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Dante Alighieri - Inferno (English)
Work rating: Medium

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When Cerberus perceived us, the great worm!
   His mouths he opened, and displayed his tusks;
   Not a limb had he that was motionless.

And my Conductor, with his spans extended,
  Took of the earth, and with his fists well filled,
  He threw it into those rapacious gullets.

Such as that dog is, who by barking craves,
  And quiet grows soon as his food he gnaws,
  For to devour it he but thinks and struggles,

The like became those muzzles filth-begrimed
  Of Cerberus the demon, who so thunders
  Over the souls that they would fain be deaf.

We passed across the shadows, which subdues
  The heavy rain-storm, and we placed our feet
  Upon their vanity that person seems.

They all were lying prone upon the earth,
  Excepting one, who sat upright as soon
  As he beheld us passing on before him.

"O thou that art conducted through this Hell,"
  He said to me, "recall me, if thou canst;
  Thyself wast made before I was unmade."

And I to him: "The anguish which thou hast
  Perhaps doth draw thee out of my remembrance,
  So that it seems not I have ever seen thee.

But tell me who thou art, that in so doleful
  A place art put, and in such punishment,
  If some are greater, none is so displeasing."

And he to me: "Thy city, which is full
  Of envy so that now the sack runs over,
  Held me within it in the life serene.

You citizens were wont to call me Ciacco;
  For the pernicious sin of gluttony
  I, as thou seest, am battered by this rain.

And I, sad soul, am not the only one,
  For all these suffer the like penalty
  For the like sin;" and word no more spake he.

I answered him: "Ciacco, thy wretchedness
  Weighs on me so that it to weep invites me;
  But tell me, if thou knowest, to what shall come

The citizens of the divided city;
  If any there be just; and the occasion
  Tell me why so much discord has assailed it."

And he to me: "They, after long contention,
  Will come to bloodshed; and the rustic party
  Will drive the other out with much offence.

Then afterwards behoves it this one fall
  Within three suns, and rise again the other
  By force of him who now is on the coast.

High will it hold its forehead a long while,
  Keeping the other under heavy burdens,
  Howe`er it weeps thereat and is indignant.

The just are two, and are not understood there;
  Envy and Arrogance and Avarice
  Are the three sparks that have all hearts enkindled."

Here ended he his tearful utterance;
  And I to him: "I wish thee still to teach me,
  And make a gift to me of further speech.

Farinata and Tegghiaio, once so worthy,
  Jacopo Rusticucci, Arrigo, and Mosca,
  And others who on good deeds set their thoughts,

Say where they are, and cause that I may know them;
  For great desire constraineth me to learn
  If Heaven doth sweeten them, or Hell envenom."

And he: "They are among the blacker souls;
  A different sin downweighs them to the bottom;
  If thou so far descendest, thou canst see them.

But when thou art again in the sweet world,
  I pray thee to the mind of others bring me;
  No more I tell thee and no more I answer."

Then his straightforward eyes he turned askance,
  Eyed me a little, and then bowed his head;
  He fell therewith prone like the other blind.

And the Guide said to me: "He wakes no more
  This side the sound of the angelic trumpet;
  When shall approach the hostile Potentate,

Each one shall find again his dismal tomb,
  Shall reassume his flesh and his own figure,
  Shall hear what through eternity re-echoes."

So we passed onward o`er the filthy mixture
  Of shadows and of rain with footsteps slow,
  Touching a little on the future life.

Wherefore I said: "Master, these torments here,
  Will they increase after the mighty sentence,
  Or lesser be, or will they be as burning?"

And he to me: "Return unto thy science,
  Which wills, that as the thing more perfect is,
  The more it feels of pleasure and of pain.

Albeit that this people maledict
  To true perfection never can attain,
  Hereafter more than now they look to be."

Round in a circle by that road we went,
  Speaking much more, which I do not repeat;
  We came unto the point where the descent is;

There we found Plutus the great enemy.


Inferno: Canto VII


"Pape Satan, Pape Satan, Aleppe!"
  Thus Plutus with his clucking voice began;
  And that benignant Sage, who all things knew,

Said, to encourage me: "Let not thy fear
  Harm thee; for any power that he may have
  Shall not prevent thy going down this crag."

