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

“No wonder, then, that in a superstitious age, when monarchs trembled at an angry voice from the Lateran, the habits of early youth should have mingled with every action of Matilda’s life, and spread an agreeable mirage over the prospect of her eternal salvation: the power that tamed a Henry’s pride, a Barbarossa’s fierceness, and afterwards withstood the vast ability of a Frederic, might without shame have been reverenced by a girl whose feelings so harmonized with the sacred strains of ancient tradition and priestly dignity. But from whatever motive, the result was a continual aggrandizement of ecclesiastics; in prosperity and adversity; during life and after death; from the lowliest priest to the proudest pontiff.

“The fearless assertion of her own independence by successful struggles with the Emperor was an example not overlooked by the young Italian communities under Matilda’s rule, who were already accused by imperial legitimacy of political innovation and visionary notions of government.⁠ ⁠…

“Being then at a place called Monte Baroncione, and in her sixty-ninth year, this celebrated woman breathed her last, after a long and glorious reign of incessant activity, during which she displayed a wisdom, vigor, and determination of character rarely seen even in men. She bequeathed to the Church all those patrimonial estates of which she had previously disposed by an act of gift to Gregory the Seventh, without, however, any immediate royal power over the cities and other possessions thus given, as her will expresses it, ‘for the good of her soul, and the souls of her parents.’

“Whatever may now be thought of her chivalrous support, her bold defence, and her deep devotion to the Church, it was in perfect harmony with the spirit of that age, and has formed one of her chief merits with many even in the present. Her unflinching adherence to the cause she had so conscientiously embraced was far more noble than the Emperor Henry’s conduct. Swinging between the extremes of unmeasured insolence and abject humiliation, he died a victim to Papal influence over superstitious minds; an influence which, amongst other debasing lessons, then taught the world that a breach of the most sacred ties and dearest affections of human nature was one means of gaining the approbation of a Being who is all truth and beneficence.

“Matilda’s object was to strengthen the chief spiritual against the chief temporal power, but reserving her own independence; a policy subsequently pursued, at least in spirit, by the Guelphic states of Italy. She therefore protected subordinate members of the Church against feudal chieftains, and its head against the feudal Emperor. True to her religious and warlike character, she died between the sword and the crucifix, and two of her last acts, even when the hand of death was already cold on her brow, were the chastisement of revolted Mantua, and the midnight celebration of Christ’s nativity in the depth of a freezing and unusually inclement winter.”

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Ovid, Metamorphoses V, Maynwaring’s Tr.:⁠—

“Here, while young Proserpine, among the maids,
Diverts herself in these delicious shades;
While like a child with busy speed and care
She gathers lilies here, and violets there;
While first to fill her little lap she strives,
Hell’s grizzly monarch at the shade arrives;
Sees her thus sporting on the flowery green,
And loves the blooming maid, as soon as seen.
His urgent flame impatient of delay,
Swift as his thought he seized the beauteous prey,
And bore her in his sooty car away.
The frighted goddess to her mother cries,
But all in vain, for now far off she flies.
Far she behind her leaves her virgin train;
To them too cries, and cries to them in vain.
And while with passion she repeats her call,
The violets from her lap, and lilies fall:
She misses them, poor heart! and makes new moan;
Her lilies, ah! are lost, her violets gone.”

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Ovid, Metamorphoses X, Eusden’s Tr.:⁠—

“For Cytherëa’s lips while Cupid prest,
He with a heedless arrow razed her breast.
The goddess felt it, and, with fury stung,
The wanton mischief from her bosom flung:
Yet thought at first the danger slight, but found
The dart too faithful, and too deep the wound.
Fired with a mortal beauty, she disdains
To haunt th’ Idalian mount, or Phrygian plains.
She seeks not Cnidos, nor her Paphian shrines,
Nor Amathus, that teems with brazen mines:
Even Heaven itself with all its sweets unsought,
Adonis far a sweeter Heaven is thought.”

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When Xerxes invaded Greece he crossed the Hellespont on a bridge of boats with an army of five million. So say the historians. On his return he crossed it in a fishing boat almost alone⁠—“a warning to all human arrogance.”

Leander naturally hated the Hellespont, having to swim it so many times. The last time, according to Thomas Hood, he met with a sea nymph, who, enamored of his beauty, carried him to the bottom of the sea. See Hero and Leander, stanza 45:⁠—

“His eyes are blinded with the sleety brine,
His ears are deafened with the wildering noise;
He asks the purpose of her fell design,
But foamy waves choke up his struggling voice,
Under the ponderous sea his body dips,
And Hero’s name dies bubbling on his lips.

“Look how a man is lowered to his grave,
A yearning hollow in the green earth’s lap;
So he is sunk into the yawning wave,
The plunging sea fills up the watery gap;
Anon he is all gone, and nothing seen,
But likeness of green turf and hillocks green.

“And where he swam, the constant sun lies sleeping,
Over the verdant plain that makes his bed;
And all the noisy waves go freshly leaping,
Like gamesome boys over the churchyard dead;
The light in vain keeps looking for his face,
Now screaming sea-fowl settle in his place.”

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Psalm 92:4:⁠—

“For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy work: I will triumph in the works of thy hands.”

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Canto XXI 46:⁠—

“Because that neither rain, nor hail, nor snow,
Nor dew, nor hoar-frost any higher falls
Than theshort, little stairway of three steps.”

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Only six hours, according to Adam’s own