Canto XIX
CANTO XIX
With wings outspread, the Imperial Eagle speaks with one voice for all the myriad lights of souls shining like rubies in the sun and proclaims itself the exalted image of a mercy and justice still remembered but no longer practiced in the world (1–21). Dante admits that a question about Divine Justice has kept him hungering for a satisfying answer, which he has never found on earth. At this, the Eagle flaps its wings like a falcon preening itself for flight and sings a song incomprehensible to mortals. It then proclaims the infinite transcendence of the Creator over even the most noble of His creatures, a fact that the light of natural human reason must recognize even though its understanding of justice resembles the vision of the ocean floor through shallow water from the shore, whereas the divine understanding of justice bears a likeness to the view of unfathomable oceanic depths from the middle of the sea (22–66). With this prelude, the Eagle formulates the Pilgrim’s question: how can a just God rightly condemn a virtuous man born along the Indus River who has never heard or read of Christ and therefore dies unbaptized and without faith, even though he has never sinned in word or deed? (67–78). Replying, it declares the inability of the human intellect to judge such things and the sufficiency of Sacred Scripture for guidance in these matters. Then, like a stork, it soars above the Poet, as if to demonstrate the divine supereminence, and cries out that men can grasp as little of the Eternal Judgment as Dante can of the Eagle’s song, unintelligible to humans (79–99). After a moment of silence, it continues that no one can be saved without true faith in Christ and that many of those who emptily profess His name will be damned along with the pagan (100–114). The Imperial Eagle closes with a diatribe against those rulers—beginning with the Emperor himself, descending through kings, and ending with a petty tyrant—who pervert the course of justice on earth. Among these it names or alludes to the Emperor Albert of Austria, Philip the Fair of France, Edward I and Edward II of England with William Wallace and Robert Bruce of Scotland, Ferdinand IV of Castile and León, Wenceslaus IV of Bohemia, Charles II of Naples, Frederick II of Sicily, James II of Aragon with James of Majorca, Haakon V of Norway, Diniz of Portugal, Stephen Urosh II of Rascia, Andrew III of Hungary, and Henry II of Lusignan (115–148).
1 With outspread wings before me was displayed
The lovely image that in patterned guise
Those joyful souls in sweet fruition made.
4 Each seemed to be a ruby small in size,
In which the sun’s rays burned, and was so lit
As to reflect its light back to my eyes.
7 And what I have to tell now, I admit,
No voice has borne; no ink’s writ like event;
No fantasy has comprehended it.
10 I saw and heard that beak’s own speech unpent,
Which voiced an “I” and “Mine,” although I trust
That in its thoughts both “We” and “Ours” were meant.
13 “I’m here—for being merciful and just—
Exalted to a glorious degree
Desire can not surpass, and on the dust
16 Of earth,” it said, “I left a memory
That even now the wicked man extols,
Without continuing its history.”
19 As one sole heat is felt from many coals,
So also from the image of those plumes
There came one sound from many loving souls.
22 I said then: “O perpetual sweet blooms
Of everlasting joyfulness and mirth,
Who make appear as one all your perfumes,
25 Breathe forth, deliver me from this great dearth
That’s held me hungering in long travail
For food that I could never find on earth.
28 Another realm in Heaven may prevail
As mirror for God’s justice, yet I know
You apprehend it here without a veil.[463]
31 You know how I prepare to listen so
Attentively, what doubts I have withstood,
And how they’ve been my fast from long ago.”
34 Just as a falcon issued from its hood
Will lift its head, and flap its wings, and love
To preen its plumes to show its lustihood,
37 So did I see that embelm woven of
The praises of God’s grace in songs whose sound
Is known to souls rejoicing there above.
40 It started: “He who turned His compass round
The world’s vast limits and marked out no less
The things there manifest and darkly bound
43 Could not on all the universe impress
His power so that His own Word then might
Not yet remain in infinite excess.
46 The first proud being proves that this is right,[464]
For of all creatures he most high had flown,
Yet fell unripe, not waiting for the light.
