Purgatory: Canto IX. Slumber And Dream Of Dante
Slumber and Dream of Dante.--The Eagle.--Lucia.--The
Gate of Purgatory.--The Angelic Gatekeeper.--Seven P's inscribed
on Dante's Forehead.--Entrance to the First Ledge.
The concubine of old Tithonus was now gleaming white on the
balcony of the orient, forth from the arms of her sweet friend;
her forehead was lucent with gems set in the shape of the cold
animal that strikes people with its tail.[1] And in the place
where we were the night had taken two of the steps with which she
ascends, and the third was already bending down its wings, when
I, who had somewhat of Adam with me, overcome by sleep, reclined
upon the grass, there where all five of us were seated.
[1] By the concubine of old Tithonus, Dante seems to have
intended the lunar Aurora, in distinction from the proper wife of
Tithonus, Aurora, who precedes the rising Sun, and the meaning of
these verses is that " the Aurora before moonrise was lighting up
the eastern sky, the brilliant stars of the sign Scorpio were on
the horizon, and, finally, it was shortly after 8.30 P.M."
(Moore.) "The steps with which the night ascends" are the six
hours of the first half of the night, from 6 P.M. to midnight.
At the hour near the morning when the little swallow begins her
sad lays,[1] perchance in memory of her former woes, and when our
mind, more a wanderer from the flesh and less captive to the
thought, is in its visions almost divine,[2] in dream it seemed
to me that I saw poised in the sky an eagle with feathers of
gold, with wings widespread, and intent to stoop. And it seemed
to me that I was there[3] where his own people were abandoned by
Ganymede, when he was rapt to the supreme consistory. In myself I
thought, "Perhaps this bird strikes only here through wont, and
perhaps from other place disdains to carry anyone upward in his
feet." Then it seemed to me that, having wheeled a little, it
descended terrible as a thunderbolt, and snatched me upwards far
as the fire.[4] There it seemed that it and I burned, and the
imagined fire so scorched that of necessity the sleep was broken.
[1] The allusion is to the tragic story of Progne and Philomela,
turned the one into a swallow, the other into a nightingale.
Dante found the tale in Ovid's Metamorphoses, Book vi.
[2] Dante passes three nights in Purgatory, and each night his
sleep is terminated by a dream towards the hour of dawn, the time
when, according to the belief of classical antiquity, the visions
of dreams are symbolic and prophetic. (Moore.)
[3] Mt. Ida.
[4] The sphere of fire by which, according to the mediaeval
cosmography, the sphere of the air was surrounded.
Not otherwise Achilles shook himself,--turning around his
awakened eyes, and not knowing where he was, when his mother from
Chiron to Scyros stole him away, sleeping in her arms, thither
whence afterwards the Greeks withdrew him,[1]--than I started,
as from my face sleep fled away; and I became pale, even as a man
frightened turns to ice. At my side was my Comforter only, and
the sun was now more than two hours high,[2] and my face was
turned toward the sea. "Have no fear," said my Lord; "be
reassured, for we are at a good point; restrain not, but increase
all thy force. Thou art now arrived at Purgatory; see there the
cliff that closes it around; see the entrance, there where it
appears divided. A while ago in the dawn that precedes the day,
when thy soul was sleeping within thee, upon the flowers
wherewith the place down yonder is adorned, came a lady, and
said, "I am Lucia; let me take this one who is sleeping; thus
will I assist him along his way.' Sordello remained, and the
other gentle forms: she took thee, and when the day was bright,
she came upward, and I along her footprints. Here she laid thee
down: and first her beautiful eyes showed me that open entrance;
then she and slumber went away together." Like a man that in
perplexity is reassured, and that alters his fear to confidence
after the truth is disclosed to him, did I change; and when my
Leader saw me without solicitude, up along the cliff he moved on,
and I behind, toward the height.
