Purgatorio: Canto X
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Dante Alighieri and Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
O ye proud Christians! wretched, weary ones! Who, in the vision of the mind infirm Confidence have in your backsliding steps,
Do ye not comprehend that we are worms, Born to bring forth the angelic butterfly That flieth unto judgment without screen?
Why floats aloft your spirit high in air? Like are ye unto insects undeveloped, Even as the worm in whom formation fails!
As to sustain a ceiling or a roof, In place of corbel, oftentimes a figure Is seen to join its knees unto its breast,
Which makes of the unreal real anguish Arise in him who sees it, fashioned thus Beheld I those, when I had ta’en good heed.
True is it, they were more or less bent down, According as they more or less were laden; And he who had most patience in his looks
Weeping did seem to say, “I can no more!”