The Divine Comedy (Complete Annotated Edition). Dante Alighieri

Чтение книги онлайн.

      Canto XI

       Table of Contents

      ARGUMENT.—Dante arrives at the verge of a rocky precipice which encloses the seventh circle, where he sees the sepulchre of Anastasius the Heretic; behind the lid of which pausing a little, to make himself capable by degrees of enduring the fetid smell that steamed upward from the abyss, he is instructed by Virgil concerning the manner in which the three following circles are disposed, and what description of sinners is punished in each. He then inquires the reason why the carnal, the gluttonous, the avaricious and prodigal, the wrathful and gloomy, suffer not their punishments within the city of Dis. He next asks how the crime of usury is an offence against God; and at length the two Poets go toward the place from whence a passage leads down to the seventh circle.

      UPON the utmost verge of a high bank,

      By craggy rocks environ’d round, we came,

      Where woes beneath more cruel yet were stow’d:

      And here to shun the horrible excess

      Of fetid exhalation, upward cast

      From the profound abyss, behind the lid

      Of a great monument we stood retir’d,

      Whereon this scroll I mark’d: “I have in charge

Pope Anastasius,1 whom Photinus drew

      From the right path. — Ere our descent behooves

      We make delay, that somewhat first the sense,

      To the dire breath accustom’d, afterward

      Regard it not.” My master thus; to whom

      Answering I spake: “Some compensation find

      That the time past not wholly lost.” He then:

      “Lo! how my thoughts e’en to thy wishes tend!

      My son! within these rocks,” he thus began,

      “Are three close circles in gradation plac’d,

      As these which now thou leav’st. Each one is full

      Of spirits accurs’d; but that the sight alone

      Hereafter may suffice thee, listen how

      And for what cause in durance they abide.

      “Of all malicious act abhorr’d in heaven,

      The end is injury; and all such end

      Either by force or fraud works other’s woe

      But fraud, because of man peculiar evil,

      To God is more displeasing; and beneath

      The fraudulent are therefore doom’d to’ endure

      Severer pang. The violent occupy

      All the first circle; and because to force

      Three persons are obnoxious, in three rounds

      Hach within other sep’rate is it fram’d.

      To God, his neighbour, and himself, by man

      Force may be offer’d; to himself I say

      And his possessions, as thou soon shalt hear

      At full. Death, violent death, and painful wounds

      Upon his neighbour he inflicts; and wastes

      By devastation, pillage, and the flames,

      His substance. Slayers, and each one that smites

      In malice, plund’rers, and all robbers, hence

      The torment undergo of the first round

      In different herds. Man can do violence

      To himself and his own blessings: and for this

      He in the second round must aye deplore

      With unavailing penitence his crime,

      Whoe’er deprives himself of life and light,

      In reckless lavishment his talent wastes,

      And sorrows there where he should dwell in joy.

      To God may force be offer’d, in the heart

      Denying and blaspheming his high power,

      And nature with her kindly law contemning.

      And thence the inmost round marks with its seal

      Sodom and Cahors, and all such as speak

      Contemptuously’ of the Godhead in their hearts.

      “Fraud, that in every conscience leaves a sting,

      May be by man employ’d on one, whose trust

      He wins, or on another who withholds

      Strict confidence. Seems as the latter way

      Broke but СКАЧАТЬ