Purgatorio -- Canto X

The Whip of Pride

Notes

16  For the needle’s eye, the narrow way to heaven, see Matthew 19:24 and Mark 20:25.

20  The first level is where the proud repent.

33  Polycletus (d. 412 B.C.) was a famous Greek sculptor.

34  The angel Gabriel announced the birth of Jesus to Mary (Luke 1:26-38).

55  The second scene shows King David dancing before the Ark of the Covenant, Uzzah presuming to touch it and being punished (1.57) and David’s wife Michal watching him with disapproval (l. 68). See 2 Samuel 6.

73  The emperor Trajan (d. 117 A.D.) was popularly believed to have been brought back to life and baptized by Saint Gregory. In the third panel he is shown dismounting to administer justice in behalf of a poor widow, even while on his way to battle.

100  Dante encounters the first group of penitents whose sin is pride.

          When we were past the threshold of the gate

          Which the soul’s wrongful love may never use

          Since such love makes the crooked way seem straight,

 

          I heard by its loud clanging the gate close:

5         And if I had turned my eyes back to it,

          What fit excuse could I find for my fault?

 

          We climbed the rockface through a zigzag cleft

          Which pitches from one side to the other

          Like a wave cresting in and rolling out.

 

10       "Here we must exercise some skill and care,"

          My guide began, "to stay close, now this side

          And now that, to the low receding edge."

 

          And this task made our steps so slow that now

          The waning moon had once again gone back

15       To bed, to sink into its morning rest,

 

          Before we issued from that needle’s eye.

          When we were free and out into the open,

          Up where the mount surged back to form a ledge,

 

          We halted — I worn out and the two of us

20       Unsure of our way — there on that level place

          Lonelier than a trail through empty deserts.

 

          From the edge which verges out on vacant space

          To the base of the sheer cliff soaring upward

          Measures three times the length of a man’s body;

 

25       And as far as my eyes could wing their way,

          Now equally to the left, now to the right,

          So wide the terrace seemed to stretch before me.

 

          From that spot we had yet to take a step

          When I discerned that all the inner cliff-ring,

30       Which rose so steep there was no way to scale it,

 

          Was pure white marble, and so decorated

          With carvings that they would have put to shame

          Not only Polycletus but nature too.

 

          The angel who came down to earth decreeing

35       The peace which, deeply mourned for many years,

          Has opened heaven from its long interdict

 

          Appeared before us there so faithfully

          Chiseled out in his soft-spoken bearing

          That he did not seem to be a silent image:

 

40       One would have sworn that he was saying "Ave,"

          Since she who turned the key to open up

          Love on high was also imaged there,

 

          And her attitude appeared stamped with the words:

          "Behold the handmaid of the Lord," as sharply

45       As a figure is engraved on sealing wax.

 

          "You need not fix your mind on one place only,"

          My gentle master stated, while he made me

          Stand on the side where the heart within us beats.

 

          At that I shifted my sight and gazed further

50       Past Mary, in the same right-hand direction

          Where he stood who had urged me on to look,

 

          To see another story cut in stone;

          So I crossed in front of Virgil and approached

          To have the scene disclosed before my eyes.

 

55       There carved upon the surface of the marble

          Were cart and oxen pulling the holy ark,

          To warn men not to overreach their charge.

 

          At the lead, seven choirs in separate files

          Appeared: one of my senses argued, "No,"

60       The other answered, "Yes, they really sing!"

 

          In the same way, the smoking from the incense

          Pictured there made my two eyes and nose

          Disagree between a yes and no.

 

          There in the vanguard of the sacred coffer,

65       Dancing with robes hitched up, the humble psalmist

          So proved himself both more and less than king.

 

          Opposite, depicted at the window

          Of a stately palace, Michal watched him dance,

          So like a woman filled with wrath and scorn.

 

70       I stirred my feet from the spot where I stood

          To study close at hand another story

          Which I saw shining white just past Michal.

 

          There was told the tale of the high glory

          Won by the Roman prince whose worthiness

75       Moved Gregory to make his mighty conquest:

 

          I here speak of the Emperor Trajan.

          And there was at his bridle a poor widow

          Held in a pose of weeping and distress.

 

          Surrounding him was shown a trampling press

80       Of horsemen, while eagles stitched in gold

          Waved in full view above them on the wind.

 

          Among them all the wretched woman seemed

          To cry, "Oh lord, take vengeance for my son

          Whose slaying has pierced my heart with sorrow."

 

85       And he appeared to answer her, "Now wait

          Until I shall return." And she: "My lord,"

          With urgent grief, "What if you don’t come back?"

 

          And he: "Whoever takes my place will act

          For me." And she: "What good shall someone else’s

90       Good deeds do you if you ignore your own?"

 

          To this he said, "Take comfort, since I must

          Fulfill my duty here before I leave:

          Justice claims it and pity holds me back."

 

          He in whose sight nothing is ever new

95       Created this art of visible speaking,

          Foreign to us who do not find it here.

 

          While I enjoyed myself with gazing on

          These images of high humility,

          Precious to look at for their Maker’s sake,

 

100      "Look over there," the poet murmured to me,

          "That throng of people walking with slow steps:

          They will direct us to the stairs on high."

 

          My eyes, happy to be full of wonder

          In seeing something new for which they yearn,

105     Surely were not slow to turn toward him.

 

          I would not have you, reader, in alarm

          Lose your good resolve when you now hear

          How God has willed that we should pay our debts.

 

          Pay no attention to the form of pain:

110     Think of the aftermath, think that the worst

          Will be that it will last till judgment day.

 

          "Master," I began, "what I make out

          Moving toward us does not look like people,

          But what I do not know — my sight’s so muddled!"

 

115      And he said to me, "The weighty condition

          Of their torment so bows them to the ground

          That my eyes first debated about them.

 

          "But peer there firmly and sort out by sight

          What approaches us beneath those boulders:

120      By now you see how each one beats his breast."

 

          O haughty Christians, woebegone, careworn,

          You, sickened in the insight of your minds,

          Who misplace all your trust in backward steps,

 

          Are you not aware that we are worms,

125      Born to become the angelic butterflies

          Which soar defenseless up toward the judgment?

 

          Why does your mind float proudly far aloft

          When you are merely like imperfect insects,

          Just as the larva lacks its final form?

 

130      Sometimes, in support of roof or ceiling,

          One sees a corbel shaped in a man’s figure

          With the knees hunched up against the chest,

 

          Which, while unreal, gives birth to real discomfort

          In someone seeing it: that’s how I saw,

135     When I took good care, how these souls were stooped.

 

          True, some were more pressed down and some were less

          If they had more or less weight on their backs,

          Yet even one who suffered most patiently

 

          Appeared to say through tears, "I can no more."

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