Canto XXXIII
CANTO XXXIII
The figures of both the cardinal moral virtues and the theological virtues sing a psalm to lament the harm visited upon the Church through unworthy popes and French kings. When they finish, Beatrice, grieving like Mary at the foot of the cross, prophesies in the words of Christ that the Church will soon be restored to its true spiritual mission. She then sends her seven handmaids ahead of her and leads Dante, Matelda, and Statius behind her. As they walk, Beatrice foretells with sphinx-like obscurity the advent of a divinely appointed, well-starred heir to the imperial eagle; it is he who will slay both the harlot and the giant. For the moment, she leaves it to future events to elucidate her meaning but commands the Pilgrim to note and teach her words to men, emphasizing the penalty suffered by Adam and all who violate the tree of Divine Justice expressed in law. The Poet would have recognized the moral sense of the tree if his mind had not been hardened by vain thoughts and his vision darkened by delight in them. At the very least, he should carry back a sketch of it, like a pilgrim bringing back a palm wreath on his staff (1–78). Dante claims that he has received his Lady’s words as the wax does the seal but wonders why her speech so far exceeds his understanding. Beatrice explains that she speaks thus so that he may realize how far his earthly philosophy strays from Divine Wisdom. If the Pilgrim cannot recall such wanderings, it is because he has drunk of Lethe’s streams (79–102). The sun is now directly overhead, as the troupe stops before a marvelous fountain, from which two rivers rise like the Tigris and the Euphrates. At Beatrice’s request, Matelda leads Dante, then Statius, to drink the waters of Eunoe to restore their memory of good deeds. When Dante has finished, he comes forth renewed like a plant in the spring and ready to rise to the stars (103–145).
1 “Venerunt, Deus, gentes,” they began[562]
Sweet psalmody—those maids now three, now four,
In alternation as a weeping clan.
4 And, sighing, Beatrice in pity wore,
On listening to them, so sad a face
That scarcely Mary at the cross changed more.
7 But when the other virgins gave her place
To speak a word, she rose erect to say,
Upon her feet and flushed with fiery grace:
10 “Modicum, et non videbitis me;
Et iterum, my sisters, who are dear,
Modicum, et vos videbitis me.”[563]
13 In front of her, she set the seven near;
Behind her, then, she placed with but a sign
Myself, the maid, the sage remaining here.[564]
16 She thus went on, and I do not opine
That on the ground ten steps had yet been traced
Before she turned her eyes to strike on mine.
19 With tranquil aspect, “Come with greater haste,”
She said, “so that if I should speak with you,
You’ll hear me better, being better placed.”
22 As soon as I was with her, as was due,
She said to me: “Do you not dare beseech
Me, brother, coming now with me anew?”
25 Like rev’rent ones who would not overreach
In speaking when before their lords they sit
And to their teeth can not bring living speech,
28 So too I spoke; I started to admit,
Without full sound: “My Lady, well you seem
To know my need and what is good for it.”
31 “I want you disentangled from the team
Of fear and shame from this point on,” she spoke,
“So speak no more like someone in a dream;
34 But know the vessel that the serpent broke[565]
Once was and now is not—the guilty there[566]
Should trust God’s vengeance fears no sop they soak.[567]
37 There will not always be without an heir
The eagle that left feathers on the car
First made a monster then a prey to snare:[568]
40 I tell you since I clearly see there are
Stars near us now to give us time to strive,
Secure from every check and every bar,
43 When a God-sent Five-hundred-ten-and-five[569]
Will slay that thieving woman yet one day,
That giant too, whose sins with her still thrive.
46 Perhaps my prophecy, as dark and grey
As Themis and as Sphinx, persuades you less[570]
Because it clouds the mind as once did they.
49 But soon the facts will be the Naiads’ guess
That solves the enigmatic mystery
But harms no flocks and harvests men possess.
52 Take note, and just as they are borne from me,
So teach these words to such as those who lead
A life that is a race to death,” said she.
55 “And bear in mind, when writing those to read,
You should not hide what of that tree was shown
Which now has been despoiled two times indeed.[571]
58 Who robs that tree or breaks a branch it’s grown
Offends our God with acts of blasphemy;
He made it holy, for His use alone.
61 In pain and want, for tasting of that tree,
Five thousand years or more the first soul yearned
For Him who bore that tasting’s penalty.[572]
64 Your wit’s asleep if it has not discerned
That for a special cause it is so high
And, at its top, is in this way upturned.
67 Did empty thoughts, like Elsa’s streams, not lie[573]
About your mind, and were not their delight
As Pyramus is to the berry’s dye,[574]
70 From but such circumstances then you might
See that tree’s moral sense and so detect
God’s justice in the interdict was right.
73 But since I see you with your intellect
All turned to stone and, stonelike, dark in hue,
Still dazzled by the light my words project,
76 I’d have you bear this back inside of you,
If not in words, in sketches that reveal
Just that which staffs enwreathed by palm leaves do.”[575]
79 I said to her: “Like wax beneath the seal,
Which does not change the figure there impressed,
My mind has now been stamped with your appeal.
82 But why do words I’ve longed to hear addressed
Go soaring far beyond my vision so
That, as it strains, it loses what’s possessed?”
85 And she: “This happens so that you may know
The school that you have followed and may hear
How well its doctrine follows mine below,
88 And so that you may see your pathways veer
As far away from where divine paths call
As earth is from the highest spinning sphere.”[576]
91 At that I answered her: “I don’t recall
That I have once estranged me from your way,
Nor does my conscience gnaw at me at all.”
94 “And if you can’t recall you went astray,”
She, smiling, said, “remember you were sent
To drink of Lethe but this very day.
97 If fire can be inferred from smoke’s ascent,
Then your forgetting proves a sinful blight
Upon your will, which elsewhere was intent.
100 But from now on the words that I recite
Will be as naked as must be the case
To lay them open to your rustic sight.”
103 Both more refulgent and with slower pace,
The sun held its meridian above,
Which, with the vantage point, will change its place,[577]
106 When—just as one who is the escort of
A group will stop if he should find displayed
Some novel thing or vestiges thereof—
109 The seven stopped at such a pallid shade
As casts a mountain where a cold stream goes
Beneath dark boughs green leaves have overlaid.
112 Ahead, from but one fount, it seemed, there rose
The Tigris and Euphrates, intertwined,[578]
From where, like parting friends, each slowly flows.
115 “O light, O glory of all humankind!
What water’s this that gushes from one source,
Becoming distant from itself, I find?”
118 “On this, beseech Matelda to discourse,”
She said to what I asked. The lovely maid
Replied, as if escaping any force
121 Of blame: “He heard me speak when I relayed
These things and others, and I am assured
That Lethe’s streams don’t hide the things conveyed.”
124 My Lady: “Maybe greater cares have lured
Him now, which often leave the mem’ry dim
So that his mental sight has been obscured.
127 But see Eunoë there flow forth; lead him[579]
To it as is your usual design,
And there revive his powers’ weakened vim.”
130 Kind souls make no excuses but align
Their wills at once with someone’s that is read
In its disclosure by an outward sign;
133 So, taking me, that lovely lady said
To Statius with just a woman’s grace:
“Do come with him,” at which she moved ahead.
136 O Reader, if I had a greater space
For writing this, then I should sing in part
Of sweet drinks that could never fill my vase.
139 But since the pages plotted from the start
Of this, my second canticle, are through,
I go no further, being curbed by art.
142 From that most holy wave I now withdrew
And felt remade—just like new plants that are
Renewed again with leafage that is new—
145 All pure and set to mount from star to star.