gion, at least the awful authority of churchmen was examined with freedom, sometimes ridiculed with sportive wit.' See also Inf. X. Note 119. 124. Currado (Conrad) da Palazzo of Brescia; Gherardo da Camino of Treviso; and Guido da Castello of Reggio. Of these three the Ottimo thus speaks: cities of Germany among the proud and more strong or more irreconcilable than turbulent princes of the Empire, more the octogenarian Gregory, in his cloister often on the sunny shores of Naples or palace, in his conclave of stern ascetics, Palermo, in southern and almost Oriental with all but severe imprisonment within luxury; the gallant Knight and trouba- conventual walls, completely monastic dour Poet, not forbidding himself those in manners, habits, views, in corporate amorous indulgences which were the re-spirit, in celibacy, in rigid seclusion from ward of chivalrous valour and of the the rest of mankind, in the conscientious 'gay science;' the Lawgiver, whose determination to enslave, if possible, all far-seeing wisdom seemed to anticipate Christendom to its inviolable unity of some of those views of equal justice, of faith, and to the least possible latitude the advantages of commerce, of the cul- of discipline; and the gay and yet tivation of the arts of peace, beyond all youthful Frederick, with his mingled the toleration of adverse religions, which assemblage of knights and ladies, of even in a more dutiful son of the Church Christians, Jews, and Mohammedans, of would doubtless have seemed godless in- poets, and men of science, met, as it difference. Frederick must appear before were, to enjoy and minister to enjoy us in the course of our history in the full ment, -to cultivate the pure intellect, development of all these shades of cha--where, if not the restraints of reliracter; but besides all this, Frederick's views of the temporal sovereignty were as imperious and autocratic as those of the haughtiest churchman of the spiritual supremacy. The ban of the Empire ought to be at least equally awful with that of the Church; disloyalty to the Emperor was as heinous a sin as infidelity to the head of Christendom; the independence of the Lombard republics was as a great and punishable political heresy. Even in Rome itself, as head of the Roman Empire, Frederick aspired to a supremacy which was not less un-quired much praise and fame. limited because vague and undefined, and irreconcilable with that of the Supreme Pontiff. If ever Emperor might be tempted by the vision of a vast hereditary monarchy to be perpetuated in his house, the princely house of Hohenstaufen, it was Frederick. He had heirs of his greatness; his eldest son was King of the Romans; from his loins might yet spring an inexhaustible race of princes; the failure of his imperial line was his last fear. The character of the man seemed formed to achieve and to maintain this vast design; he was at once terrible and popular, courteous, generous, placable to his foes; yet there was a depth of cruelty in the heart of Frederick towards revolted subjects, which made him look on the atrocities of his allies, Eccelin di Romano, and the Salinguerras, but as legitimate means to quell insolent and stubborn rebellion. "It is impossible to conceive a contrast "Messer Currado was laden with honour during his life, delighted in a fine retinue, and in political life in the government of cities, in which he ac "Messer Guido was assiduous in honouring men of worth, who passed on their way to France, and furnished many with horses and arms, who came hitherward from France. To all who had honourably consumed their property, and returned more poorly furnished than became them, he gave, without hope of return, horses, arms, and money. "Messer Gherardo da Camino delighted not in one, but in all noble things, keeping constantly at home." He farther says, that his fame was so great in France that he was there spoken of as the "simple Lombard," just as, "when one says the City, and no more, one means Rome.' Benvenuto da Imola says that all Italians were called Lombards by the French. In the Histoire et Cronique du petit Jehan de Saintré, fol. 219, ch. iv., the author remarks: "The fifteenth day after Saintré's return, there came to Paris two young, noble, and brave Italians, whom we call Lombards." 132. Deuteronomy xviii. 2: "Therefore shall they have no inheritance among their brethren: the Lord is their inheritance, as he hath said unto them." 140. "This Gherardo," says Buti, "had a daughter, called, on account of her beauty, Gaja; and so modest and virtuous was she, that through all Italy was spread the fame of her beauty and modesty.' The Ottimo, who preceded Buti in point of time, gives a somewhat different and more equivocal account. He says "Madonna Gaia was the daughter of Messer Gherardo da Camino: she was a lady of such conduct in amorous delectations, that her name was notorious throughout all Italy; and therefore she is thus spoken of here." When Procne, on revengeful mischief bent, Or perhaps the reference is to the 25. Esther vii. 9, 10: "And Harbonah, one of the chamberlains, said before the king, Behold also, the gallows, fifty cubits high, which Haman had made for Mordecai, who had spoken good for the king, standeth in the house of Haman. Then the king said, Hang him thereon. So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then was the king's wrath pacified." 