We see from these lines that Dante first went to Verona, the seat of Bartolommeo della Scala (the "great Lombard," whose coat of arms was a ladder "scala," with an eagle perched upon it). From there he went to Bologna, thence to Padua, and thence to the Lunigiana. It is about this time that he is said to have gone to Paris (this is probable), and to Germany, Flanders, and England; it is not at all probable that he ever saw the last-mentioned place.

Dante never gave up altogether the hope that he might one day return to Florence. He yearned all his life for the "beautiful sheep-fold" where he had lived as a lamb. Yet even this happiness he would not accept at the price of dishonor. When, in 1312, a general amnesty was proclaimed by Florence, and he might have returned if he would consent to certain humiliating conditions, he wrote the following noble words to a friend in Florence:

A great hope rose above the horizon of his life when Henry VII., of Luxemburg, came to Italy to restore the ancient power of the empire. Dante's letters written at this time are couched in exultant, almost extravagant, language: "Rejoice, Oh! Italy," he cries, "for thy bridegroom, the comfort of the world, and the glory of the people, the most merciful Henry, the divine Augustus and Cæsar is hastening hither to the wedding feast." His joy and exultation, alas! were doomed to a speedy end.

In 1312 Henry, who, after the murder of Albert, had been crowned emperor (in 1309), came to Pisa, thence to Rome. Then, after having in vain besieged Florence, which had become the leader of the anti-imperial movement, he retired to Buonconvento, where he died (probably from poison) August 24, 1313.

With the tragic death of Henry, Dante seems to have given up all hope of earthly happiness and from now on turned his eyes to heaven, from which alone he could hope for justice to himself and peace and righteousness for unhappy Italy. The composition of the Divine Comedy dates from this period. His final refuge and place of rest was at Ravenna, at the court of Guido da Polenta, uncle of Francesca da Rimini, whose pathetic story is quoted in the next chapter. Here, in comparative comfort and peace, he spent the evening of his life, occupying his time in writing the Divine Comedy and in occasional journeys in the interest of his patron. In 1321, while on one of these journeys to Venice, he caught fever and died on the 13th of September of that year.

Many anecdotes and legends are told of these years of exile. Thus it is said that while in Verona, as he was walking one day through the streets, some women saw him and said: "Behold, there is the man who has been in hell." A beautiful story is told in a letter, doubtful however, written by Fra Ilario of the Monastery of Santa Croce on Monte Corvo, to the effect that one day a dust-stained, travel-worn man, carrying a roll of manuscript under his arm, knocked at the door of the monastery, and on being asked what he wanted, answered "pace, pace" (peace, peace). This legend has been beautifully rendered by Longfellow in the following lines:

Dante's character reveals itself in all its phases in his works. His youth as represented in the New Life was a happy one, filled with ardor for study, with affection for friends, and with the ecstasy of a pure and virtuous love. He needed, however, the death of Beatrice, the long years of exile, and the disappointment of all his hopes to develop that strong and noble character which the world admires almost as much as his poetry. He was an enthusiastic student, yet mingled with the affairs of men; never willingly doing wrong himself, he was unyielding in what he conceived to be right, and consecrated his consummate powers to the cause of the noble and the good. His own conscience was clear, and under this "breastplate," as he calls it, he went steadily on his way. He was proud of his learning, strong in his opinions, and does not hesitate to constitute himself the stern judge of all his contemporaries; this in a lesser man would have seemed presumptuous; in Dante it was only the prosecution of a solemn and, as he thought, a Godgiven duty. Yet, in spite of this sternness his heart was soft and tender.

Like Tennyson's poet, Dante was "dowered with love of love," as well as "hate of hate and scorn of scorn."

Those who read only the Inferno, may get the impression of a savage, revengeful spirit, but the Purgatory and Paradise are full of tenderest poetry of sublimest imagination, and show their author to have had a heart full of love and gentleness, sweetness and light. A deep melancholy weighed over the whole later life of Dante; his heart never ceased to long for home and friends, yet this melancholy is not pessimism; he never lost his confidence in God, never doubted right would win.