Then he turned round unto that bloated lip,
  And said: "Be silent, thou accursed wolf;
  Consume within thyself with thine own rage.

Not causeless is this journey to the abyss;
  Thus is it willed on high, where Michael wrought
  Vengeance upon the proud adultery."

Even as the sails inflated by the wind
  Involved together fall when snaps the mast,
  So fell the cruel monster to the earth.

Thus we descended into the fourth chasm,
  Gaining still farther on the dolesome shore
  Which all the woe of the universe insacks.

Justice of God, ah! who heaps up so many
  New toils and sufferings as I beheld?
  And why doth our transgression waste us so?

As doth the billow there upon Charybdis,
  That breaks itself on that which it encounters,
  So here the folk must dance their roundelay.

Here saw I people, more than elsewhere, many,
  On one side and the other, with great howls,
  Rolling weights forward by main force of chest.

They clashed together, and then at that point
  Each one turned backward, rolling retrograde,
  Crying, "Why keepest?" and, "Why squanderest thou?"

Thus they returned along the lurid circle
  On either hand unto the opposite point,
  Shouting their shameful metre evermore.

Then each, when he arrived there, wheeled about
  Through his half-circle to another joust;
  And I, who had my heart pierced as it were,

Exclaimed: "My Master, now declare to me
  What people these are, and if all were clerks,
  These shaven crowns upon the left of us."

And he to me: "All of them were asquint
  In intellect in the first life, so much
  That there with measure they no spending made.

Clearly enough their voices bark it forth,
  Whene`er they reach the two points of the circle,
  Where sunders them the opposite defect.

Clerks those were who no hairy covering
  Have on the head, and Popes and Cardinals,
  In whom doth Avarice practise its excess."

And I: "My Master, among such as these
  I ought forsooth to recognise some few,
  Who were infected with these maladies."

And he to me: "Vain thought thou entertainest;
  The undiscerning life which made them sordid
  Now makes them unto all discernment dim.

Forever shall they come to these two buttings;
  These from the sepulchre shall rise again
  With the fist closed, and these with tresses shorn.

Ill giving and ill keeping the fair world
  Have ta`en from them, and placed them in this scuffle;
  Whate`er it be, no words adorn I for it.

Now canst thou, Son, behold the transient farce
  Of goods that are committed unto Fortune,
  For which the human race each other buffet;

For all the gold that is beneath the moon,
  Or ever has been, of these weary souls
  Could never make a single one repose."

"Master," I said to him, "now tell me also
  What is this Fortune which thou speakest of,
  That has the world`s goods so within its clutches?"

And he to me: "O creatures imbecile,
  What ignorance is this which doth beset you?
  Now will I have thee learn my judgment of her.

He whose omniscience everything transcends
  The heavens created, and gave who should guide them,
  That every part to every part may shine,

Distributing the light in equal measure;
  He in like manner to the mundane splendours
  Ordained a general ministress and guide,

That she might change at times the empty treasures
  From race to race, from one blood to another,
  Beyond resistance of all human wisdom.

Therefore one people triumphs, and another
  Languishes, in pursuance of her judgment,
  Which hidden is, as in the grass a serpent.

Your knowledge has no counterstand against her;
  She makes provision, judges, and pursues
  Her governance, as theirs the other gods.

Her permutations have not any truce;
  Necessity makes her precipitate,
  So often cometh who his turn obtains.

And this is she who is so crucified
  Even by those who ought to give her praise,
  Giving her blame amiss, and bad repute.

But she is blissful, and she hears it not;
  Among the other primal creatures gladsome
  She turns her sphere, and blissful she rejoices.

Let us descend now unto greater woe;
  Already sinks each star that was ascending
  When I set out, and loitering is forbidden."

We crossed the circle to the other bank,
  Near to a fount that boils, and pours itself
  Along a gully that runs out of it.

The water was more sombre far than perse;
  And we, in company with the dusky waves,
  Made entrance downward by a path uncouth.

A marsh it makes, which has the name of Styx,
  This tristful brooklet, when it has descended
  Down to the foot of the malign gray shores.

And I, who stood intent upon beholding,
  Saw people mud-besprent in that lagoon,
  All of them naked and with angry look.

They smote each other not alone with hands,
  But with the head and with the breast and feet,
  Tearing each other piecemeal with their teeth.

