Inferno
Canto III
The poets pass through the door of Hell. And first, in what is Hell’s ante-room, they meet a confused lamenting rabble: these are those, displeasing alike to God and to his enemies, who pursued neither good nor evil. Among them Dante recognises him “who made the great refusal,” generally identified with the Pope Celestine V, who, elected in 1294, resigned a few months later in favour of Boniface VIII, Dante’s great enemy. Then they come to the shores of Acheron, the river which circles the rim of Hell before descending deeper; across it Charon ferries the lost souls, but demurs to taking Dante in his boat. A sudden earthquake throws Dante into a trance.
THROUGH ME THE WAY IS TO THE CITY OF WOE:
THROUGH ME THE WAY INTO THE ETERNAL PAIN;
THROUGH ME THE WAY AMONG THE LOST BELOW.
RIGHTEOUSNESS DID MY MAKER ON HIGH CONSTRAIN.
ME DID DIVINE AUTHORITY UPREAR;[i]5-6. Hell was made by the triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, or Power, Wisdom, and Love.
ME SUPREME WISDOM AND PRIMAL LOVE SUSTAIN.
BEFORE I WAS, NO THINGS CREATED WERE[ii]7-8. “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void” (Gen. 1:1-2). At this point, apparently, Hell was created for the rebellious angels, who sinned almost as soon as they were made. On the Judgment Day, when all the wicked shall have been consigned to Hell, it will be sealed up, and will remain unchanged forever.
SAVE THE ETERNAL, AND I ETERNAL ABIDE.
RELINQUISH ALL HOPE, YE WHO ENTER HERE.
These words, of a dim colour, I espied [10]
Written above the lintel of a door.
Whereat: “Master, the sense is hard,” I cried.
And he, as one experienced in that lore:
“Here all misgiving must thy mind reject.
Here cowardice must die and be no more.
We are come to the place I told thee to expect,
Where thou shouldst see the people whom pain stings
And who have lost the good of the intellect.”[iii]18. “The good of the intellect” is the vision of God.
His hand on mine, to uphold my falterings,
With looks of cheer that bade me comfort keep, [20]
He led me on into the secret things.
Here lamentation, groans, and wailings deep
Reverberated through the starless air,
So that it made me at the beginning weep.
Uncouth tongues, horrible chatterings of despair,
Shrill and faint cries, words of grief, tones of rage,
And, with it all, smiting of hands, were there,
Making a tumult, nothing could assuage,
To swirl in the air that knows not day or night,
Like sand within the whirlwind’s eddying cage. [30]
And I, whose mind failed to discern aright,
Said: “Master, what is it that my ear affrays?
Who are these that seem so crushed beneath their plight?”
And he to me: “These miserable ways
The forlorn spirits endure of those who spent
Life without infamy and without praise.
They are mingled with that caitiff rabblement
Of the angels, who rebelled not, yet avowed
To God no loyalty, on themselves intent.
Heaven chased them forth, lest, being there, they cloud [40]
Its beauty, and the deep Hell refuses them,
For, beside these, the wicked might be proud.”[iv]42. The guilty might derive some satisfaction from comparing themselves with these.
And I: “Master, what is the grief extreme
Which makes them so their fortune execrate?”
He answered: “Brief words best their case beseem.
They have no hope of death: and their estate
Is so abased in the blind life they own
That they are envious of all others’ fate.
Report of them the world permitteth none.
Mercy and Justice have them in disdain. [50]
Let us not talk of them. Look, and pass on.”
I, who looked, beheld a banner all a-strain,
Which moved, and, as it moved, so quickly spun
That never a respite it appeared to deign.
And after it I saw so many run,
I had not believed, they seemed so numberless,
That Death so great a legion had undone.
When I had marked some few among the press,
I chanced the shade of him to recognise
Who made the great refusal, in cowardice. [60][v]60. Without much doubt this is Celestine V, a pious hermit, who, after a long vacancy of the papal office, was elected Pope in July, 1294, but abdicated five months later, feeling himself physically and mentally unfit. Through his renunciation Boniface VIII, Dante’s chief enemy, became Pope.
Forthwith I was assured, and knew mine eyes
Looked of a truth on the abject crew that were
Odious to God and to his enemies.
These paltry, who never were alive, were bare
As to the body, and all about were stung
By stings of the wasps and hornets that were there.
Because of these, blood, from their faces sprung,
Was mingled with their tears and flowed to feast
The loathly worms about their feet that clung.
Then as my peering eyes made further quest, [70]
I saw folk on the shore of a great stream.
“Master,” I said, “make to me manifest
Who these are and what law constraineth them
Willingly to pass over and be gone,
If rightly I can discern by the faint gleam.”
And he to me: “The things shall all be known
To thy understanding when our steps are stayed
Upon the mournful shores of Acheron.”
Casting abashed eyes downward, and afraid
Lest that my words should some offence have wrought, [80]
I ceased from speech until the stream we made.
And toward us lo! arriving in a boat
An Ancient, white with hair upon him old,[vi]83. The ancient boatman is Charon.
Crying, “Woe to you, ye spirits misbegot!
Hope not that heaven ye ever shall behold.
I come to carry you to yon shore, and lead
Into the eternal darkness, heat and cold.
And thou who art there, a living spirit, with speed
Get hence, nor with these who are dead delay”—
But when he noted that I took no heed, [90]
He said: “By another ferry, another way
Of entrance must thou seek to pass, not here.
Needs must a lighter vessel thee convey.”
My Guide to him: “Charon, thy frowns forbear.[vii]94. Charon sees that Dante is destined to be carried, after death, to Purgatory in the angel's boat described in Purg. II, 40-52.
Thus is this thing willed there, where what is willed
Can be accomplished. Further question spare.”
Then were the shaggy cheeks from trouble stilled[viii]97-99 Charon, like most of the classical guardians retained in Dante’s Hell, becomes a demonic figure.
Of that old steersman on the livid fen
Around whose eyes flames in a circle wheeled.
But those forlorn and naked spirits of men [100]
Changed colour, chattering with their teeth, all numb,
Soon as the harsh words sounded in their ken.
They blasphemed God, blasphemed their mother’s womb,
The human kind, the place, the time, the seed
Of their engendering, and their birth and doom;
Then weeping all together in their sad need
Betook themselves to the accursed shore
Which awaits each who of God takes no heed.
Charon, the demon, beckoning before,
With eyes of glowing coal, assembles all: [110]
Whoever lags, he beats him with his oar.
And as the late leaves of November fall
To earth, one after another, ever fewer,
Till the bough sees its spoil gone past recall,
So by that river Adam’s seed impure
Cast themselves from the wharf, one after one,
At signals, as the bird goes to the lure.[ix]117. “The lure”: the call by which the hunter lures it.
Thus are they borne across the water dun;
And ere they disembark on the far strand
On this another gathering is begun. [120]
“Son,” said the courteous Master, “understand
That all those who have died in the anger of God
Congregate hither out of every land.
And they are prompt to pass over the flood,
For Divine Justice pricketh in them so
That fear is changed to longing in their blood.[x]126. Any reality seems to them less intolerable than the apprehension.
By this way no good spirit is seen to go.
Therefore if Charon doth of thee complain,
What his words mean thou easily may’st know.”
When he had ended, the whole shadowy plain [130]
Shuddered so strongly, that the terror past
Still at the memory bathes me in sweat again.
Out of the tear-drenched earth came forth a blast
That made a crimson flash before me leap
And numbness over all my senses cast.
And I fell, like to one seized with a sleep.