It is this inspiring combination of noble qualities in Dante's character, reflected in every page of the Divine Comedy, which makes the study of the latter not merely an æsthetic pleasure, but a spiritual exercise, ennobling and uplifting the minds of those who read it with the "spirit and with the understanding also."

The works of Dante are not many. They consist of prose and poetry, the former comprising the so-called Banquet (Convito) and the essay on Universal Monarchy. The former was to have been finished in fifteen books or chapters, but is only a fragment of four. It is a sort of encyclopedia of knowledge, such as were so popular in the Middle Ages, but written in Italian, in order to bring it within the reach of the unlearned reader. It is full of the scholastic learning of the times, and while not attractive to the ordinary reader, is of great importance for a complete understanding of the Divine Comedy. Likewise important in this respect is the political treatise on the Monarchy, in which Dante sums up his theory of world-politics. This book, written in Latin, is divided into three parts: in Book I., the author shows the necessity of a universal empire; in Book II., he shows the right of Rome to be the seat of this empire; in Book III., he shows the independence of the emperor from the pope. This theory of the separation of the church and state runs like a thread through the whole of the Divine Comedy, in which Dante constantly attributes the sufferings of Italy to the lust for temporal power on the part of the pope and clergy.

For the general reader, however, the most interesting of Dante's writings, after the Divine Comedy, is the New Life, a strange and beautiful little book which serves as a prologue to the Divine Comedy. It is the story of Dante's love for Beatrice Portinari, the daughter of Folco, a neighbor and friend of the poet's father. It is a simple story, containing but few actual events, the details consisting for the most part of repetitions of the theory of love propounded by Guido Guinicelli, of analyses of Dante's own state of mind, and of mystical visions. The form of the book is peculiar, part prose, part poetry, the latter being accompanied by a brief commentary. Yet there is a truth and sincerity in the book which prove that it is no mere allegory or symbol, but the record of an actual love on the part of Dante for the fair young Florentine girl who is its heroine.

Dante tells us in quaint and scholastic language how he first saw Beatrice at a May festival, when she was at the beginning of her ninth year and he was at the end of his. She was dressed in red, with ornaments suited to her youthful age, and was so beautiful "that surely one could say of her the words of the poet, Homer: 'She seemed not the daughter of mortal man but of God.'" He tells us, further, how he felt the spirit of love awaken within him and how, after that first meeting, he sought every opportunity of seeing her again.

Nine years later, again in May, he records another occasion when he met Beatrice, this time dressed in white and accompanied by two ladies, "and passing along the street she turned her eyes toward the place where I stood, very timid, and through her ineffable courtesy she gently saluted me, so that it seemed to me that I experienced all the depths of bliss. The hour was precisely the ninth of that day, and inasmuch as it was the first time that her words reached my ears, such sweetness came upon me that, intoxicated, as it were, with joy, I left the people and went to my solitary chamber, and began to muse upon this most courteous lady." This love, accompanied as it was with violent alternations of joy and sorrow, produced a strong effect on Dante; his health suffered, his nerves were shattered, and he became frail and weak. Yet he refused to tell her name, although he confessed that love was the cause of his sufferings: "And when they asked me by means of whom love brought me to this wretched state, I looked at them with a smile, but said nothing."

In order, however, to put people on the wrong track, he pretended to love another lady, and so successful was this subterfuge, that even Beatrice herself believed it, so that one day, meeting Dante, she refused to salute him, an act which filled him with deepest affliction: "Now after my happiness was denied me, there came upon me so much grief that leaving all people I went my way to a solitary place to bathe the earth with bitterest tears; and when I was somewhat relieved by this weeping, I entered my chamber where I could lament without being heard. And there I began to call on my lady for mercy, and saying: 'Love, help thy faithful one,' I fell asleep in tears like a little, beaten child."