34. Lavinia, daughter of King Latinus and Queen Amata, betrothed to Turnus. Amata, thinking Turnus dead, hanged herself in anger and despair. Æneid, XII. 875, Dryden's Tr. : "Mad with her anguish, impotent to bear The mighty grief, she loathes the vital air. She calls herself the cause of all this ill, And owns the dire effects of her ungoverned will; She raves against the gods, she beats her breast, She tears with both her hands her purple vest; Then round a beam a running noose she tied, And, fastened by the neck, obscenely died. "Soon as the fatal news by fame was blown, And to her dames and to her daughters known, The sad Lavinia rends her yellow hair And rosy cheeks; the rest her sorrow share; With shrieks the palace rings, and madness of despair.' 97. The first, the object; the second, too much or too little vigour. 124. The sins of Pride, Envy, and Anger. The other is Sloth, or lukewarmness in well-doing, punished in this circle. 136. The sins of Avarice, Gluttony, "The greatest gift that in his largess God and Lust. CANTO XVIII. 1. The punishment of the sin of Sloth. 27. Bound or taken captive by the image of pleasure presented to it. See Canto XVII. 91. 22. Milton, Parad. Lost, V. 100: "But know that in the soul Are many lesser faculties, that serve 30. The region of Fire. Brunetto Latini, Tresor, Ch. CVIII.: "After the zone of the air is placed the fourth element.. This is an orb of fire without any moisture, which extends as far as the moon, and surrounds this atmosphere in which we are. And know that above the fire is first the moon, and the other stars, which are all of the nature of fire." 44. If the soul follows the appetitus naturalis, or goes not with another foot than that of nature.. 49. In the language of the Scholastics, Form was the passing from the potential to the actual. "Whatever is Act," says Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theol., Quæst. LXVI. Art. I, “whatever is Act is Form; quod est actus est forma." And again Form was divided into Substantial Form, which caused a thing to be; and Accidental Form, which caused it to be in a certain way, 66 as heat makes its subject not simply to be, but to be hot. "The soul," says the same Angelic Doctor, Quæst. LXXVI. Art. 4, "is the substantial form of man; anima est forma ubstantialis hominis." It is segregate or distinct from matter, though united with it. 61. "This" refers to the power that counsels, or the faculty of Reason. 66. Accepts, or rejects like chaff. 73. Dante makes Beatrice say, Par. V. 19: Creating made, and unto his own goodness Nearest conformed, and that which he doth prize Most highly, is the freedom of the will, Wherewith the creatures of intelligence Both all and only were and are endowed." 76. Near midnight of the Second Day of Purgatory. 80. The moon was rising in the sign of the Scorpion, it being now five days after the full; and when the sun is in this sign, it is seen by the inhabitants of Rome to sit between the islands of Corsica and Sardinia. 83. Virgil, born at Pietola, near Mantua. 84. The burden of Dante's doubts and questions, laid upon Virgil,, 91. Rivers of Boeotia, on whose banks the Thebans crowded at night to invoke the aid of Bacchus to give them rain for their vineyards. 94. The word falcare, in French faucher, here translated "curve," is a term of equitation, describing the motion of the outer fore-leg of a horse in going round in a circle. It is the sweep of a mower's scythe. 100. Luke i. 39: "And Mary arose in those days and went into the hill: country with haste." 101. Cæsar on his way to subdue Ilerda, now Lerida, in Spain, besieged Marseilles, leaving there part of his army under Brutus to complete the work. 118. Nothing is known of this Abbot, not even his name. Finding him here, the commentators make bold to say that he was "slothful and deficient in good deeds." This is like some of the definitions in the Crusca, which, instead of the interpretation of a Dantesque word, give you back the passage in which it occurs. 119. This is the famous Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, who, according to the German popular tradition, is still sitting in a cave in the Kipphauser mountains, waiting for something to happen, while his beard has grown through the stone-table before him. In 1162 he burned and devastated Milan, Brescia, Piacenza, and Cremona. He was drowned in the Salef in Armenia, on his crusade in 1190, endeavouring to ford the river on horseback in his impa-where Avarice is punished. It is the tience to cross. His character is thus dawn of the Third Day. drawn by Milman, Lat. Christ., Book VIII. Ch. 7, and sufficiently explains why Dante calls him "the good Barba rossa 3. Brunetto Latini, Tresor. Ch. CXL "Saturn, who is sovereign over all, is cruel and malign and of a cold nature." 4. Geomancy is divination by points “Frederick was a prince of intrepid in the ground, or pebbles arranged in valour, consummate prudence, unmea- certain figures, which have peculiar sured ambition, justice which hardened names. Among these is the figure into severity, the ferocity of a barbarian called the Fortuna Major, which is thus somewhat tempered with a high chival-drawn: rous gallantry; above all, with a strength of character which subjugated alike the great temporal and ecclesiastical princes of Germany; and was prepared to assert the Imperial rights in Italy to the utmost. Of the constitutional rights of the Emperor, of his unlimited supremacy, his absolute independence of, his temporal superiority over, all other powers, even that of the Pope, Frederick proclaimed the loftiest notions. He was to the Empire what Hildebrand and Innocent were to the Popedom. His power was of God alone; to assert that it was bestowed by the successor of St. Peter was a lie, and directly contrary to the doctrine of St. Peter." 