Said the good Master: "Son, thou now beholdest
  The souls of those whom anger overcame;
  And likewise I would have thee know for certain

Beneath the water people are who sigh
  And make this water bubble at the surface,
  As the eye tells thee wheresoe`er it turns.

Fixed in the mire they say, `We sullen were
  In the sweet air, which by the sun is gladdened,
  Bearing within ourselves the sluggish reek;

Now we are sullen in this sable mire.`
  This hymn do they keep gurgling in their throats,
  For with unbroken words they cannot say it."

Thus we went circling round the filthy fen
  A great arc `twixt the dry bank and the swamp,
  With eyes turned unto those who gorge the mire;

Unto the foot of a tower we came at last.


Inferno: Canto VIII


I say, continuing, that long before
  We to the foot of that high tower had come,
  Our eyes went upward to the summit of it,

By reason of two flamelets we saw placed there,
  And from afar another answer them,
  So far, that hardly could the eye attain it.

And, to the sea of all discernment turned,
  I said: "What sayeth this, and what respondeth
  That other fire? and who are they that made it?"

And he to me: "Across the turbid waves
  What is expected thou canst now discern,
  If reek of the morass conceal it not."

Cord never shot an arrow from itself
  That sped away athwart the air so swift,
  As I beheld a very little boat

Come o`er the water tow`rds us at that moment,
  Under the guidance of a single pilot,
  Who shouted, "Now art thou arrived, fell soul?"

"Phlegyas, Phlegyas, thou criest out in vain
  For this once," said my Lord; "thou shalt not have us
  Longer than in the passing of the slough."

As he who listens to some great deceit
  That has been done to him, and then resents it,
  Such became Phlegyas, in his gathered wrath.

My Guide descended down into the boat,
  And then he made me enter after him,
  And only when I entered seemed it laden.

Soon as the Guide and I were in the boat,
  The antique prow goes on its way, dividing
  More of the water than `tis wont with others.

While we were running through the dead canal,
  Uprose in front of me one full of mire,
  And said, "Who `rt thou that comest ere the hour?"

And I to him: "Although I come, I stay not;
  But who art thou that hast become so squalid?"
  "Thou seest that I am one who weeps," he answered.

And I to him: "With weeping and with wailing,
  Thou spirit maledict, do thou remain;
  For thee I know, though thou art all defiled."

Then stretched he both his hands unto the boat;
  Whereat my wary Master thrust him back,
  Saying, "Away there with the other dogs!"

Thereafter with his arms he clasped my neck;
  He kissed my face, and said: "Disdainful soul,
  Blessed be she who bore thee in her bosom.

That was an arrogant person in the world;
  Goodness is none, that decks his memory;
  So likewise here his shade is furious.

How many are esteemed great kings up there,
  Who here shall be like unto swine in mire,
  Leaving behind them horrible dispraises!"

And I: "My Master, much should I be pleased,
  If I could see him soused into this broth,
  Before we issue forth out of the lake."

And he to me: "Ere unto thee the shore
  Reveal itself, thou shalt be satisfied;
  Such a desire `tis meet thou shouldst enjoy."

A little after that, I saw such havoc
  Made of him by the people of the mire,
  That still I praise and thank my God for it.

They all were shouting, "At Philippo Argenti!"
  And that exasperate spirit Florentine
  Turned round upon himself with his own teeth.

We left him there, and more of him I tell not;
  But on mine ears there smote a lamentation,
  Whence forward I intent unbar mine eyes.

And the good Master said: "Even now, my Son,
  The city draweth near whose name is Dis,
  With the grave citizens, with the great throng."

And I: "Its mosques already, Master, clearly
  Within there in the valley I discern
  Vermilion, as if issuing from the fire

They were."  And he to me: "The fire eternal
  That kindles them within makes them look red,
  As thou beholdest in this nether Hell."

Then we arrived within the moats profound,
  That circumvallate that disconsolate city;
  The walls appeared to me to be of iron.

Not without making first a circuit wide,
  We came unto a place where loud the pilot
  Cried out to us, "Debark, here is the entrance."

More than a thousand at the gates I saw
  Out of the Heavens rained down, who angrily
  Were saying, "Who is this that without death

Goes through the kingdom of the people dead?"
  And my sagacious Master made a sign
  Of wishing secretly to speak with them.