[1] Statius, in the first book of the Achilleid, tells how
Thetis, to prevent Achilles from going to the siege of Troy, bore
him sleeping away from his instructor, the centaur Chiron, and
carried him to the court of King Lycomedes, on the Island of
Scyros, where, though concealed in women's garments, Ulysses and
Diomed discovered him. Statius relates how wonderstruck Achilles
was when on awaking he found himself at Scyros:
Quae loca? qui fluctus? ubi Pelion? onmia versa
Atque ignota videt, dubitatque agnoscere matrem--249-50.
[2] The morning of Easter Monday.
[3] Lucia seems to be here the symbol of assisting grace, the
gratia operans of the school-men. It was she who was called upon
by the Virgin (Hell, Canto II.) to aid Dante when he was astray
in the wood, and who had moved Beatrice to go to his succor.
Reader, thou seest well how I exalt my theme, and therefore
marvel not if with more art I reenforce it.[1]
[1] These words may be intended to call attention to the doctrine
which underlies the imagery of the verse.
The entrance within the gate of Purgatory is the assurance of
justification, which is the change of the soul from a state of
sin to a state of justice or righteousness. Justification itself
consists, according to St. Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica,
Prima Secundae, quaest. cxiii. art. 6 and 8), of four parts:
first, the infusion of grace; second, the turning of the free
will to God through faith; third, the turning of the free will
against sin; fourth, the remission of sin. It must be accompanied
by the sacrament of penance, which consists of contrition,
confession, and satisfaction by works of righteousness.
Outside the gate of Purgatory justification cannot be complete.
The souls in the Ante-Purgatory typify those who have entered on
the way towards justification, but have not yet attained it. They
undergo a period of mortification to sin, of deliberation, as St.
Thomas Aquinas says: "Contingit autem quandoque quod praecedit
aliqua deliberatio quae non est do substantia justificationis sed
via in justificationem." Summa Theol., l. c. art. 7.
We drew near to it, and reached such place that there, where at
first there seemed to me a rift, like a cleft which divides a
wall, I saw a gate, and three steps beneath for going to it of
divers colors, and a gatekeeper who as yet said not a word. And
as I opened my eye there more and more, I saw him sitting on the
upper step, such in his face that I endured it not.[1] And he had
in his hand a naked sword, which so reflected the rays toward us
that I often raised my sight in vain. "Tell it from there, what
would ye?" began he to say; "where is the guide? Beware lest the
coming up be harmful to you." [2] "A lady from Heaven with these
things acquainted," replied my Master to him, "only just now said
to us, 'Go thither, here is the gate.'" "And may she speed your
progress in good," began again the courteous gatekeeper, "come
forward then unto our steps."
[1] The angel at the gate appears to be the type of the priest
who administers absolution.
[2] Unless grace has been infused into the heart it is a sin to
present one's self as ready for the sacrament.
Thither we came to the first great stair; it was of white marble
so polished and smooth that I mirrored myself in it as I appear.
The second, of deeper hue than perse, was of a rough and scorched
stone, cracked lengthwise and athwart. The third, which above
lies massy, seemed to me of porphyry as flaming red as blood that
spirts forth from a vein. Upon this the Angel of God held both
his feet, seated upon the threshold that seemed to me stone of
adamant.[1] Up over the three steps my Leader drew me with good
will, saying, "Beg humbly that he undo the lock." Devoutly I
threw myself at the holy feet; I besought for mercy's sake that
he would open for me; but first upon my breast I struck three
times.[2] Seven P's upon my forehead he inscribed with the point
of his sword,[3] and "See that thou wash these wounds when thou
art within," he said.
[1] The first step is the symbol of confession, the second of
contrition, the third of satisfaction; the threshold of adamant
may perhaps signify the authority of the Church.
[2] Three times, in penitence for sins in thought, in word, and
in deed.