As we have already said, there is little action in this book, only a few meetings in the street, in church, or at funerals; even the death of Beatrice's father is spoken of vaguely and allusively. The importance of all lies in the psychological analysis of feelings and thoughts of the poet. The descriptions of Beatrice are vague and her figure is wrapped in an atmosphere of "vaporous twilight." Her beauty is not presented to us by means of word-painting, but rather by its effect on all who behold her. This is illustrated in the following sonnet, which is justly considered the most beautiful not only of Dante's poetry but of all Italian literature:

The effect of all the conflicting sentiments which agitated Dante's bosom was to throw him into a serious illness, in the course of which he had a terrible vision of the approaching death of Beatrice. "Now a few days after this, it happened that there came upon me a dolorous infirmity, whence for nine days I suffered most bitter pain; this led me to such weakness that I was not able to move from my bed. I say, then, that on the ninth day, feeling my pain almost intolerable, there came to me a thought concerning my lady. And when I had thought somewhat of her, and turned again in thought to my own weakened life, and considered how fragile is its duration, even though it be in health, I began to weep to myself over so much misery. Whence I said to myself with sighs: verily the most gentle Beatrice must sometime die. Wherefore there came upon me so great a depression that I closed my eyes and began to wander in mind, so that there appeared to me certain faces of ladies with disheveled hair, who said to me, 'Thou also shalt die.' And after these ladies certain other faces, horribly distorted, appeared and said: 'Thou art dead.' Then I seemed to see ladies with disheveled hair going along the street weeping, and wondrous sad; and the sun grew dark, so that the stars showed themselves, of such color that methought they wept; and the birds as they flew fell dead; and there were mighty earthquakes; and as I wondered and was smitten with terror in such fancies, methought I saw a friend come to me and say: 'Dost thou not know? Thy peerless lady has departed this life.' Then I began to weep very piteously, and not only in dream, but bathing my cheeks in real tears. And I dreamed that I looked skyward and saw a multitude of angels flying upwards, and they had before them a small cloud, exceedingly white.[4] And the angels seemed to be singing gloriously, and the words which I seemed to hear were these: 'Hosanna in the Highest,' and naught else could I hear. Then it seemed to me that my heart, which was so full of love, said to me: 'It is true, indeed, that our lady lies dead.' And so strong was my wandering fancy that it showed me this lady dead; and I seemed to see ladies covering her head with a very white veil, and her face had so great an aspect of humility that she seemed to say: 'I have gone to behold the beginning of peace.' And then I seemed to have returned to my own room, and there I looked toward heaven and began to cry out in tears: 'O, soul most beautiful, how blessed is he who beholds thee.' And as I said these words with sobs and tears, and called on death to come to me, a young and gentle lady who was at my bedside, thinking that my tears and cries were for grief on account of my infirmity began also to weep in great fear. Whereupon other ladies who were in the room, noticed that I wept, and leading away from my bedside her who was joined to me by close ties of blood,[5] they came to me to wake me from my dream, and saying: 'Weep no more,' and again: 'Be not so discomforted.' And as they thus spoke, my strong fancy ceased, and just as I was about to say: 'O, Beatrice, blessed art thou,' and I had already said, 'O, Beatrice—' giving a start I opened my eyes and saw that I had been dreaming."

The presentiment of Dante in the above exquisite passage came true. Beatrice, too fair and good for earth, was called by God to Himself. One day the poet sat down to write a poem in praise of her and had finished one stanza when the news came that Beatrice was dead. At first he seemed too benumbed even for tears, and after a quotation from Jeremiah—

at the beginning of the next paragraph, he gives a fantastic discussion of the symbolical figure nine and its connection with the life and death of Beatrice. Then the tears began to flow, and unutterable sadness took possession of his heart. A whole year after he tells us how one day he sat thinking of her and drawing the picture of an angel, a picture, alas! which was never finished, as he was interrupted by visitors.[6] At another time he tells how one day he saw a number of pilgrims passing through Florence on their way to Rome, and to them he addressed one of his most beautiful sonnets:

With these lines the New Life practically ends. After one more sonnet, in which he tells how he was lifted in spirit and had a vision of Beatrice in paradise, he concludes the book with the following paragraph, in which we first see a definite purpose on the part of Dante to write a long poem in praise of Beatrice: "After this sonnet there appeared to me a wonderful vision, in which I saw things which made me resolve to say no more of this blessed one until I should be able to treat more worthily of her, and to come to that I study as much as I can, as she truly knows. So that if it shall be the pleasure of Him in whom all things live that my life endure for some years more, I hope to say of her that which has never yet been said of mortal woman. And then may it please Him who is Lord of Courtesy, that my soul may go to see the glory of its lady, that is, the blessed Beatrice who gloriously looks on the face of him 'qui est per cuncta sæcula benedictus in sæcula sæculorum. Amen.'" (Who is blessed throughout all the ages.)

