NOTES TO PURGATORIO. CANTO I. 1. The Mountain of Purgatory is a vast conical mountain, rising steep and high from the waters of the Southern Ocean, at a point antipodal to Mount Sion in Jerusalem. In Canto III. 14, Dante speaks of it as "The hill That highest tow'rds the heaven uplifts itself"; and in Paradiso, XXVI. 139, as "The mount that rises highest o'er the wave." ichæans imagined that all souls, before returning to their native heaven, must be borne first to the moon, where with good waters they would be washed pure from outward filth, and then to the sun, where they would be purged by good fires from every inward stain. After these lunar and solar lustrations, they were fit for the eternal world of light. But the conception of Purgatory as it was held by the early Christians, whether orthodox Fathers or heretical sects, was merely the just and necessary result of applying to the subject of future punishment the two ethical ideas that punishment should partake of degrees proportioned to guilt, and that it should be Around it run seven terraces, on which The Seven Sins punished in the Seven Circles are,-1. Pride; 2. Envy; 3. Anger; 4. Sloth; 5. Avarice and Prodigality; 6. Gluttony; 7. Lust. The threefold division of the Purgatorio, marked only by more elaborate preludes, or by a natural pause in the action of the poem, is,-1. From Canto I. to Canto IX. ; 2. From Canto IX. to Canto XXVIII.; 3, From Canto XXVIII. to the end. The first of these divisions describes the region lying outside the gate of Purgatory; the second, the Seven Circles of the mountain; and the third, the Terrestrial Paradise on its summit. "Traces of belief in a Purgatory," says Mr. Alger, Doctrine of a Future Life, p. 410, "early appear among the Christians. Many of the gravest Fathers of the first five centuries naturally conceived and taught,- -as is indeed intrinsically reasonable, that after death some souls will be punished for their sins until they are cleansed, and then will be released from pain. The Man 66 Pope Gregory the Great, in the sixth century, either borrowing some of the more objectionable features of the Purgatory-doctrine previously held by the heathen, or else devising the same things himself from a perception of the striking adaptedness of such notions to secure an enviable power to the Church,-constructed, established, and gave working efficiency to the dogmatic scheme of Purgatory ever since firmly defended by the Papal adherents as an integral part of the Roman Catholic system. The doctrine as matured and promulgated by Gregory, giving to the representatives of the Church an almost unlimited power over Purgatory, rapidly grew into favour with the clergy, and sank with general conviction into the hopes and fears of the laity." 9. The Muse "of the beautiful voice," who presided over eloquence and heroic verse. 11. The nine daughters of Pierus, king of Macedonia, called the Pierides. They challenged the Muses to a trial of skill in singing, and being vanquished were changed by Apollo into magpies. Ovid, Met. V., Maynwaring's Tr.: 'Beneath their nails Feathers they feel, and on their faces scales; Pied wings, and flutter in the fleeting air. 15. The highest heaven. "The besy larke, the messager of day, 23. The stars of the Southern Cross. Figuratively the four cardinal virtues, Justice, Prudence, Fortitude, and Temperance. See Canto XXXI. 106:— piece that advances very regularly near four minutes a day, and no other group of stars exhibits, to the naked eye, an observation of time so easily made. How often have we heard our guides exclaim in the savannahs of Venezuela, or in the desert extending from Lima to Truxillo, Midnight is past, the Cross begins to bend!' How often those words reminded us of that affecting scene, where Paul and Virginia, seated near the source of the river of Lataniers, conversed together for the last time, and where the old man, at the sight of the Southern Cross, warns them that it is time to separate.' 24. By the "primal people" Dante does not mean our first parents, but "the early races which inhabited Europe and Asia," says Dr. Barlow, Study of Dante, and quotes in confirmation of his view the following passage from Humboldt's Cosmos, II.: "In consequence of the precession of the equinoxes, the starry heavens are "We here are Nymphs, and in the Heaven are continually changing their aspect from stars. The next line may be interpreted in the same figurative sense. Humboldt, Personal Narrative, II. 21, Miss Williams's Tr., thus describes his first glimpse of the Southern Cross. every portion of the earth's surface. The early races of mankind beheld in the far north the glorious constellations of the southern hemisphere rise before them, which, after remaining long invisible, will again appear in those latitudes after a lapse of thousands of years. The Southern Cross began to become invisible in 52° 30' north latitude 2900 years before our era, since, according to Galle, this constellation might previously Among have reached an altitude of more than 10°. When it disappeared from the horizon of the countries of the Baltic, the