A little then they quelled their great disdain,
  And said: "Come thou alone, and he begone
  Who has so boldly entered these dominions.

Let him return alone by his mad road;
  Try, if he can; for thou shalt here remain,
  Who hast escorted him through such dark regions."

Think, Reader, if I was discomforted
  At utterance of the accursed words;
  For never to return here I believed.

"O my dear Guide, who more than seven times
  Hast rendered me security, and drawn me
  From imminent peril that before me stood,

Do not desert me," said I, "thus undone;
  And if the going farther be denied us,
  Let us retrace our steps together swiftly."

And that Lord, who had led me thitherward,
  Said unto me: "Fear not; because our passage
  None can take from us, it by Such is given.

But here await me, and thy weary spirit
  Comfort and nourish with a better hope;
  For in this nether world I will not leave thee."

So onward goes and there abandons me
  My Father sweet, and I remain in doubt,
  For No and Yes within my head contend.

I could not hear what he proposed to them;
  But with them there he did not linger long,
  Ere each within in rivalry ran back.

They closed the portals, those our adversaries,
  On my Lord`s breast, who had remained without
  And turned to me with footsteps far between.

His eyes cast down, his forehead shorn had he
  Of all its boldness, and he said, with sighs,
  "Who has denied to me the dolesome houses?"

And unto me: "Thou, because I am angry,
  Fear not, for I will conquer in the trial,
  Whatever for defence within be planned.

This arrogance of theirs is nothing new;
  For once they used it at less secret gate,
  Which finds itself without a fastening still.

O`er it didst thou behold the dead inscription;
  And now this side of it descends the steep,
  Passing across the circles without escort,

One by whose means the city shall be opened."


Inferno: Canto IX


That hue which cowardice brought out on me,
  Beholding my Conductor backward turn,
  Sooner repressed within him his new colour.

He stopped attentive, like a man who listens,
  Because the eye could not conduct him far
  Through the black air, and through the heavy fog.

"Still it behoveth us to win the fight,"
  Began he; "Else. . .Such offered us herself. . .
  O how I long that some one here arrive!"

Well I perceived, as soon as the beginning
  He covered up with what came afterward,
  That they were words quite different from the first;

But none the less his saying gave me fear,
  Because I carried out the broken phrase,
  Perhaps to a worse meaning than he had.

"Into this bottom of the doleful conch
  Doth any e`er descend from the first grade,
  Which for its pain has only hope cut off?"

This question put I; and he answered me:
  "Seldom it comes to pass that one of us
  Maketh the journey upon which I go.

True is it, once before I here below
  Was conjured by that pitiless Erictho,
  Who summoned back the shades unto their bodies.

Naked of me short while the flesh had been,
  Before within that wall she made me enter,
  To bring a spirit from the circle of Judas;

That is the lowest region and the darkest,
  And farthest from the heaven which circles all.
  Well know I the way; therefore be reassured.

This fen, which a prodigious stench exhales,
  Encompasses about the city dolent,
  Where now we cannot enter without anger."

And more he said, but not in mind I have it;
  Because mine eye had altogether drawn me
  Tow`rds the high tower with the red-flaming summit,

Where in a moment saw I swift uprisen
  The three infernal Furies stained with blood,
  Who had the limbs of women and their mien,

And with the greenest hydras were begirt;
  Small serpents and cerastes were their tresses,
  Wherewith their horrid temples were entwined.

And he who well the handmaids of the Queen
  Of everlasting lamentation knew,
  Said unto me: "Behold the fierce Erinnys.

This is Megaera, on the left-hand side;
  She who is weeping on the right, Alecto;
  Tisiphone is between;" and then was silent.

Each one her breast was rending with her nails;
  They beat them with their palms, and cried so loud,
  That I for dread pressed close unto the Poet.

"Medusa come, so we to stone will change him!"
  All shouted looking down; "in evil hour
  Avenged we not on Theseus his assault!"

"Turn thyself round, and keep thine eyes close shut,
  For if the Gorgon appear, and thou shouldst see it,
  No more returning upward would there be."

Thus said the Master; and he turned me round
  Himself, and trusted not unto my hands
  So far as not to blind me with his own.

O ye who have undistempered intellects,
  Observe the doctrine that conceals itself
  Beneath the veil of the mysterious verses!

