Notes.
16 Virgil continues his discourse on love as
the motive-force of all action; having apprehended some good, love inclines, desires, and
rejoices at last to rest in what is loved (ll. 22-33).
49 Here Virgil begins his analysis (based on
Thomas Aquinas) of the operations of the human soul which transcends the body and yet
operates with it.
76 On the opposite side of the world, the
moon appears moving west to east along the path the sun would take in Sagittarius or late
November.
82 Pietola, near Mantua, is Virgil’s
birthplace.
92 Ismenus and Asopus, rivers of Thebes where
Bacchus was born, were the sites, along their banks, of the frenzied rites of his worship.
100 Mary "in haste" visited
Elizabeth after learning of her cousin’s pregnancy (Luke 1:38-40). Julius
Caesar’s speedy campaign against the forces of Pompey provides the second example of
zeal, shouted by the sinners of sloth as they run past.
118 Gherardo, abbot of San Zeno in Verona,
died in 1187 during the reign of Frederick I who sacked Milan in 1162 (l. 120).
121 Alberto della Scala, lord of Verona,
placed his bastard and deformed son Giuseppe as abbot of San Zeno in 1292 (ll. 124-126).
133 Two more examples of sloth are the
Israelites who, after passing through the Red Sea, so grumbled and rebelled in the desert
that they were denied seeing the Promised Land (Exodus 14:10-20, Numbers
4:26-34); and the followers of Aeneas who stayed in
Sicily rather than continue to Italy (Aeneid
V, 700-778). |
|
-
The lofty teacher came to the conclusion
- Of
his discourse and looked intently into
- My
eyes to see if I appeared content,
-
- And
I, who was by now parched with fresh thirst,
- 5
Kept outward silence, but within I said,
-
"Perhaps I irk him with too many questions."
-
- But
that true father, who intuited
- The
timid wish that would not be let out,
- By
speaking gave me confidence to speak.
-
- 10
With that I said, "Master, my sight is so
-
Enlivened by your light that I grasp clearly
- All
that your words explain or analyze.
-
-
"Therefore I beg you, gentle father dear,
- Teach
me this love to which you have reduced
- 15
Every good action and its opposite."
-
-
"Direct toward me," he answered, "the sharp beams
- Of
your mind’s eye, and you shall plainly see
- The
error of the blind passed off as guides.
-
-
"The intellect, created quick to love,
- 20
Responds to everything that pleases it
- As
soon as pleasure wakens it to act.
-
-
"Your apprehension draws an image from
- A
real object and displays it in you
- So
that it makes the mind attend to it;
-
- 25
"And if, attentive, the mind tends toward it,
- That
tendency is love: it is its nature
- Which
is by pleasure bound anew in you.
-
-
"Then, just as fire by its innate form
- Flies
ever higher to reach that element
- 30
Where in its matter it may longest last,
-
-
"So the enamored mind falls into longing,
- Which
is a spiritual motion and never rests
- Until
the thing it loves has made it happy.
-
-
"Now you may plainly see how far the truth
- 35
Is hidden from those people who maintain
- That
every love is in itself praiseworthy,
-
-
"Because perhaps its subject-matter seems
-
Always to be good, but every imprint
- Is
not flawless although the wax is fine."
-
- 40
"Your discourse and my thoughts that followed it,"
- I
answered him, "have opened love to me,
- But
that has made me still more full of doubt;
-
-
"For if love is offered to us from without
- And
if the soul treads on no other foot,
- 45
It gains no merit, walking straight or crooked."
-
- And
he told me, "As much as reason sees here
- I can
inform you; beyond that, just wait
- For
Beatrice, since it is a point of faith.
-
-
"Every substantial form that is distinct
- 50
From matter and is yet united with it
- Holds
a specific power in itself
-
-
"Which is not seen except in operation
- And
only in its effects is it shown,
- As
the life of a plant in its green leaves.