[3] The seven P's stand for the seven so-called mortal sins,--
Peccati, not specific acts, but the evil dispositions of the soul
from which all evil deeds spring,--pride, envy, anger, sloth
(accidia), avarice, gluttony, and lust. After justification these
dispositions which already have been overcome, must be utterly
removed from the soul.
Ashes or earth dug out dry would be of one color with his
vestment, and from beneath that he drew two keys. One was of gold
and the other was of silver; first with the white and then with
the yellow he so did to the door, that I was content.[1]
"Whenever one of these keys fails, and turns not rightly in the
lock," said he to us, "this passage doth not open. More precious
is one[2] but the other requires much art and wit before it
unlocks, because it is the one that disentangles the knot. From
Peter I hold them; and he told me to err rather in opening than
in keeping shut, if but the people prostrate themselves at my
feet." Then he pushed the valve of the sacred gate, saying,
"Enter, but I give you warning that whoso looks behind returns
outside."[3] And when the pivots of that sacred portal, which are
of metal, sonorous and strong, were turned within their hinges,
Tarpeia roared not so loud nor showed herself so harsh, when the
good Metellus was taken from her, whereby she afterwards remained
lean.[4]
[1] The golden key is typical of the power to open, and the
silver of the knowledge to whom to open.
[2] The gold, more precious because the power of absolution was
purchased by the death of the Saviour.
[3] For he who returns to his sins loses the Divine Grace.
[4] This roaring of the gate may, perhaps, be intended to enforce
the last words of the angel, and may symbolize the voices of his
own sins as the sinner turns his back on them. When Caesar forced
the doors of the temple of Saturn on the Tarpeian rock, in order
to lay hands on the sacred treasure of Rome, he was resisted by
the tribune Metellus.
I turned away attentive to the first tone,[1] and it seemed to me
I heard "Te Deum laudamus"[2] in voices mingled with sweet sound.
That which I heard gave me just such an impression as we are wont
to receive when people stand singing with an organ, and the words
now are, now are not caught.
[1] The first sound within Purgatory.
[2] Words appropriate to the entrance of a sinner that repenteth.
Gate of Purgatory.--The Angelic Gatekeeper.--Seven P's inscribed
on Dante's Forehead.--Entrance to the First Ledge.
The concubine of old Tithonus was now gleaming white on the
balcony of the orient, forth from the arms of her sweet friend;
her forehead was lucent with gems set in the shape of the cold
animal that strikes people with its tail.[1] And in the place
where we were the night had taken two of the steps with which she
ascends, and the third was already bending down its wings, when
I, who had somewhat of Adam with me, overcome by sleep, reclined
upon the grass, there where all five of us were seated.
[1] By the concubine of old Tithonus, Dante seems to have
intended the lunar Aurora, in distinction from the proper wife of
Tithonus, Aurora, who precedes the rising Sun, and the meaning of
these verses is that " the Aurora before moonrise was lighting up
the eastern sky, the brilliant stars of the sign Scorpio were on
the horizon, and, finally, it was shortly after 8.30 P.M."
(Moore.) "The steps with which the night ascends" are the six
hours of the first half of the night, from 6 P.M. to midnight.
At the hour near the morning when the little swallow begins her
sad lays,[1] perchance in memory of her former woes, and when our
mind, more a wanderer from the flesh and less captive to the
thought, is in its visions almost divine,[2] in dream it seemed
to me that I saw poised in the sky an eagle with feathers of
gold, with wings widespread, and intent to stoop. And it seemed
to me that I was there[3] where his own people were abandoned by
Ganymede, when he was rapt to the supreme consistory. In myself I
thought, "Perhaps this bird strikes only here through wont, and
perhaps from other place disdains to carry anyone upward in his
feet." Then it seemed to me that, having wheeled a little, it
descended terrible as a thunderbolt, and snatched me upwards far
as the fire.[4] There it seemed that it and I burned, and the
imagined fire so scorched that of necessity the sleep was broken.