And now there came across the turbid waves
  The clangour of a sound with terror fraught,
  Because of which both of the margins trembled;

Not otherwise it was than of a wind
  Impetuous on account of adverse heats,
  That smites the forest, and, without restraint,

The branches rends, beats down, and bears away;
  Right onward, laden with dust, it goes superb,
  And puts to flight the wild beasts and the shepherds.

Mine eyes he loosed, and said: "Direct the nerve
  Of vision now along that ancient foam,
  There yonder where that smoke is most intense."

Even as the frogs before the hostile serpent
  Across the water scatter all abroad,
  Until each one is huddled in the earth.

More than a thousand ruined souls I saw,
  Thus fleeing from before one who on foot
  Was passing o`er the Styx with soles unwet.

From off his face he fanned that unctuous air,
  Waving his left hand oft in front of him,
  And only with that anguish seemed he weary.

Well I perceived one sent from Heaven was he,
  And to the Master turned; and he made sign
  That I should quiet stand, and bow before him.

Ah! how disdainful he appeared to me!
  He reached the gate, and with a little rod
  He opened it, for there was no resistance.

"O banished out of Heaven, people despised!"
  Thus he began upon the horrid threshold;
  "Whence is this arrogance within you couched?

Wherefore recalcitrate against that will,
  From which the end can never be cut off,
  And which has many times increased your pain?

What helpeth it to butt against the fates?
  Your Cerberus, if you remember well,
  For that still bears his chin and gullet peeled."

Then he returned along the miry road,
  And spake no word to us, but had the look
  Of one whom other care constrains and goads

Than that of him who in his presence is;
  And we our feet directed tow`rds the city,
  After those holy words all confident.

Within we entered without any contest;
  And I, who inclination had to see
  What the condition such a fortress holds,

Soon as I was within, cast round mine eye,
  And see on every hand an ample plain,
  Full of distress and torment terrible.

Even as at Arles, where stagnant grows the Rhone,
  Even as at Pola near to the Quarnaro,
  That shuts in Italy and bathes its borders,

The sepulchres make all the place uneven;
  So likewise did they there on every side,
  Saving that there the manner was more bitter;

For flames between the sepulchres were scattered,
  By which they so intensely heated were,
  That iron more so asks not any art.

All of their coverings uplifted were,
  And from them issued forth such dire laments,
  Sooth seemed they of the wretched and tormented.

And I: "My Master, what are all those people
  Who, having sepulture within those tombs,
  Make themselves audible by doleful sighs?"

And he to me: "Here are the Heresiarchs,
  With their disciples of all sects, and much
  More than thou thinkest laden are the tombs.

Here like together with its like is buried;
  And more and less the monuments are heated."
  And when he to the right had turned, we passed

Between the torments and high parapets.


Inferno: Canto X


Now onward goes, along a narrow path
  Between the torments and the city wall,
  My Master, and I follow at his back.

"O power supreme, that through these impious circles
  Turnest me," I began, "as pleases thee,
  Speak to me, and my longings satisfy;

The people who are lying in these tombs,
  Might they be seen? already are uplifted
  The covers all, and no one keepeth guard."

And he to me: "They all will be closed up
  When from Jehoshaphat they shall return
  Here with the bodies they have left above.

Their cemetery have upon this side
  With Epicurus all his followers,
  Who with the body mortal make the soul;

But in the question thou dost put to me,
  Within here shalt thou soon be satisfied,
  And likewise in the wish thou keepest silent."

And I: "Good Leader, I but keep concealed
  From thee my heart, that I may speak the less,
  Nor only now hast thou thereto disposed me."

"O Tuscan, thou who through the city of fire
  Goest alive, thus speaking modestly,
  Be pleased to stay thy footsteps in this place.

Thy mode of speaking makes thee manifest
  A native of that noble fatherland,
  To which perhaps I too molestful was."

Upon a sudden issued forth this sound
  From out one of the tombs; wherefore I pressed,
  Fearing, a little nearer to my Leader.

And unto me he said: "Turn thee; what dost thou?
  Behold there Farinata who has risen;
  From the waist upwards wholly shalt thou see him."

I had already fixed mine eyes on his,
  And he uprose erect with breast and front
  E`en as if Hell he had in great despite.

