THE DIVINE COMEDY: Inferno, Purgatorio & Paradiso (3 Classic Translations in One Edition). Dante Alighieri
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Название: THE DIVINE COMEDY: Inferno, Purgatorio & Paradiso (3 Classic Translations in One Edition)

Автор: Dante Alighieri

Издательство: Bookwire

Жанр: Языкознание

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isbn: 9788027233335

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СКАЧАТЬ Escap'd; and, in her vesture mantling me,

       Made promise of the way her sect enjoins.

       Thereafter men, for ill than good more apt,

       Forth snatch'd me from the pleasant cloister's pale.

       God knows how after that my life was fram'd.

       This other splendid shape, which thou beholdst

       At my right side, burning with all the light

       Of this our orb, what of myself I tell

       May to herself apply. From her, like me

       A sister, with like violence were torn

       The saintly folds, that shaded her fair brows.

       E'en when she to the world again was brought

       In spite of her own will and better wont,

       Yet not for that the bosom's inward veil

       Did she renounce. This is the luminary

       Of mighty Constance, who from that loud blast,

       Which blew the second over Suabia's realm,

       That power produc'd, which was the third and last."

       She ceas'd from further talk, and then began

       "Ave Maria" singing, and with that song

       Vanish'd, as heavy substance through deep wave.

       Mine eye, that far as it was capable,

       Pursued her, when in dimness she was lost,

       Turn'd to the mark where greater want impell'd,

       And bent on Beatrice all its gaze.

       But she as light'ning beam'd upon my looks:

       So that the sight sustain'd it not at first.

       Whence I to question her became less prompt.

       Between two kinds of food, both equally

       Remote and tempting, first a man might die

       Of hunger, ere he one could freely choose.

       E'en so would stand a lamb between the maw

       Of two fierce wolves, in dread of both alike:

       E'en so between two deer a dog would stand,

       Wherefore, if I was silent, fault nor praise

       I to myself impute, by equal doubts

       Held in suspense, since of necessity

       It happen'd. Silent was I, yet desire

       Was painted in my looks; and thus I spake

       My wish more earnestly than language could.

       As Daniel, when the haughty king he freed

       From ire, that spurr'd him on to deeds unjust

       And violent; so look'd Beatrice then.

       "Well I discern," she thus her words address'd,

       "How contrary desires each way constrain thee,

       So that thy anxious thought is in itself

       Bound up and stifled, nor breathes freely forth.

       Thou arguest; if the good intent remain;

       What reason that another's violence

       Should stint the measure of my fair desert?

       "Cause too thou findst for doubt, in that it seems,

       That spirits to the stars, as Plato deem'd,

       Return. These are the questions which thy will

       Urge equally; and therefore I the first

       Of that will treat which hath the more of gall.

       Of seraphim he who is most ensky'd,

       Moses and Samuel, and either John,

       Choose which thou wilt, nor even Mary's self,

       Have not in any other heav'n their seats,

       Than have those spirits which so late thou saw'st;

       Nor more or fewer years exist; but all

       Make the first circle beauteous, diversely

       Partaking of sweet life, as more or less

       Afflation of eternal bliss pervades them.

       Here were they shown thee, not that fate assigns

       This for their sphere, but for a sign to thee

       Of that celestial furthest from the height.

       Thus needs, that ye may apprehend, we speak:

       Since from things sensible alone ye learn

       That, which digested rightly after turns

       To intellectual. For no other cause

       The scripture, condescending graciously

       To your perception, hands and feet to God

       Attributes, nor so means: and holy church

       Doth represent with human countenance

       Gabriel, and Michael, and him who made

       Tobias whole. Unlike what here thou seest,

       The judgment of Timaeus, who affirms

       Each soul restor'd to its particular star,

       Believing it to have been taken thence,

       When nature gave it to inform her mold:

       Since to appearance his intention is

       E'en what his words declare: or else to shun

       Derision, haply thus he hath disguis'd

       His true opinion. If his meaning be,

       That to the influencing of these orbs revert

       The honour and the blame in human acts,

       Perchance he doth not wholly miss the truth.

       This principle, not understood aright,

       СКАЧАТЬ