Harvard Classics Volume 20. Golden Deer Classics

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      But tell me this: they of the dull, fat pool,

      Whom the rain beats, or whom the tempest drives,

      Or who with tongues so fierce conflicting meet,

      Wherefore within the city fire-illumed

      Are not these punish’d, if God’s wrath be on them?

      And if it be not, wherefore in such guise

      Are they condemn’d?” He answer thus return’d:

      “Wherefore in dotage wanders thus thy mind,

      Not so accustom’d? or what other thoughts

      Possess it? Dwell not in thy memory

      The words, wherein thy ethic page^[76] describes

      Three dispositions adverse to Heaven’s will,

      Incontinence, malice, and mad brutishness,

      And how incontinence the least offends

      God, and least guilt incurs? If well thou note

      This judgment, and remember who they are,

      Without these walls to vain repentance doom’d,

      Thou shalt discern why they apart are placed

      From these fell spirits, and less wreakful pours

      Justice divine on them its vengeance down.”

      “O sun! who healest all imperfect sight,

      Thou so content’st me, when thou solvest my doubt,

      That ignorance not less than knowledge charms.

      Yet somewhat turn thee back,” I in these words

      Continued,” where thou said’st, that usury

      Offends celestial Goodness; and this knot

      Perplex’d unravel.” He thus made reply:

      “Philosophy, to an attentive ear,

      Clearly points out, not in one part alone,

      How imitative Nature takes her course

      From the celestial mind, and from its art:

      And where her laws^[77] the Stagirite unfolds,

      Not many leaves scann’d o’er, observing well

      Thou shalt discover, that your art on her

      Obsequious follows, as the learner treads

      In his instructor’s step; so that your art

      Deserves the name of second in descent

      From God. These two, if thou recall to mind

      Creation’s holy book,^[78] from the beginning

      Were the right source of life and excellence

      To human-kind. But in another path

      The usurer walks; and Nature in herself

      And in her follower thus he sets at nought,

      Placing elsewhere his hope.^[79] But follow now

      My steps on forward journey bent; for now

      The Pisces play with undulating glance

      Along the horizon, and the Wain^[80] lies all

      O’er the northwest; and onward there a space

      Is our steep passage down the rocky height.”

Canto XII

      Argument.—Descending by a very rugged way into the seventh circle, where the violent are punished, Dante and his leader find it guarded by the Minotaur; whose fury being pacified by Virgil, they step downward from crag to crag; till, drawing near the bottom, they descry a river of blood, wherein are tormented such as have committed violence against their neighbor. At these, when they strive to emerge from the blood, a troop of Centaurs, running along the side of the river, aim their arrows; and three of their band opposing our travellers at the foot of the steep, Virgil prevails so far that one consents to carry them both across the stream; and on their passage, Dante is informed by him of the course of the river, and of those that are punished therein.

      The place, where to descend the precipice

      We came, was rough as Alp; and on its verge

      Such object lay, as every eye would shun.

      As is that ruin, which Adice’s stream^[81]

      On this side Trento struck, shouldering the wave,

      Or loosed by earthquake or for lack of prop;

      For from the mountain’s summit, whence it moved

      To the low level, so the headlong rock

      Is shiver’d, that some passage it might give

      To him who from above would pass; e’en such

      Into the chasm was that descent: and there

      At point of the disparted ridge lay stretch’d

      The infamy of Crete,^[82] detested brood

      Of the feign’d heifer:^[83] and at sight of us

      It gnaw’d itself, as one with rage distract.

      To him my guide exclaim’d: “Perchance thou deem’st

      The King of Athens^[84] here, who, in the world

      Above, thy death contrived. Monster! avaunt!

      He comes not tutor’d by thy sister’s art,^[85]

      But to behold your torments is he come.”

      Like to a bull, that with impetuous spring

      Darts, at the moment when the fatal blow

      Hath struck him, but unable to proceed

      Plunges on either side; so saw I plunge

      The Minotaur; whereat the sage exclaim’d:

      “Run to the passage! while he storms, ’tis well

      That thou descend.” Thus down our road we took

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