And with courageous hands and prompt my Leader
  Thrust me between the sepulchres towards him,
  Exclaiming, "Let thy words explicit be."

As soon as I was at the foot of his tomb
  Somewhat he eyed me, and, as if disdainful,
  Then asked of me, "Who were thine ancestors?"

I, who desirous of obeying was,
  Concealed it not, but all revealed to him;
  Whereat he raised his brows a little upward.

Then said he: "Fiercely adverse have they been
  To me, and to my fathers, and my party;
  So that two several times I scattered them."

"If they were banished, they returned on all sides,"
  I answered him, "the first time and the second;
  But yours have not acquired that art aright."

Then there uprose upon the sight, uncovered
  Down to the chin, a shadow at his side;
  I think that he had risen on his knees.

Round me he gazed, as if solicitude
  He had to see if some one else were with me,
  But after his suspicion was all spent,

Weeping, he said to me: "If through this blind
  Prison thou goest by loftiness of genius,
  Where is my son? and why is he not with thee?"

And I to him: "I come not of myself;
  He who is waiting yonder leads me here,
  Whom in disdain perhaps your Guido had."

His language and the mode of punishment
  Already unto me had read his name;
  On that account my answer was so full.

Up starting suddenly, he cried out: "How
  Saidst thou,--he had?  Is he not still alive?
  Does not the sweet light strike upon his eyes?"

When he became aware of some delay,
  Which I before my answer made, supine
  He fell again, and forth appeared no more.

But the other, magnanimous, at whose desire
  I had remained, did not his aspect change,
  Neither his neck he moved, nor bent his side.

"And if," continuing his first discourse,
  "They have that art," he said, "not learned aright,
  That more tormenteth me, than doth this bed.

But fifty times shall not rekindled be
  The countenance of the Lady who reigns here,
  Ere thou shalt know how heavy is that art;

And as thou wouldst to the sweet world return,
  Say why that people is so pitiless
  Against my race in each one of its laws?"

Whence I to him: "The slaughter and great carnage
  Which have with crimson stained the Arbia, cause
  Such orisons in our temple to be made."

After his head he with a sigh had shaken,
  "There I was not alone," he said, "nor surely
  Without a cause had with the others moved.

But there I was alone, where every one
  Consented to the laying waste of Florence,
  He who defended her with open face."

"Ah! so hereafter may your seed repose,"
  I him entreated, "solve for me that knot,
  Which has entangled my conceptions here.

It seems that you can see, if I hear rightly,
  Beforehand whatsoe`er time brings with it,
  And in the present have another mode."

"We see, like those who have imperfect sight,
  The things," he said, "that distant are from us;
  So much still shines on us the Sovereign Ruler.

When they draw near, or are, is wholly vain
  Our intellect, and if none brings it to us,
  Not anything know we of your human state.

Hence thou canst understand, that wholly dead
  Will be our knowledge from the moment when
  The portal of the future shall be closed."

Then I, as if compunctious for my fault,
  Said: "Now, then, you will tell that fallen one,
  That still his son is with the living joined.

And if just now, in answering, I was dumb,
  Tell him I did it because I was thinking
  Already of the error you have solved me."

And now my Master was recalling me,
  Wherefore more eagerly I prayed the spirit
  That he would tell me who was with him there.

He said: "With more than a thousand here I lie;
  Within here is the second Frederick,
  And the Cardinal, and of the rest I speak not."

Thereon he hid himself; and I towards
  The ancient poet turned my steps, reflecting
  Upon that saying, which seemed hostile to me.

He moved along; and afterward thus going,
  He said to me, "Why art thou so bewildered?"
  And I in his inquiry satisfied him.

"Let memory preserve what thou hast heard
  Against thyself," that Sage commanded me,
  "And now attend here;" and he raised his finger.

"When thou shalt be before the radiance sweet
  Of her whose beauteous eyes all things behold,
  From her thou`lt know the journey of thy life."

Unto the left hand then he turned his feet;
  We left the wall, and went towards the middle,
  Along a path that strikes into a valley,

Which even up there unpleasant made its stench.


Inferno: Canto XI


Upon the margin of a lofty bank
  Which great rocks broken in a circle made,
  We came upon a still more cruel throng;

And there, by reason of the horrible
  Excess of stench the deep abyss throws out,
  We drew ourselves aside behind the cover

Of a great tomb, whereon I saw a writing,
  Which said: "Pope Anastasius I hold,
  Whom out of the right way Photinus drew."