[1] The allusion is to the tragic story of Progne and Philomela,
turned the one into a swallow, the other into a nightingale.
Dante found the tale in Ovid's Metamorphoses, Book vi.
[2] Dante passes three nights in Purgatory, and each night his
sleep is terminated by a dream towards the hour of dawn, the time
when, according to the belief of classical antiquity, the visions
of dreams are symbolic and prophetic. (Moore.)
[3] Mt. Ida.
[4] The sphere of fire by which, according to the mediaeval
cosmography, the sphere of the air was surrounded.
Not otherwise Achilles shook himself,--turning around his
awakened eyes, and not knowing where he was, when his mother from
Chiron to Scyros stole him away, sleeping in her arms, thither
whence afterwards the Greeks withdrew him,[1]--than I started,
as from my face sleep fled away; and I became pale, even as a man
frightened turns to ice. At my side was my Comforter only, and
the sun was now more than two hours high,[2] and my face was
turned toward the sea. "Have no fear," said my Lord; "be
reassured, for we are at a good point; restrain not, but increase
all thy force. Thou art now arrived at Purgatory; see there the
cliff that closes it around; see the entrance, there where it
appears divided. A while ago in the dawn that precedes the day,
when thy soul was sleeping within thee, upon the flowers
wherewith the place down yonder is adorned, came a lady, and
said, "I am Lucia; let me take this one who is sleeping; thus
will I assist him along his way.' Sordello remained, and the
other gentle forms: she took thee, and when the day was bright,
she came upward, and I along her footprints. Here she laid thee
down: and first her beautiful eyes showed me that open entrance;
then she and slumber went away together." Like a man that in
perplexity is reassured, and that alters his fear to confidence
after the truth is disclosed to him, did I change; and when my
Leader saw me without solicitude, up along the cliff he moved on,
and I behind, toward the height.
[1] Statius, in the first book of the Achilleid, tells how
Thetis, to prevent Achilles from going to the siege of Troy, bore
him sleeping away from his instructor, the centaur Chiron, and
carried him to the court of King Lycomedes, on the Island of
Scyros, where, though concealed in women's garments, Ulysses and
Diomed discovered him. Statius relates how wonderstruck Achilles
was when on awaking he found himself at Scyros:
Quae loca? qui fluctus? ubi Pelion? onmia versa
Atque ignota videt, dubitatque agnoscere matrem--249-50.
[2] The morning of Easter Monday.
[3] Lucia seems to be here the symbol of assisting grace, the
gratia operans of the school-men. It was she who was called upon
by the Virgin (Hell, Canto II.) to aid Dante when he was astray
in the wood, and who had moved Beatrice to go to his succor.
Reader, thou seest well how I exalt my theme, and therefore
marvel not if with more art I reenforce it.[1]
[1] These words may be intended to call attention to the doctrine
which underlies the imagery of the verse.
The entrance within the gate of Purgatory is the assurance of
justification, which is the change of the soul from a state of
sin to a state of justice or righteousness. Justification itself
consists, according to St. Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica,
Prima Secundae, quaest. cxiii. art. 6 and 8), of four parts:
first, the infusion of grace; second, the turning of the free
will to God through faith; third, the turning of the free will
against sin; fourth, the remission of sin. It must be accompanied
by the sacrament of penance, which consists of contrition,
confession, and satisfaction by works of righteousness.
Outside the gate of Purgatory justification cannot be complete.
The souls in the Ante-Purgatory typify those who have entered on
the way towards justification, but have not yet attained it. They
undergo a period of mortification to sin, of deliberation, as St.
Thomas Aquinas says: "Contingit autem quandoque quod praecedit
aliqua deliberatio quae non est do substantia justificationis sed
via in justificationem." Summa Theol., l. c. art. 7.