49 Hence, it is clear each lesser nature known
Is far too scant a vessel for that Good,
Unbounded, measured by Itself alone.
52 And thus your sight, which must be understood
As but a single ray of the First Mind,[465]
Which fills all things, by nature never could
55 Be of such force as not to have divined
That its First Principle must truly be
Beyond all that appears for it to find.
58 The sight, then, that your world receives can’t see
Within Eternal Justice any more
Than human eyes can penetrate the sea;
61 For though they spy the bottom from the shore,
They can’t on open waves, and yet it’s lain
There long, although the deep conceals its floor.
64 Save from that never-clouded, peaceful reign,
There is no light, but darkness all about
From flesh’s shadow or its poisoned bane.[466]
67 By now the hiding place is well laid out
That hid the Living Justice, once so dim,
Concerning which you often raised a doubt.
70 You said: ‘A man is born upon the brim
Of the far Indus where there has been none[467]
To speak of Christ or read or write of Him.
73 All his desires and acts are good, each one,
As far as human reason has perceived,
And sin in life or speech is never done.
76 He dies unbaptized; faith was not received.
Where is the justice that condemns this man?
Where is his sin if he has not believed?’
79 Now who are you upon the bench who plan
To sit and judge a thousand miles away,
With vision that is shorter than a span?
82 For him who would engage in subtle play,
Were Scripture not above you, then there would
Be such a wondrous cause for doubt, I say.
85 O gross of mind! O earthly creatures! could
The Primal Will, the Good Itself we praise,
Have once moved from Itself, the Highest Good?
88 All things are just when suited to Its ways,
But It is drawn by no created thing,
Which It has caused by sending forth Its rays.”
91 Just as above the nest the stork will ring
In circles when her fledglings have been fed,
And as those fed look up to watch her wing,
94 So was that blessèd image overhead,
Its wings impelled by many counsels, when
I likewise raised my brows. It sang and said:
97 “As are my notes,” while wheeling round again,
“To one like you who cannot understand,
So is Eternal Judgment to all men.”
100 The Holy Spirit’s flames fell silent, and,
Still in the sign that made the Romans be[468]
A people much revered in every land,
103 “Up to this realm,” it recommenced for me,
“None ever rose who had not faith in Christ,
Before or since they nailed him to the tree.
106 But look and see: so many cry, ‘Christ, Christ,’
Who at the Judgment Day will find their niche
Less close to Him than those who know not Christ.
109 The Ethiope will damn such Christians, which,[469]
When they are parted in two different strings,
Will be forever poor, the others rich.
112 What will the Persians say to all your kings,
Whom in that open tome they’ll see abased[470]
In which are written all their shameful things.
115 Right there you’ll see, where Albert’s deeds are traced,[471]
The act that very soon will move the pen—
His laying of the Reign of Prague to waste.
118 Right there you’ll see the woe brought on the Seine
By one who falsified the money first,
And who will die by dint of bristles then.
121 Right there you’ll see the pride that quickens thirst,
Which maddens both the Englishman and Scot,
So neither stays in borders untraversed;
124 And see the lustful Spaniard’s easy lot,
And one grown from Bohemia’s own stem
Who knew no valor and who willed it not;
127 And see Jerusalem’s lame king with them,
He who will have his goodness marked with I,
Whereas its opposite is marked with M;
130 And see the greed and cowardice that lie
In him who guards the Isle of Fire, the place
Anchises ended his long life to die.
133 Then you will see how trifling is his case
When letters of his writing are cut small,
Which will note much of him in little space.
136 Then all will see to what foul deeds they fall
—His uncle and his brother—they’ve disgraced
So fine a nation and two crowns in all.
139 Then Norway’s king and Portugal’s, shame-faced,
Will there be known, and Rascia’s too, I vow,
Who to his harm saw Venice-coins debased.[472]
142 Blest Hungary, should she no more allow
Mistreatment! See Navarra’s bliss increased,
If armed with her encircling mountains now!
145 In proof of this, let each believe at least
In Nicosía’s, Famagosta’s fate;
For they lament and shriek because their beast
148 Still keeps his place beside the rest of late.”