-
- 55
"And so man does not know where understanding
- Of
his first ideas derives, nor where
-
Affection for first objects of desire,
-
-
"Which both are in you as instinct in the bee
- For
making honey; and this primal will
- 60
Has no merit for either praise or blame.
-
-
"Now that all other wills conform to this one,
- You
have the innate power which gives counsel
- And
which should guard the threshold of consent.
-
-
"This is the principle from which derives
- 65
The reason for your merits, so far as it
-
Garners and winnows good and evil loves.
-
-
"Those whose reasoning went to the root of things
-
Perceived this innate freedom; as a result,
- They
left the gift of ethics to the world.
-
- 70
"So, even supposing every love enkindled
-
Within you rises from necessity,
- The
power to restrain it still lies in you.
-
-
"This noble power Beatrice calls free will;
- And
for this reason, keep it in your mind
- 75
In case she wants to speak of it to you."
-
- The
moon arising late, almost at midnight,
- Made
the stars look scantier to us,
- For
it was glowing like a burnished bucket,
-
- And
it ran counter to the sky on paths
- 80
The sun inflames when men in Rome observe it
-
Setting between Sardinia and Corsica.
-
- That
noble shade, for whom Pietola
-
Shines with more fame than any Mantuan town,
-
Released me from the load I placed on him,
-
- 85
So that I, who had harvested his clear
- And
open-handed answers to my questions,
-
Remained like someone rambling drowsily.
-
- But I
was snapped out of this drowsiness
-
Suddenly by people who had come
- 90
Already round to us behind our backs.
-
- And
as, of old, Ismenus and Asopus
- Saw
on their banks at night fanatic crowds
- So
often as the Thebans called for Bacchus,
-
- Such
was the crowd, from what I saw, curving
- 95
Its way around that circle, of those who came
- With
good will and just love holding the reins.
-
- How
soon they were upon us — since that whole
- Huge
company was moving at a run,
- And
two of them up front cried out in tears:
-
- 100
"Mary ran with haste to the hill country!
- And
Caesar to subdue Lerida thrust
- First
at Marseilles and then sped on to Spain!"
-
-
"Faster! faster! let no time be lost
-
Through little love," the rest who followed cried,
- 105
"So zeal for good may make grace green again."
-
-
"O people whose sharp fervor now perhaps
-
Redeems the negligence and dallying
- You
showed in lukewarmness for doing good,
-
-
"This man, alive — and surely I’d not lie —
- 110
Would climb as soon as daylight shines on us:
- So
tell us where an opening is at hand."
-
- These
were the words spoken by my guide,
- And
one of those swift spirits called, "Come,
-
Follow us and you will find the gap.
-
- 115
"We are so full of passion to keep moving,
- We
cannot stop, we beg your pardon, then,
- If
you should take our penance for bad manners.
-
-
"I was abbot of San Zeno in Verona
- Under
the rule of worthy Barbarossa
- 120
Of whom Milan still talks with bitter tears.
-
-
"And I know one with one foot in the grave
- Who
soon will sorrow for that monastery
- And
will regret he once had power there,
-
-
"Because he’s put, in place of its true shepherd,
- 125
His son, who is deformed in his whole body
- And
even more in mind, and born a bastard."
-
- I do
not know if he said more or ceased,
- Since
he by now had raced so far beyond us,
- But I
heard this much and was glad to note it.
-
- 130
And he who was my help in every need
- Spoke
up, "Turn round this way: observe those two
-
Coming who sink their teeth deep into sloth."
-
-
Behind them all these two declaimed, "The people
- For
whom the sea had parted were all dead
- 135
Before the Jordan saw its promised heirs;
-
-
"And those who to the end did not endure
-
Ordeals in company with Anchises’ son
- Gave
themselves up to an inglorious life."
-
- Then
when those shades had sped so far from us
- 140
That they could not be sighted any more,
- A new
thought worked itself up from within me,
-
- And
from it many different thoughts were born,
- And I
so drifted from one to the other
- That
in my wandering off I closed my eyes,
-
- 145
And I transmuted thinking into dreaming.
|
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