The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell — Dante Alighieri — John Shaqi
The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell
Dante Alighieri · en
Thereon he hid himself; and I toward the ancient Poet turned my steps,
reflecting on that speech which seemed hostile to me. He moved on, and
then, thus going, he said to me, “Why art thou so distraught?” And I
satisfied his demand. “Let thy memory preserve that which thou hast
heard against thyself,” commanded me that Sage, “and now attend to
this,” and he raised his finger. “When thou shalt be in presence of the
sweet radiance of her whose beautiful eye sees everything, from her
thou shalt learn the journey of thy life.” Then to the left he turned
his step.
We left the wall, and went toward the middle by a path which strikes
into a valley that even up there its stench made displeasing.
CANTO XI.
The Sixth Circle: Heretics.—Tomb of Pope Anastasins.—Discourse of
Virgil on the divisions of the lower Hell.
Upon the edge of a high bank formed by great rocks broken in a circle,
we came above a more cruel pen. And here, because of the horrible
excess of the stench that the deep abyss throws out, we drew aside
behind the lid of a great tomb, whereon I saw an inscription which
said, “Pope Anastasius I hold, he whom Photinus drew from the right
way.”
“Our descent must needs be slow so that the sense may first accustom
itself a little to the dismal blast, and then will be no heed of it.”
Thus the Master, and I said to him, “Some compensation do thou find
that the time pass not lost.” And be, “Behold, I am thinking of that.
My son, within these rocks,” he began to say, “are three circlets from
grade to grade like those thou leavest. All are full of accursed
spirits; but, in order that hereafter sight only may suffice thee, hear
how and wherefore they are in constraint.
“Of every malice that wins hate in heaven injury is the end, and every
such end afflicts others either by force or by fraud. But because fraud
is the peculiar sin of man, it most displeaseth God; and therefore the
fraudulent are the lower, and more woe assails them.
“The first circle[1] is wholly of the violent; but because violence can
be done to three persons, in three rounds it is divided and
constructed. Unto God, unto one’s self, unto one’s neighbor may
violence be done; I mean unto them and unto their belongings, as thou
shalt hear in plain discourse. By violence death and grievous wounds
are inflicted on one’s neighbor; and on his substance ruins, burnings,
and harmful robberies. Wherefore homicides, and every one who smites
wrongfully, devastators and freebooters, all of them the first round
torments, in various troops.
[1] The first circle below, the seventh in the order of Hell.
“Man may lay violent hands upon himself and on his goods; and,
therefore, in the second round must needs repent without avail whoever
deprives himself of your world, gambles away and squanders his
property, and laments there where he ought to be joyous.[2]
[2] Laments on earth because of violence done to what should have made
him happy.