121. Alberto della Scala, Lord of Verona. He made his natural son, whose qualifications for the office Dante here enumerates, and the commentators repeat, Abbot of the Monastery of San Zeno. 132. See Inf. VII. Note 115. 135. Numbers xxxii. 11, 12: Surely none of the men that came out of Egypt, from twenty years old and upward, shall see the land which I sware unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob; because they have not wholly followed me: save Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite, and Joshua the son of Nun; for they have wholly followed the Lord.' 137. The Trojans who remained with Acestes in Sicily, instead of following Æneas to Italy. Eneid, V.: "They enroll the matrons for the city, and set on shore as many of the people as were willing,-souls that had no desire of! high renown.” 145. The end of the Second Day. and which by an effort of imagination can also be formed out of some of the last stars of Aquarius, and some of the first of Pisces. Chaucer, Troil, and Cres., III., 1415 "But whan the cocke, commune astrologer, 6. Because the sun is following close behind. 7. This "stammering woman" of Dante's dream is Sensual Pleasure, which the imagination of the beholder adorns with a thousand charms. The "lady saintly and alert" is Reason, the same that tied Ulysses to the mast, and stopped the ears of his sailors with wax that they might not hear the song of the Sirens. CANTO XIX. "Blessed are they they shall be com. 59. The three remaining sins to be purged away are Avarice, Gluttony, and Lust. 61. See Canto XIV. 148. 73. Psalms cxix. 25: "My soul cleaveth unto the dust: quicken thou me according to thy word." 99. Know that I am the successor of Peter. It is Pope Adrian the Fifth who speaks. He was of the family of the Counts of Lavagna, the family taking its title from the river Lavagna, flowing between Siestri and Chiaveri, towns on the Riviera di Genova. He was Pope only thirty-nine days, and died in 1276. When his kindred came to congratulate him on his election, he said, "Would that ye came to a Cardinal in good health, and not to a dying Pope." 134. Revelation xix. 10: "And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See thou do it not, I am thy fellow-servant." 137. Matthew xxii. 30: "For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels in heaven." He reminds Dante that here all earthly distinctions and relations are laid aside. He is no longer "the Spouse of the Church." 141. Penitence; line 92: "In whom weeping ripens That without which to God we cannot turn." 142. Madonna Alagia was the wife of Marcello Malespini, that friend of Dante with whom, during his wanderings he took refuge in the Lunigiana, in 1307. CANTO XX. 1. In this canto the subject of the preceding is continued, namely, the punishment of Avarice and Prodigality. 2. To please the speaker, Pope Adrian the Fifth, (who, Canto XIX. 139, says, "Now go, no longer will I have thee linger,") Dante departs without further question, though not yet satisfied. 13. See the article Cabala at the end of Paradiso. 15. This is generally supposed to refer to Can Grande della Scala. See Inf. I. Note 101. 23. The inn at Bethlehem. 25. The Roman Consul who rejected with disdain the bribes of Pyrrhus, and died so poor that he was buried at the public expense, and the Romans were obliged to give a dowry to his daughters. Virgil, Eneid, VI. 844, calls him "powerful in poverty.' Dante also extols him in the Convito, IV. 5. 31. Gower, Conf. Amant.,, V. 13:— "Betwene the two extremites Of vice stont the propertes Of vertue, and to prove it so Take avarice and take also The vice of prodegalite, Betwene hem liberalite, Which is the vertue of largesse Stant and governeth his noblesse. 32. This is St. Nicholas, patron saint of children, sailors, and travellers. The incident here alluded to is found in the Legenda Aurea of Jacobus de Voragine, the great storehouse of medieval wonders. It may be found also in Mrs. Jameson's Sacred and Legendary Art, II. 62, and in her version runs thus: "Now in that city there dwelt a certain nobleman who had three daugh. ters, and, from being rich, he became poor; so poor that there remained no means of obtaining food for his daugh ters but by sacrificing them o an infamous life; and oftentimes it came into his mind to tell them so, but shame and maidens wept continually, not knowing sorrow held him dumb. Meantime the what to do, and not having bread to eat; and their father became more and more desperate. When Nicholas heard of this, he thought it a shame that such a thing should happen in a Christian land; therefore one night, when the maidens were asleep, and their father alone sat watching and weeping, he took a handful of gold, and, tying it up in a handkerchief, he repaired to the dwelling of the poor man. He considered how he might bestow it without making himself known, and, while he stood irresolute, the moon coming from behind a cloud showed him a window open; so he threw it in, and it fell at the feet of the father, who, when he found it, returned thanks, and with it he portioned his eldest daughter. A second time Nicho、 las provided a similar sum, and again he |