The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri (13 inch ebook reader .txt) 📕

proper cause,
And the language that I used and that I made.
Now, son of mine, the tasting of the tree
Not in itself was cause of so great exile,
But solely the o’erstepping of the bounds.
There, whence thy Lady moved Virgilius,1917
Four thousand and three hundred and two circuits
Made by the sun, this Council I desired;
And him I saw return to all the lights
Of his highway nine hundred times and thirty,
Whilst I upon the earth was tarrying.
The language that I spake was quite extinct1918
Before that in the work interminable
The people under Nimrod were employed;
For nevermore result of reasoning
(Because of human pleasure that doth change,
Obedient to the heavens) was durable.1919
A natural action is it that man speaks;
But whether thus or thus, doth nature leave
To your own art, as seemeth best to you.
Ere I descended to the infernal anguish,
El was on earth the name of the Chief Good,1920
From whom comes all the joy that wraps me round
Eli he then was called, and that is proper,1921
Because the use of men is like a leaf1922
On bough, which goeth and another cometh.
Upon the mount that highest o’er the wave1923
Rises was I, in life or pure or sinful,
From the first hour to that which is the second,
As the sun changes quadrant, to the sixth.”1924 Canto XXVII

St. Peter’s reproof of bad popes⁠—The Ascent to the Ninth Heaven, or the Primum Mobile.

“Glory be to the Father, to the Son,1925
And Holy Ghost!” all Paradise began,
So that the melody inebriate made me.
What I beheld seemed unto me a smile
Of the universe; for my inebriation
Found entrance through the hearing and the sight.
O joy! O gladness inexpressible!
O perfect life of love and peacefulness!
O riches without hankering secure!1926
Before mine eyes were standing the four torches1927
Enkindled, and the one that first had come
Began to make itself more luminous;
And even such in semblance it became
As Jupiter would become, if he and Mars1928
Were birds, and they should interchange their feathers.
That Providence, which here distributeth
Season and service, in the blessed choir
Had silence upon every side imposed.
When I heard say: “If I my color change,
Marvel not at it; for while I am speaking
Thou shalt behold all these their color change.
He who usurps upon the earth my place,1929
My place, my place, which vacant has become
Before the presence of the Son of God,
Has of my cemetery made a sewer1930
Of blood and stench, whereby the Perverse One,
Who fell from here, below there is appeased!”
With the same color which, through sun adverse,
Painteth the clouds at evening or at morn,
Beheld I then the whole of heaven suffused.
And as a modest woman, who abides
Sure of herself, and at another’s failing,
From listening only, timorous becomes,
Even thus did Beatrice change countenance;
And I believe in heaven was such eclipse,
When suffered the supreme Omnipotence;1931
Thereafterward proceeded forth his words
With voice so much transmuted from itself,
The very countenance was not more changed.
“The spouse of Christ has never nurtured been
On blood of mine, of Linus and of Cletus,1932
To be made use of in acquest of gold;
But in acquest of this delightful life
Sixtus and Pius, Urban and Calixtus,1933
After much lamentation, shed their blood.
Our purpose was not, that on the right hand
Of our successors should in part be seated1934
The Christian folk, in part upon the other;
Nor that the keys which were to me confided
Should e’er become the escutcheon on a banner,1935
That should wage war on those who are baptized;1936
Nor I be made the figure of a seal
To privileges venal and mendacious,1937
Whereat I often redden and flash with fire.
In garb of shepherds the rapacious wolves1938
Are seen from here above o’er all the pastures!
O wrath of God, why dost thou slumber still?1939
To drink our blood the Caorsines and Gascons1940
Are making ready. O thou good beginning,
Unto how vile an end must thou needs fall!
But the high Providence, that with Scipio1941
At Rome the glory of the world defended,
Will speedily bring aid, as I conceive;
And thou, my son, who by thy mortal weight
Shalt down return again, open thy mouth;
What I conceal not, do not thou conceal.”
As with its frozen vapors downward falls
In flakes our atmosphere, what time the horn1942
Of the celestial Goat doth touch the sun,1943
Upward in such array saw I the ether
Become, and flaked with the triumphant vapors,
Which there together with us had remained.1944
My sight was following up their semblances,
And followed till the medium, by excess,1945
The passing farther onward took from it;
Whereat the Lady, who beheld me freed
From gazing upward, said to me: “Cast down
Thy sight, and see how far thou art turned round.”
Since the first time that I had downward looked,1946
I saw that I had moved through the whole arc
Which the first climate makes from midst to end;1947
So that I saw the mad track of Ulysses1948
Past Gades, and this side, well nigh the shore1949
Whereon became Europa a sweet burden.1950
And of this threshing-floor the site to me1951
Were more unveiled, but the sun was proceeding
Under my feet, a sign and more removed.1952
My mind enamoured, which is dallying1953
At all times with my Lady, to bring back