and thou shouldest see her, no return upward would there ever be." Thus said the Master, and he himself turned me, and did not so trust to my hands that with his own he did not also blindfold me.
O ye who have sound understanding, regard the doctrine that is hidden under the veil of the strange verses.
And already was coming across the turbid waves a tumult of a sound full of terror at which both the shores trembled. Not otherwise it was than of a wind, impetuous through the opposing heats, that strikes the forest, and without any stay shatters the branches, beats down and carries them away; forward, laden with dust, it goes superb, and makes the wild beasts and the shepherds fly.
My eyes he loosed, and said, "Now direct the nerve of sight across the ancient scum, there yonder where that fume is most bitter."
As frogs before the hostile snake all scatter through the water, till each huddles on the ground, I saw more than a thousand destroyed souls flying thus before one, who at the ford was passing over the Styx with dry feet. From his face he removed that thick air, waving his left hand oft before him, and only with that trouble seemed he weary. Well I perceived that he was sent from Heaven, and I turned me to the Master, and he made sign that I should stand quiet and bow down unto him. Ah, how full of disdain he seemed to me! He reached the gate and with a little rod he opened it, for there was no withstanding.
"O outcasts from Heaven, folk despised," began he upon the horrible threshold, "wherefore is this overweening harbored in you? Why do ye kick against that will from which its end can never be cut short, and which many a time hath increased your grief? What avails it to butt against the fates? Your Cerberus, if ye remember well, still bears his chin and his throat peeled for that." Then he turned back upon the filthy road and said no word to us, but wore the semblance of a man whom other care constrains and stings, than that of him who is before him.
And we moved our feet toward the city, confident after his holy words. Within we entered without any strife, and I, who had desire to observe the condition which such a stronghold locks in, when I was within, sent my eyes round about; and I see on every hand a great plain full of woe and of cruel torment.
As at Arles, where the Rhone stagnates, as at Pola, near the Quarnaro that shuts in Italy and bathes its borders, sepulchres make all the place uneven; so did they here on every side, saving that the manner was more bitter here; for among the tombs flames were scattered, by which they were so intensely kindled that no art requires iron more so. All their lids were lifted; and such dire laments were issuing forth from them as truly seemed of wretches and of sufferers.
And I, "Master, who are these folk that, buried within those coffers, make themselves heard with their woeful sighs?" And he to me, "Here are the heresiarchs with their followers of every sect, and the tombs are much more laden than thou thinkest. Like with like is buried here, and the monuments are more and less hot."
And when he to the right hand had turned, we passed between the torments and the high battlements.
Footnotes
1 Beatrice.
2 The messenger from Heaven, referred to in the last verses of the last canto.
3 Dante asks for assurance that Virgil, whose station is in Limbo, "the first grade," knows the way.
Canto X
The Sixth Circle: Heresiarchs.—Farinata degli Uberti.-Cavalcante Cavalcanti.—Frederick II.
Now along a narrow path between the wall of the city and the torments my Master goeth on, and I behind his shoulders.
"O Virtue supreme," I began, "that through the impious circles turnest me, according to thy pleasure, speak to me and satisfy my desires. The folk that are lying in the sepulchres, can they be seen? All the lids are now lifted, and no one keepeth guard." And he to me, "All shall be locked in when from Jehoshaphat they shall here return with the bodies which they have left on earth. Upon this side Epicurus with all his followers, who make the soul mortal with the body, have their burial place. Therefore as to the demand that thou makest of me, thou shalt soon be satisfied here within; and also as to the desire concerning which thou art silent to me." And I, "Good Leader, I hold not my heart hidden from thee except in order to speak little; and not only now to that hast thou disposed me."
"O Tuscan, who through the city of fire alive art going, speaking thus modestly, may it please thee to stop in this place. Thy speech makes manifest that thou art native of that noble fatherland to which perchance I was too molestful." Suddenly this sound issued from one of the coffers, wherefore I drew, in fear, a little nearer to my Leader. And he said to me, "Turn, what dost thou? Behold Farinata who hath uprisen; thou shalt see him all from the girdle up."
I had already fixed my face on his, and he straightened himself up with breast and front as though he had Hell in great scorn. And the bold and ready hands of my Leader pushed me among the sepulchres to him, saying, "Let thy words be choice."
When I was at the foot of his tomb, he looked at me a little, and then, as though disdainful, asked me, "Who were thy ancestors?" I, who was desirous to obey, concealed them not, but disclosed them all to him; whereon he raised his brows a little up, then said, "Fiercely were they adverse to me, and to my fathers, and to my party, so that twice I scattered them." 1 "If they were driven out, they returned from every side," replied I to him, "both one and the other time, but yours have not learned well that art."
Then there arose, to view uncovered down to the chin, a shade at the side of this one; I think that it had risen on its knees. Round about me it looked, as if it had desire to see if another were with me, but when its expectancy was quite extinct, weeping it said, "If through this blind dungeon thou goest through loftiness of genius, my son, where is he? and why is he not with thee?" And I to him, "Of myself I come not; he who waits yonder leads me through here, whom perchance your Guido held in scorn."2
His words and the mode of the punishment had already read to me the name of this one, wherefore my answer was so full.
Suddenly straightening up, he cried, "How didst thou say, 'he held'? lives he not still? doth not the sweet light strike his eyes?" When he took note of some delay that I made before answering, he fell again supine, and forth appeared no more.
But that other magnanimous one, at whose instance I had stayed, changed not aspect, nor moved his neck, nor bent his side. "And if," he said, continuing his first words, "they have ill learned that art, it torments me more than this bed. But the face of the lady who ruleth here will not be rekindled fifty times ere thou shalt know how much that art weighs. And, so mayest thou return unto the sweet world, tell me wherefore is that people so pitiless against my race in its every law?" Then I to him, "The rout and the great carnage that colored the Arbia red cause such orison to be made in our temple." After he had, sighing, shaken his head, "In that I was not alone," he said, "nor surely without cause would I have moved with the rest; but I was alone,—there 3 where it was agreed by every one to lay Florence waste,—he who defended her with open face." "Ah! so hereafter may your seed repose," I
