So long has been ordained to all our prayers

As the day lasts; but when the night comes on,
Contrary sound we take instead thereof.

At that time we repeat Pygmalion,

Of whom a traitor, thief, and parricide
Made his insatiable desire of gold;

And the misery of avaricious Midas,

That followed his inordinate demand,

At which forevermore one needs but laugh.

The foolish Achan each one then records,

And how he stole the spoils; so that the wrath
Of Joshua still appears to sting him here.

Then we accuse Sapphira with her husband,
We laud the hoof-beats Heliodorus had,
And the whole mount in infamy encircles
Polymnestor who murdered Polydorus.

Here finally is cried: 'O Crassus, tell us,
For thou dost know, what is the taste of gold?'
Sometimes we speak, one loud, another low,

According to desire of speech, that spurs us
To greater now and now to lesser pace.
But in the good that here by day is talked of,
Erewhile alone I was not; yet near by
No other person lifted up his voice."
From him already we departed were,

And made endeavour to o'ercome the road
As much as was permitted to our power,

When I perceived, like something that is falling,

The mountain tremble, whence a chill seized on me,
As seizes him who to his death is going.

Certes so violently shook not Delos,

Before Latona made her nest therein

To give birth to the two eyes of the heaven. Then upon all sides there began a cry,

Such that the Master drew himself towards me,
Saying, "Fear not, while I am guiding thee."

135

"Gloria in excelsis Deo," all

Were saying, from what near I comprehended,
Where it was possible to hear the cry.

We paused immovable and in suspense,

Even as the shepherds who first heard that song,
Until the trembling ceased, and it was finished.

Then we resumed again our holy path,

Watching the shades that lay upon the ground,
Already turned to their accustomed plaint.

140

No ignorance ever with so great a strife
Had rendered me importunate to know,
If erreth not in this my memory,
As meditating then I seemed to have;

Nor out of haste to question did I dare,
Nor of myself I there could aught perceive;
So I went onward timorous and thoughtful.

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150

CANTO XXI.

THE natural thirst, that ne'er is satisfied
Excepting with the water for whose grace
The woman of Samaria besought,

Put me in travail, and haste goaded me

Along the encumbered path behind my Leader
And I was pitying that righteous vengeance;
And lo! in the same manner as Luke writeth
That Christ appeared to two upon the way
From the sepulchral cave already risen,
A shade appeared to us, and came behind us,
Down gazing on the prostrate multitude,
Nor were we ware of it, until it spake,
Saying, "My brothers, may God give you peace!"
We turned us suddenly, and Virgilius rendered
To him the countersign thereto conforming.
Thereon began he: "In the blessed council,

Thee may the court veracious place in peace,
That me doth banish in eternal exile !"
"How," said he, and the while we went with speed,
"If ye are shades whom God deigns not on high,
Who up his stairs so far has guided you?"
And said my Teacher: "If thou note the marks

Which this one bears, and which the Angel traces Well shalt thou see he with the good must reign. But because she who spinneth day and night

For him had not yet drawn the distaff off,
Which Clotho lays for each one and compacts,
His soul, which is thy sister and my own,

In coming upwards could not come alone,
By reason that it sees not in our fashion.
Whence I was drawn from out the ample throat
Of Hell to be his guide, and I shall guide him
As far on as my school has power to lead.

But tell us, if thou knowest, why such a shudder
Erewhile the mountain gave, and why together
All seemed to cry, as far as its moist feet?"
In asking he so hit the very eye

66

Of my desire, that merely with the hope
My thirst became the less unsatisfied.
Naught is there," he began, "that without order
May the religion of the mountain feel,
Nor aught that may be foreign to its custom.
Free is it here from every permutation;

What from itself heaven in itself receiveth
Can be of this the cause, and naught beside ;
Because that neither rain, nor hail, nor snow,

Nor dew, nor hoar-frost any higher falls
Than the short, little stairway of three steps.
Dense clouds do not appear, nor rarefied,

Nor coruscation, nor the daughter of Thaumas,
That often upon earth her region shifts;

No arid vapour any farther rises

Than to the top of the three steps I spake of,
Whereon the Vicar of Peter has his feet.
Lower down perchance it trembles less or more,
But, for the wind that in the earth is hidden
I know not how, up here it never trembled.
It trembles here, whenever any soul

Feels itself pure, so that it soars, or moves
To mount aloft, and such a cry attends it.