We drew near to it, and reached such place that there, where at
first there seemed to me a rift, like a cleft which divides a
wall, I saw a gate, and three steps beneath for going to it of
divers colors, and a gatekeeper who as yet said not a word. And
as I opened my eye there more and more, I saw him sitting on the
upper step, such in his face that I endured it not.[1] And he had
in his hand a naked sword, which so reflected the rays toward us
that I often raised my sight in vain. "Tell it from there, what
would ye?" began he to say; "where is the guide? Beware lest the
coming up be harmful to you." [2] "A lady from Heaven with these
things acquainted," replied my Master to him, "only just now said
to us, 'Go thither, here is the gate.'" "And may she speed your
progress in good," began again the courteous gatekeeper, "come
forward then unto our steps."
[1] The angel at the gate appears to be the type of the priest
who administers absolution.
[2] Unless grace has been infused into the heart it is a sin to
present one's self as ready for the sacrament.
Thither we came to the first great stair; it was of white marble
so polished and smooth that I mirrored myself in it as I appear.
The second, of deeper hue than perse, was of a rough and scorched
stone, cracked lengthwise and athwart. The third, which above
lies massy, seemed to me of porphyry as flaming red as blood that
spirts forth from a vein. Upon this the Angel of God held both
his feet, seated upon the threshold that seemed to me stone of
adamant.[1] Up over the three steps my Leader drew me with good
will, saying, "Beg humbly that he undo the lock." Devoutly I
threw myself at the holy feet; I besought for mercy's sake that
he would open for me; but first upon my breast I struck three
times.[2] Seven P's upon my forehead he inscribed with the point
of his sword,[3] and "See that thou wash these wounds when thou
art within," he said.
[1] The first step is the symbol of confession, the second of
contrition, the third of satisfaction; the threshold of adamant
may perhaps signify the authority of the Church.
[2] Three times, in penitence for sins in thought, in word, and
in deed.
[3] The seven P's stand for the seven so-called mortal sins,--
Peccati, not specific acts, but the evil dispositions of the soul
from which all evil deeds spring,--pride, envy, anger, sloth
(accidia), avarice, gluttony, and lust. After justification these
dispositions which already have been overcome, must be utterly
removed from the soul.
Ashes or earth dug out dry would be of one color with his
vestment, and from beneath that he drew two keys. One was of gold
and the other was of silver; first with the white and then with
the yellow he so did to the door, that I was content.[1]
"Whenever one of these keys fails, and turns not rightly in the
lock," said he to us, "this passage doth not open. More precious
is one[2] but the other requires much art and wit before it
unlocks, because it is the one that disentangles the knot. From
Peter I hold them; and he told me to err rather in opening than
in keeping shut, if but the people prostrate themselves at my
feet." Then he pushed the valve of the sacred gate, saying,
"Enter, but I give you warning that whoso looks behind returns
outside."[3] And when the pivots of that sacred portal, which are
of metal, sonorous and strong, were turned within their hinges,
Tarpeia roared not so loud nor showed herself so harsh, when the
good Metellus was taken from her, whereby she afterwards remained
lean.[4]
[1] The golden key is typical of the power to open, and the
silver of the knowledge to whom to open.
[2] The gold, more precious because the power of absolution was
purchased by the death of the Saviour.
[3] For he who returns to his sins loses the Divine Grace.
[4] This roaring of the gate may, perhaps, be intended to enforce
the last words of the angel, and may symbolize the voices of his
own sins as the sinner turns his back on them. When Caesar forced
the doors of the temple of Saturn on the Tarpeian rock, in order
to lay hands on the sacred treasure of Rome, he was resisted by
the tribune Metellus.
I turned away attentive to the first tone,[1] and it seemed to me
I heard "Te Deum laudamus"[2] in voices mingled with sweet sound.
That which I heard gave me just such an impression as we are wont
to receive when people stand singing with an organ, and the words
now are, now are not caught.
[1] The first sound within Purgatory.
[2] Words appropriate to the entrance of a sinner that repenteth.
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