SUMMARY AND QUESTIONS FOR REVIEW

BIBLIOGRAPHY

CHAPTER III

The Divine Comedy is divided into three parts or books, canticas, as they are called by Dante: Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise, each one containing thirty-three cantos, with one additional introductory canto prefixed to the Hell. Even the number of lines in the three canticas is approximately the same.[7] Dante's love for number-symbols was shown in the New Life, hence we are justified in accepting the theory that the threefold division of the poem is symbolical of the Trinity, and that the thirty-three cantos of each cantica represent the years of the Savior's life. It is worthy of note that the last word in each of the three books is "stars."

The allegory of the Divine Comedy has been the subject of countless discussions. The consensus of the best modern commentators seems to be, however, that although the allegory is more or less political, it is chiefly religious. The great theme is the salvation of the human soul, represented by Dante himself, who is the protagonist of the poem. As he wanders first through hell, he sees in all its loathly horrors the "exceeding sinfulness of sin," and realizes its inevitable punishment; as he climbs the steep slopes of purgatory, at first with infinite difficulty, but with ever-increasing ease as he approaches the summit, he learns by his own experience how hard it is to root out the natural tendencies to sin that pull the soul downward; and finally, as he mounts from heaven to heaven, till he arrives in the very presence of God Himself, he experiences the joy unspeakable that comes to him who, having purged himself of all sin, is found worthy to join "the innumerable company of saints and the spirits of just men made perfect."

The Divine Comedy is a visionary journey through the three supernatural worlds, Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. Such visions were by no means infrequent in the Middle Ages, and Dante had many predecessors. He simply adopted a poetical device well known to his contemporaries. What differentiated him from others is the dramatic and intensely personal character of his vision; the consummate skill with which he interwove into this one poem all the science, learning, philosophy, and history of the times; and the lovely poetry in which all these things are embalmed. To appreciate the vast difference between the Divine Comedy and previous works of a similar nature, we need only to read a few pages of such crude books as the Visions of Alberico, Tugdale, and Saint Brandon.

To Dante and his contemporaries the supernatural world was not what it is to us to-day, a vast, unbounded space filled with star-systems like our own: the topography of Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise seemed to them as definite as that of our own planet. The Ptolemaic system of astronomy (overthrown by Copernicus, yet still forming the framework of Milton's Paradise Lost) was accepted with implicit confidence. According to this system the universe consisted of ten heavens or concentric spheres, in the center of which was our earth, immovable itself, while around it revolved the heavenly spheres. The earth was surrounded by an atmosphere of air, then one of fire, and then came in order the heavens of the moon, Mercury, Venus, the sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, the fixed stars, and the Primum Mobile (the source of the motion of the spheres) beyond which stretched out to infinity the Empyrean, the heaven of light and love, the seat of God and the angels.

According to Dante, hell is situated in the interior of the earth, being in shape a sort of funnel with the point downward, and reaching to the center of the earth, which is also the center of the universe. Purgatory rises in the form of a truncated cone in the surface of the southern hemisphere, having in solid form, the same shape as the hollow funnel of hell. It was formed of the earth which fled before Lucifer, and splashed up behind him like water, when, after his revolt against the Almighty he was flung headlong from heaven and became fixed in the center of the earth, as far as possible according to the Ptolemaic system from the Empyrean and God.

Hell is formed of nine concentric, ever-narrowing terraces, or circles, exhibiting a great variety of landscapes, rivers, and lakes, gloomy forests and sandy deserts, all shrouded in utter darkness except where flickering flames tear the thick pall of night, or the red-hot walls of Dis gleam balefully over the waters of the Stygian marsh. Here are punished the various groups of sinners, whom Dante sees, whose suffering he describes, and with whom he converses as he makes his way downward from circle to circle.