Of purity the will alone gives proof,

Which, being wholly free to change its convent,
Takes by surprise the soul, and helps it fly.

First it wills well; but the desire permits not,
Which divine justice with the self-same will
There was to sin, upon the torment sets.

And I, who have been lying in this pain

Five hundred years and more, but just now felt
A free volition for a better seat.

Therefore thou heardst the earthquake, and the pious
Spirits along the mountain rendering praise
Unto the Lord, that soon he speed them upwards."

So said he to him; and since we enjoy

As much in drinking as the thirst is great,
I could not say how much it did me good.

And the wise Leader: "Now I see the net

That snares you here, and how ye are set free,
Why the earth quakes, and wherefore ye rejoice.

Now who thou wast be pleased that I may know;
And why so many centuries thou hast here
Been lying, let me gather from thy words."
"In days when the good Titus, with the aid

Of the supremest King, avenged the wounds
Whence issued forth the blood by Judas sold,
Under the name that most endures and honours,
Was I on earth," that spirit made reply,

66

"Greatly renowned, but not with faith as yet. My vocal spirit was so sweet, that Rome

Me, a Thoulousian, drew unto herself,
Where I deserved to deck my brows with myrtle.
Statius the people name me still on earth;

I sang of Thebes, and then of great Achilles;
But on the way fell with my second burden.

The seeds unto my ardour were the sparks

Of that celestial flame which heated me,
Whereby more than a thousand have been fired;

Of the Æneid speak I, which to me

A mother was, and was my nurse in song;
Without this weighed I not a drachma's weight.
And to have lived upon the earth what time

Virgilius lived, I would accept one sun
More than I must ere issuing from my ban."
These words towards me made Virgilius turn
With looks that in their silence said, "Be silent!"
But yet the power
that wills cannot do all things;
For tears and laughter are such pursuivants

Unto the passion from which each springs forth,
In the most truthful least the will they follow.
I only smiled, as one who gives the wink;

Whereat the shade was silent, and it gazed
Into mine eyes, where most expression dwells;
And, "As thou well mayst consummate a labour
So great," it said, "why did thy face just now
Display to me the lightning of a smile?"
Now am I caught on this side and on that;

One keeps me silent, one to speak conjures me,
Wherefore I sigh, and I am understood.
"Speak," said my Master, "and be not afraid

Of speaking, but speak out, and say to him
What he demands with such solicitude."
Whence I "Thou peradventure marvellest,
O antique spirit, at the smile I gave ;

But I will have more wonder seize upon thee.

This one, who guides on high these eyes of mine,
Is that Virgilius, from whom thou didst learn
To sing aloud of men and of the Gods.

If other cause thou to my smile imputedst,
Abandon it as false, and trust it was

Those words which thou hast spoken concerning him."
Already he was stooping to embrace

Brother,

My Teacher's feet; but he said to him: "
Do not; for shade thou art, and shade beholdest."

And he uprising: "Now canst thou the sum

Of love which warms me to thee comprehend,
When this our vanity I disremember,
Treating a shadow as substantial thing."

CANTO XXII.

ALREADY was the Angel left behind us,

The Angel who to the sixth round had turned us,
Having erased one mark from off my face;

And those who have in justice their desire

Had said to us, "Beati," in their voices,
With "sitio," and without more ended it.
And I, more light than through the other passes,
Went onward so, that without any labour
I followed upward the swift-footed spirits;
When thus Virgilius began: "The love

Kindled by virtue aye another kindles,
Provided outwardly its flame appear.
Hence from the hour that Juvenal descended
Among us into the infernal Limbo,
Who made apparent to me thy affection,
My kindliness towards thee was as great

As ever bound one to an unseen person,

So that these stairs will now seem short to me.

But tell me, and forgive me as a friend,

If too great confidence let loose the rein,
And as a friend now hold discourse with me;

How was it possible within thy breast

For avarice to find place, 'mid so much wisdom
As thou wast filled with by thy diligence?"
These words excited Statius at first

Somewhat to laughter; afterward he answered:
"Each word of thine is love's dear sign to me.