CANTO X.

THE ARGUMENT.

The Poets mount up, through a rough and narrow path, to the first round of Purgatory, where the Proud are punished. Here they see some Scriptural and Legendary examples of humility, sculptured with wondrous art in the white marble of the precipice. The shades of those who suffer for their former pride approach, each bending under the weight of a rocky burden.

WHEN we had pass'd the threshold of the gate

From which the soul's corrupt desires rebound, Making the crooked way appear the straight,1 My startled ear perceived its closing sound:

And towards it if I then had turn'd mine eyes, How could my fault a fit excuse have found? Up through a riven rock our pathway lies,

Which now on this hand now on that was bent, Even as the wave advances and then flies. "Here," said my master, as we made the ascent, "Some little skill to wind our way we need, Just as their walls the parted rocks present." With such slow steps this caused us to proceed, That now the moon, already in her wane,

Ere we from out that needle's eye were freed,2

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1 The love of sin makes men shrink back from the good way, and often deceives them with the false hope of safety without repentance and amendment of life.

2 An oriental figure to denote a narrow path or entrance.-See Matt. xix. 24.

Had reach'd her bed and gone to rest again.1

But when we thence emerged, before us lay, Where shrunk the mountain back,2 another plain; I wearied, and both doubtful of our way,

We rested there more lonely seem'd to me

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That plain, than roads which through the desert stray. From where its edge just borders vacancy

To the bank's foot from whence on high it springs, Its breadth would thrice the human stature be.

And far as now mine eye could wave its wings,

Of just such breadth, both on the left and right,
Its arms this cornice round the mountain flings.
Ere we thereon our march could expedite,

I saw the circling bank, that path direct
Had none by which to scale its lofty height,
Was of white marble with such carving deck'd,
That not alone from thence might Polycletus,1
But Nature's self even, suffer disrespect.
The angel who came down with peace to greet us,
For which the tears of ages past had stream'd,
Re-opening heaven, long shut, therein to seat us,5
Before us now so true and life-like seem'd,

'Had set in the West. Time about 11.20 A.M.

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2 As the poets ascend, the circular cliffs become less and less in circumference, being nearer the centre and summit of the mountain.

3 Dante alone was wearied, as he only had the incumbrance of a body.

4 A celebrated sculptor of Sicyon, about B.C. 232. Among the ancients he was ranked first in his profession, taking precedence even of Phidias.

5 "When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death, thou didst open the kingdom of heaven to all believers."-Te Deum Laudamus.

That sculptured there, and in such graceful act,

A silent image he could not be deem'd.

One might have sworn that he said "Hail !" in fact. 40
For she who turn'd the key of Heaven's high love,
Was imaged there in figure so exact,

The words with which her lips appear'd to move,
"Behold the handmaid of the Lord,"2 were shown,
True as doth wax the seal's impression prove.3
"Fix not thy mind on this one place alone,"
Said my sweet master then, while on that side
He had me which the human heart doth own.
I turn'd my face round, therefore, and espied
Beyond blest Mary, and on that side where
He stood who this to me had signified,
Another history in the rock traced there.
Then passing Virgil, thereto I drew nigh,
That better to mine eyes it might appear.
There on the same white marble, sculptured high,
The car and oxen drew the sacred ark,
Whence men from uncommission'd office fly.
The crowd precede it, and the whole we mark
In seven choirs parted: of my senses two,

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While one denies, one says, "They're singing, Hark!" 60 So likewise we the smoke of incense view,

1 "And the Angel came in unto her and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women."—Luke i. 28.

2 Luke i. 38.

3 Clay was used for sealing in the time of Job, xxxviii. 14. The seal was in use in the time of Jacob.-Gen. xxxviii. 18, 25. Wax has been used in Europe for sealing from very early times but sealing-wax, like what we now use, was unknown, says Beckman, till the beginning of the sixteenth century.

4 Uzzah:-2 Sam. vi. 6-8.

There imaged, which between the

eyes

and nose

With their both Yes and No make discord too. Before the consecrated ark there goes

The humble Psalmist, dancing joyfully;

Thence more or less than king himself he shows.1 At a great palace opposite we see

A window sculptured, where look'd Michal on, Like a high dame who mourns disdainfully." Now from that spot a short space I had gone

Just by, to look upon another story,

Which after Michal there all whitely shone.
There saw I sculptured the exceeding glory
Of him whose mercy won for him relief,
Through Gregory's victorious oratory.3

1 2 Sam. vii. 14.

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2 "And as the ark of the Lord came into the city of David, Michal, Saul's daughter, looked through a window, and saw king David leaping and dancing before the Lord; and she despised him in her heart."-2 Sam. vi. 16.

3 The story is told of the emperor Hadrian, by Dion Cassius, lib. lxix. “When a woman appeared before him with a suit, as he was on a journey, at first he refused her, 'I have no leisure;' but she crying out to him, 'Then reign no longer,' he turned about and heard her cause." In the Medieval writers the tale is told as in Dante, but much more copiously and with added particulars. "St. Gregory, walking one day through Trajan's forun, was thus reminded of that emperor's justice, benignity, and other virtues : he hastened to St. Peter's church, and there wept so long over the unbelief and error of that prince, that he received an answer, assuring him that he had been heard on Trajan's behalf, and that the soul of that emperor was delivered from the pains of hell.”— Golden Legend, fol. 97; Rog. Wendov. p. 62-4; Piers Ploughman's Vision, 1. 6857-7846. This is another instance in which Common Sense and Christian Piety have revolted against the Medieval doctrine which consigned all the unbaptised to eternal misery.

I speak of Trajan, that imperial chief,
And a poor widow at his bridle rein,
Pouring forth tears and in the garb of grief.
Round him a brilliant throng of knights were seen;
And over them the eagles in the breeze
Were waving to and fro in golden sheen.1
The humble widow seem'd, amidst all these,
To say, "My lord, revenge I supplicate;
My son is slain, which robs my heart of ease.”
And he seem'd thus to answer her, "Then wait
Till my return." "My lord," thus answer'd she,
(As one made hasty by her grievous fate)

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"If thou shouldst not return?" "My heir," said he,

"Will do thee right." "What meed," she seem'd to say, "If thou art slack, will his good acts bring thee ?"2 90 Then he, "Take comfort: ere I go away,

The duty I'll perform to which I'm bound.
While Justice wills it, Pity bids me stay.”

He who ne'er sees aught new, carved on the mound
This visible discourse in marble white,

So strange to us because on earth not found.3
While I was gazing with intense delight
On the sweet forms of such humility,*

1 The military standards of the Romans were generally of silver, often of gold. An eagle with expanded wings on the top of a spear, sometimes holding thunderbolts in its claws, was the common standard of the legion.

2 The woman's common sense here overturns the favorite doctrine of Purgatorial remission by the good deeds of survivors.

3 Perhaps our poet borrowed a hint here from the figures of saints and angels with scrolls in their hands, or labels proceeding from their mouths, in the illuminations of ancient missals and the paintings in church windows.

4 In this first circle of Purgatory, appropriated to the correc