It was in the year 1300, at Easter time, when Dante began his strange and eventful pilgrimage, "midway in this our mortal life," he says in the first line of the poem, that is when he himself was thirty-five years old. He finds himself lost in a dense forest, not knowing how he came there, and after wandering for some time, reaches the foot of a lofty mountain, whose top is lighted by the rays of the morning sun. He is about to make his way thither, when he is stopped by the appearance, one after the other, of three terrible beasts, a leopard, a lion, and a wolf. He falls back in terror to the forest, when suddenly he sees a figure advancing toward him and learns that this is Vergil, who has been sent by Beatrice (now in heaven) to lead her lover from the wood of sin to salvation. To do this it will be necessary for Dante to pass through the infernal world, then up the craggy heights of purgatory to the earthly paradise, where Beatrice herself will take charge of him and lead him from heaven to heaven, even to the presence of God Himself. Dante's courage and confidence fail at this prospect—he is not Æneas or St. Paul, he says, to undertake such supernatural journeys—but when Vergil tells him that Beatrice herself has sent him, Dante expresses his willingness to undertake the difficult and awe-inspiring task.

It is nightfall when they reach the gate of hell, over which is written the dread inscription:

Entering in they are met with the sound of sighs, moans, and lamentations, mingled with curses hoarse and deep, and the beating of hands, all making a hideous din in the starless air, in which a long train of spirits is whirled about hither and thither stung by wasps and hornets. These spirits are the souls of those ignoble ones who were neither for God nor against him.

Here Dante recognizes the soul of him who made the "great refusal," recalling thus the strange story of the aged hermit, Peter Murrone, who after fifty-five years and more of solitary life in a cave high up among the Abruzzi Mountains, was forced to ascend the papal throne, and who after a short period of ineffectual reign under the name of Celestine V., resigned, thus making way for Boniface VIII., Dante's bitter enemy. Vergil's contemptuous remark concerning these souls,

has become proverbial.

Soon after this the two poets reach the shores of the river Acheron, where Charon, the infernal boatman, is busy ferrying the souls of the damned to the other side. He refuses to take Dante in his boat, and the latter falls into a swoon, and being aroused by a clap of thunder, finds himself on the other side. How he was carried over we are not told. The wanderers are now in limbo or the first circle of hell, in which are contained the souls of unbaptized children and of the great and good of the pagan world, especially the poets and philosophers of ancient Greece and Rome, who, having lived before the coming of Christ, had through no fault of their own died without faith in Him who alone can save. These souls are not punished by physical pain, as is the case with those in the following circles, but nourishing forever a desire which they have no hope of ever having satisfied, they pass the endless years of eternity in gentle melancholy. Here Dante meets the spirits of Homer, Ovid, Horace, and Lucan, who treat him kindly and make him one of the band, thus consecrating him as a great poet.

Leaving this beautiful oasis in the infernal desert, the poets enter the second circle, where Hell may be said really to begin. Here Dante sees the monster Minos, the judge of the infernal regions, who assigns to each soul its proper circle, indicating the number thereof by winding his tail about his body a corresponding number of times. In circle two are the souls of the licentious, blown about forever by a violent wind. Among them Dante recognizes the famous lovers of antiquity, Dido, Helen, Cleopatra. His attention is especially attracted toward two spirits, who, locked closely in each other's arms, are blown hither and thither like chaff before the wind. Calling upon them to tell him who they are, he hears the pathetic story of Francesca da Rimini, perhaps the most famous and beautiful passage in all poetry:

Passing rapidly over circle three, in which the gluttons lie in mire under a pelting storm of hail, snow, and rain, torn to pieces by the three-throated Cerberus; and circle four, where misers and spendthrifts roll great weights against each other and upbraid each the other with his besetting sin; we come to circle five, where in the dark and dismal waters of the Styx the wrathful and the melancholy are plunged. It is singular that Dante makes low spirits or mental depression as much a sin as violence and lack of self-control:

As they stand at the foot of a dark tower, a light flashes from its top and another light, far off above the waters, sends back an answer through the murky air. Dante, full of curiosity, turns to Vergil for explanation:

Thus they cross the Styx, and soon approach the other shore, where luridly picturesque in the ink-black atmosphere rise the red-hot walls and towers of the city of Dis: