The Divine Comedy (Illustrated Edition). Dante Alighieri

Table of Contents

      ARGUMENT.—They come to the third gulf, wherein are punished those who have been guilty of simony. These are fixed with the head downward in certain apertures, so that no more of them than the legs appears without, and on the soles of their feet are seen burning flames. Dante is taken down by his guide into the bottom of the gulf; and there finds Pope Nicholas V, whose evil deeds, together with those of other pontiffs, are bitterly reprehended. Virgil then carries him up again to the arch, which affords them a passage over the following gulf.

      WOE to thee, Simon Magus! woe to you,

      His wretched followers! who the things of God,

      Which should be wedded unto goodness, them,

      Rapacious as ye are, do prostitute

      For gold and silver in adultery!

      Now must the trumpet sound for you, since yours

      Is the third chasm. Upon the following vault

      We now had mounted, where the rock impends

      Directly o’er the centre of the foss.

      Wisdom Supreme! how wonderful the art,

      Which thou dost manifest in heaven, in earth,

      And in the evil world, how just a meed

      Allotting by thy virtue unto all!

      I saw the livid stone, throughout the sides

      And in its bottom full of apertures,

      All equal in their width, and circular each,

      Nor ample less nor larger they appear’d

Than in Saint John’s fair dome1 of me belov’d

      Those fram’d to hold the pure baptismal streams,

      One of the which I brake, some few years past,

      To save a whelming infant; and be this

      A seal to undeceive whoever doubts

      The motive of my deed. From out the mouth

      Of every one, emerg’d a sinner’s feet

      And of the legs high upward as the calf

      The rest beneath was hid. On either foot

      The soles were burning, whence the flexile joints

      Glanc’d with such violent motion, as had snapt

      Asunder cords or twisted withs. As flame,

      Feeding on unctuous matter, glides along

      The surface, scarcely touching where it moves;

      So here, from heel to point, glided the flames.

      “Master! say who is he, than all the rest

      Glancing in fiercer agony, on whom

      A ruddier flame doth prey?” I thus inquir’d.

      “If thou be willing,” he replied, “that I

      Carry thee down, where least the slope bank falls,

      He of himself shall tell thee and his wrongs.”

      I then: “As pleases thee to me is best.

      Thou art my lord; and know’st that ne’er I quit

      Thy will: what silence hides that knowest thou.”

      Thereat on the fourth pier we came, we turn’d,

      And on our left descended to the depth,

      A narrow strait and perforated close.

      Nor from his side my leader set me down,

      Till to his orifice he brought, whose limb

      Quiv’ring express’d his pang. “Whoe’er thou art,

      Sad spirit! thus revers’d, and as a stake

      Driv’n in the soil!” I in these words began,

      “If thou be able, utter forth thy voice.”

      There stood I like the friar, that doth shrive

      A wretch for murder doom’d, who e’en when fix’d,

      Calleth him back, whence death awhile delays.

      He shouted: “Ha! already standest there?

Already standest there, O Boniface!2

      By many a year the writing play’d me false.

      So early dost thou surfeit with the wealth,

      For which thou fearedst not in guile to take

      The lovely lady, and then mangle her?”

      I felt as those who, piercing not the drift

      Of answer made them, stand as if expos’d

      In mockery, nor know what to reply,

      When Virgil thus admonish’d: “Tell him quick,

      I am not he, not he, whom thou believ’st.”

      And I, as was enjoin’d me, straight replied.

      That heard, the spirit all did wrench his feet,

      And sighing next in woeful accent spake:

      “What then of me requirest?” If to know

      So much imports thee, who I am, that thou

      Hast therefore down the bank descended, learn

That in the mighty mantle I was rob’d,3

      And of a she-bear was indeed the son,

      So eager to advance my whelps, that there

      My having in my purse above I stow’d,

      And here myself. Under my head are dragg’d

      The rest, my predecessors in the guilt

      Of simony. Stretch’d at their length they lie

      Along an opening in the rock. ’Midst them

      I also low shall fall, soon as he comes,

      For whom I took thee, when so hastily

      I question’d. But already longer time

      Hath pass’d, since my souls kindled, and I thus

      Upturn’d have stood, than is his doom to stand

      Planted with fiery feet. For after him,

      One yet of deeds more ugly shall arrive,

From forth the west, a shepherd without law,4

      Fated to cover both his form and mine.

He a new Jason5 shall be call’d, of whom

      In Maccabees we read; and favour such

      As to that priest his king indulgent show’d,

Shall be of France’s monarch6 shown to him.”

      I