great Pyramid of Cheops had already been erected more than 500 years." "The pleasure we felt on discovering the Southern Cross was warmly shared by such of the crew as had lived in the colonies. In the solitude of the seas, we hail a star as a friend from whom we have long been separated. the Portuguese and Spaniards peculiar motives seem to increase this feeling; a religious sentiment attaches them to a constellation, the form of which recalls the sign of the faith planted by their ancestors in the deserts of the New World. "The two great stars which mark the summit and the foot of the Cross having nearly the same right ascension, it follows hence, that the constellation is almost perpendicular at the moment when it passes the meridian. This circumstance is known to every nation that lives beyond the tropics, or in the Southern hemisphere. It has been observed at what hour of the night, in different seasons, the Cross of the South is erect or inclined. It is a time 30. Iliad, XVIII. "The Pleiades, and the Hyades, and the strength of Orion, and the Bear, which likewise they call by the appellation of the Wain, which there turns round and watches Orion; and it alone is deprived of the baths of Oceanus.” 31. Cato of Utica. "Pythagoras escapes, in the fabulous hell of Dante,' says Sir Thomas Browne, Urn Burial, IV., "among that swarm of philosophers, wherein, whilst we meet with Plato and Socrates, Cato is found in no lower place than Purgatory." In the description of the shield of Æneas, Eneid, VIII., Cato is represented as presiding over the good in the Tartarean realms: "And the good apart, Cato dispensing laws to them." This line of Virgil may have suggested to Dante the idea of making Cato the warden of Purgatory. marks: "The eighth book of the Tesoro of Brunetto Latini is headed Qui comincia la Rettorica che c' insegna a ben parlare, e di governare città e popoli. In this art Dante was duly instructed by his loving master, and became the most able orator of his era in Italy. Giov. Villani speaks of him as retorico perfetto tanto in dittare e versificare come in aringhiera But without this record and In the Convito, IV. 28, he expresses the greatest reverence for him. Marcia parlare. returning to him in her widowhood, he without acquaintance with the poet's says, "symbolizes the noble soul return-political history, knowing nothing of his ing to God in old age.' And continues: influence in debates and councils, nor of What man on earth was more worthy his credit at foreign courts, we might, to symbolize God, than Cato? Surely from the occasional speeches in the none";-ending the chapter with these Divina Commedia, be fully assured of words: "In his name it is beautiful to the truth of what Villani has said, and close what I have had to say of the signs that Dante's words and manner were of nobility, because in him this nobility always skilfully adapted to the purpose displays them all through all ages." he had in view, and to the persons whom he addressed. 66 Here, on the shores of Purgatory, his countenance is adorned with the light of Virgil's speech to the venerable the four stars, which are the four virtues, Cato is a perfect specimen of persuasive Justice, Prudence, Fortitude, and Tem- eloquence. The sense of personal digperance, and it is foretold of him, that nity is here combined with extreme his garments will shine brightly on the courtesy and respect, and the most flatlast day. And here he is the symbol of tering appeals to the old man's wellLiberty, since, for her sake, to him "not known sentiments, his love of liberty, bitter was death in Utica"; and the his love of rectitude, and his devoted meaning of Purgatory is spiritual Liberty, attachment to Marcia, are interwoven or freedom from sin through purification, with irresistible art; but though the "the glorious liberty of the children of resentment of Cato at the approach of God." Therefore in thus selecting the the strangers is thus appeased, and he "Divine Cato" for the guardian of this is persuaded to regard them with as realm, Dante shows himself to have greater freedom then the critics, who accuse him of "a perverse theology in saving the soul of an idolater and suicide. 40. The "blind river" is Lethe, which by sound and not by sight had guided them through the winding cavern from the centre of the earth to the surface. Inf. XXXIV. 130. 42. His beard. "Now the down much favour as the severity of his char- Ma se donna del Ciel ti muove e regge, Ford, Lany's Trial: In this also the consistency of Cato's Of softness is exchanged for plumes of age." Dante uses the same expression, Inf. XX. 45, and Petrarca, who became gray at an early period, says: "In such a tenebrous and narrow cage Were we shut up, and the accustomed plumes, 52. Upon this speech of Virgil to Cato, Dr. Barlow, Study of Dante, re IV. 28: "This the great poet Lucan 78. See Inf. IV. 128. Also Convito, shadows forth in the second book of his Pharsalia, when he says that Marcia returned to Cato, and besought him and entreated him to take her back in his old age. And by this Marcia is understood the noble soul." |