"Slow it behoveth our descent to be,
  So that the sense be first a little used
  To the sad blast, and then we shall not heed it."

The Master thus; and unto him I said,
  "Some compensation find, that the time pass not
  Idly;" and he: "Thou seest I think of that.

My son, upon the inside of these rocks,"
  Began he then to say, "are three small circles,
  From grade to grade, like those which thou art leaving.

They all are full of spirits maledict;
  But that hereafter sight alone suffice thee,
  Hear how and wherefore they are in constraint.

Of every malice that wins hate in Heaven,
  Injury is the end; and all such end
  Either by force or fraud afflicteth others.

But because fraud is man`s peculiar vice,
  More it displeases God; and so stand lowest
  The fraudulent, and greater dole assails them.

All the first circle of the Violent is;
  But since force may be used against three persons,
  In three rounds `tis divided and constructed.

To God, to ourselves, and to our neighbour can we
  Use force; I say on them and on their things,
  As thou shalt hear with reason manifest.

A death by violence, and painful wounds,
  Are to our neighbour given; and in his substance
  Ruin, and arson, and injurious levies;

Whence homicides, and he who smites unjustly,
  Marauders, and freebooters, the first round
  Tormenteth all in companies diverse.

Man may lay violent hands upon himself
  And his own goods; and therefore in the second
  Round must perforce without avail repent

Whoever of your world deprives himself,
  Who games, and dissipates his property,
  And weepeth there, where he should jocund be.

Violence can be done the Deity,
  In heart denying and blaspheming Him,
  And by disdaining Nature and her bounty.

And for this reason doth the smallest round
  Seal with its signet Sodom and Cahors,
  And who, disdaining God, speaks from the heart.

Fraud, wherewithal is every conscience stung,
  A man may practise upon him who trusts,
  And him who doth no confidence imburse.

This latter mode, it would appear, dissevers
  Only the bond of love which Nature makes;
  Wherefore within the second circle nestle

Hypocrisy, flattery, and who deals in magic,
  Falsification, theft, and simony,
  Panders, and barrators, and the like filth.

By the other mode, forgotten is that love
  Which Nature makes, and what is after added,
  From which there is a special faith engendered.

Hence in the smallest circle, where the point is
  Of the Universe, upon which Dis is seated,
  Whoe`er betrays for ever is consumed."

And I: "My Master, clear enough proceeds
  Thy reasoning, and full well distinguishes
  This cavern and the people who possess it.

But tell me, those within the fat lagoon,
  Whom the wind drives, and whom the rain doth beat,
  And who encounter with such bitter tongues,

Wherefore are they inside of the red city
  Not punished, if God has them in his wrath,
  And if he has not, wherefore in such fashion?"

And unto me he said: "Why wanders so
  Thine intellect from that which it is wont?
  Or, sooth, thy mind where is it elsewhere looking?

Hast thou no recollection of those words
  With which thine Ethics thoroughly discusses
  The dispositions three, that Heaven abides not,--

Incontinence, and Malice, and insane
  Bestiality? and how Incontinence
  Less God offendeth, and less blame attracts?

If thou regardest this conclusion well,
  And to thy mind recallest who they are
  That up outside are undergoing penance,

Clearly wilt thou perceive why from these felons
  They separated are, and why less wroth
  Justice divine doth smite them with its hammer."

"O Sun, that healest all distempered vision,
  Thou dost content me so, when thou resolvest,
  That doubting pleases me no less than knowing!

Once more a little backward turn thee," said I,
  "There where thou sayest that usury offends
  Goodness divine, and disengage the knot."

"Philosophy," he said, "to him who heeds it,
  Noteth, not only in one place alone,
  After what manner Nature takes her course

From Intellect Divine, and from its art;
  And if thy Physics carefully thou notest,
  After not many pages shalt thou find,

That this your art as far as possible
  Follows, as the disciple doth the master;
  So that your art is, as it were, God`s grandchild.

From these two, if thou bringest to thy mind
  Genesis at the beginning, it behoves
  Mankind to gain their life and to advance;

And since the usurer takes another way,
  Nature herself and in her follower
Source
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