, and thither turned his sight,

  And tumbling in the troubled stream took keep

  How the strong waves together rush and fight,

  Whence first he saw, with golden tresses, peep

  The rising visage of a virgin bright,

  And then her neck, her breasts, and all, as low

  As he for shame could see, or she could show.

  "So in the twilight does sometimes appear

  A nymph, a goddess, or a fairy queen,

  And though no siren but a sprite this were

  Yet by her beauty seemed it she had been

  One of those sisters false which haunted near

  The Tyrrhene shores and kept those waters sheen,

  Like theirs her face, her voice was, and her sound,

  And thus she sung, and pleased both skies and ground;

  "'Ye happy youths, who April fresh and May

  Attire in flowering green of lusty age,

  For glory vain, or virtue's idle ray,

  Do not your tender limbs to toil engage;

  In calm streams, fishes; birds, in sunshine play,

  Who followeth pleasure he is only sage,

  So nature saith, yet gainst her sacred will

  Why still rebel you, and why strive you still?

  "'O fools who youth possess, yet scorn the same,

  A precious, but a short-abiding treasure,

  Virtue itself is but an idle name,

  Prized by the world 'bove reason all and measure,

  And honor, glory, praise, renown and fame,

  That men's proud hearts bewitch with tickling pleasure

  An echo is, a shade, a dream, a flower,

  With each wind blasted, spoiled with every shower.

  "'But let your happy souls in joy possess

  The ivory castles of your bodies fair,

  Your passéd harms salve with forgetfulness,

  Haste not your coming evils with thought and care,

  Regard no blazing star with burning tress,

  Nor storm, nor threatening sky, nor thundering air,

  This wisdom is, good life, and worldly bliss,

  Kind teacheth us, nature commands us this.'

  "Thus sung the spirit false, and stealing sleep,

  To which her tunes enticed his heavy eyes,

  By step and step did on his senses creep,

  Still every limb therein unmovéd lies,

  Not thunders loud could from this slumber deep,

  Of quiet death true image, make him rise:

  Then from her ambush forth Armida start,

  Swearing revenge, and threatening torments smart.

  "But when she lookéd on his face awhile,

  And saw how sweet he breathed, how still he lay,

  How his fair eyes though closéd seemed to smile,

  At first she stayed, astound with great dismay,

  Then sat her down, so love can art beguile,

  And as she sat and looked, fled fast away

  Her wrath, that on his forehead gazed the maid,

  As in his spring Narcissus tooting laid;

  "And with a veil she wipéd now and then

  From his fair cheeks the globes of silver sweat,

  And cool air gathered with a trembling fan,

  To mitigate the rage of melting heat,

  Thus, who would think it, his hot eye-glance can

  Of that cold frost dissolve the hardness great

  Which late congealed the heart of that fair dame,

  Who late a foe, a lover now became.

  "Of woodbines, lilies, and of roses sweet,

  Which proudly flowered through that wanton plain,

  All platted fast, well knit, and joinéd meet,

  She framed a soft but surely holding chain,

  Wherewith she bound his neck his hands and feet;

  Thus bound, thus taken, did the prince remain,

  And in a coach which two old dragons drew,

  She laid the sleeping knight, and thence she flew:

  "Nor turned she to Damascus' kingdoms large,

  Nor to the fort built in Asphaltë's lake,

  But jealous of her dear and precious charge,

  And of her love ashamed, the way did take,

  To the wide ocean whither skiff or barge

  From us doth seld or never voyage make,

  And there to frolic with her love awhile,

  She chose a waste, a sole and desert isle.

  "An isle that with
her fellows bears the name

  Of Fortunate, for temperate air and mould,

  There in a mountain high alight the dame,

  A hill obscured with shades of forests old,

  Upon whose sides the witch by art did frame

  Continual snow, sharp frost and winter cold,

  But on the top, fresh, pleasant, sweet and green,

  Beside a lake a palace built this queen.

  "There in perpetual sweet and flowering spring,

  She lives at ease, and joys her lord at will;

  The hardy youth from this strange prison bring

  Your valors must, directed by my skill,

  And overcome each monster and each thing,

  That guards the palace or that keeps the hill,

  Nor shall you want a guide, or engines fit,

  To bring you to the mount, or conquer it.

  "Beside the stream, yparted shall you find

  A dame, in visage young, but old in years,

  Her curléd locks about her front are twined,

  A party-colored robe of silk she wears:

  This shall conduct you swift as air or wind,

  Or that flit bird that Jove's hot weapon bears,

  A faithful pilot, cunning, trusty, sure,

  As Tiphys was, or skilful Palinure.

  "At the hill's foot, whereon the witch doth dwell,

  The serpents hiss, and cast their poison vilde,

  The ugly boars do rear their bristles fell,

  There gape the bears, and roar the lions wild;

  But yet a rod I have can easily quell

  Their rage and wrath, and make them meek and mild.

  Yet on the top and height of all the hill,

  The greatest danger lies, and greatest ill:

  "There welleth out a fair, clear, bubbling spring,

  Whose waters pure the thirsty guests entice,

  But in those liquors cold the secret sting

  Of strange and deadly poison closéd lies,

  One sup thereof the drinker's heart doth bring

  To sudden joy, whence laughter vain doth rise,

  Nor that strange merriment once stops or stays,

  Till, with his laughter's end, he end his days:

  "Then from those deadly, wicked streams refrain

  Your thirsty lips, despise the dainty cheer

  You find exposed upon the grassy plain,

  Nor those false damsels once vouchsafe to hear,

  That in melodious tunes their voices strain,

  Whose faces lovely, smiling, sweet, appear;

  But you their looks, their voice, their songs despise,

  And enter fair Armida's paradise.

  "The house is builded like a maze within,

  With turning stairs, false doors and winding ways,

  The shape whereof plotted in vellum thin

  I will you give, that all those sleights bewrays,

  In midst a garden lies, where many a gin