XIV.
After the battle of the diverse thoughts, it happened that this most gentle lady went to a place where many gentle ladies were assembled; to which place I was conducted by a friendly person, who thought to give me a great pleasure in leading me where so many ladies were displaying their beauties. Wherefore I, hardly knowing whereunto I had been led, and trusting myself to the person who had conducted his friend to the verge of life, said: “Wherefore are we come to these ladies?” Then he said to me: “To the end that they may be worthily served.”
And the truth is, that they were met together here to attend on a gentle lady who was married that day; and therefore, according to the custom of the above-mentioned city, it behoved them to bear her company at her first sitting at table in the house of her new-made husband. So that I, believing to do the pleasure of this friend, determined to stand in company with him at the service of the ladies. And as soon as I had thus resolved, I seemed to feel a wonderful tremor begin in my breast on the left side, and extend suddenly through all the parts of my body. Then I say that, dissembling, I leaned against a painting which ran around the wall of this house, and fearing lest my trembling should be observed by others, I lifted mine eyes, and, looking at the ladies, saw among them the most gentle Beatrice. Then were my spirits so destroyed by the force that Love acquired, on seeing himself in such neighborhood to this most gentle lady, that none remained alive except the spirits of the sight, and even these remained outside of their instruments, because Love wished to stand in their most noble place to look upon this marvellous lady. And although I was other than at first, I grieved much for these little spirits, who were lamenting bitterly, and saying, “If he so like a thunderbolt had not smitten us from our place, we might stand to gaze upon the marvel of this lady, as do the others our peers.”
I say that many of these ladies, perceiving my transfiguration, began to wonder; and, talking, make a mock of me with this most gentle lady. Thereupon my friend, who in good faith had been deceived, took me by the hand, and, leading me out from the sight of these ladies, asked me what ailed me. Then, having somewhat reposed, and my dead spirits having risen again, and those that were driven out having returned to their possessions, I said to this my friend these words: “I have held my feet on that part of life beyond which no man can go with intent to return.”
And leaving him, I returned to the chamber of tears, in which, weeping and ashamed, I said within myself, “if this lady knew my condition, I do not believe that she would thus have made mock of my person; nay, I believe that she would feel much pity therefor.” And being in this grief, I resolved to say some words in which, speaking to her, I would explain the cause of my transfigurement, and would say that I know well that it is not known, and that, were it known, I believe that it would move others to pity; and I resolved to say them, desiring that peradventure they might come to her hearing. And then I devised this sonnet: —
With other ladies you make mock of me,
And think not, Lady, of the reason why
So strange a shape I offer to your eye,
Whene’er it hap that I your beauty see.
If this you knew, your pity could not hold
Longer against me its accustomed guise;
For when so near you Love doth me surprise,
He courage takes and such assurance bold,
He smites among my spirits chilled with fear,
And some he slays, and some he doth expel,
So he alone remains to look on you;
Hence I another’s form am changed into,
Yet not so changed but even then full well
The grievous cries of those expelled I hear.
This sonnet I do not divide into parts, because the division is made only for the sake of disclosing the meaning of the thing divided; therefore, since, through what has been said of its occasion, it has been made sufficiently plain, there is no need of division. It is true that among the words whereby the occasion of this sonnet is set forth, certain ambiguous words are found; namely, when I say that Love slays all my spirits, and only those of vision remain alive, and even they outside of their instruments. And this ambiguity it were impossible to solve to one who is not in like degree the liegeman of Love; and to such as are so, that is already plain which would solve these ambiguous words; and therefore it is not well for me to explain this ambiguousness, since my speech would be vain or superfluous.