Purgatorio: Canto XXXIII
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Dante Alighieri and Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
The beautiful lady: “This and other things Were told to him by me; and sure I am The water of Lethe has not hid them from him.”
And Beatrice: “Perhaps a greater care, Which oftentimes our memory takes away, Has made the vision of his mind obscure.
But Eunoe behold, that yonder rises; Lead him to it, and, as thou art accustomed, Revive again the half-dead virtue in him.”
Like gentle soul, that maketh no excuse, But makes its own will of another’s will As soon as by a sign it is disclosed,
Even so, when she had taken hold of me, The beautiful lady moved, and unto Statius Said, in her womanly manner, “Come with him.”
If, Reader, I possessed a longer space For writing it, I yet would sing in part Of the sweet draught that ne’er would satiate me;
But inasmuch as full are all the leaves Made ready for this second canticle, The curb of art no farther lets me go.
From the most holy water I returned Regenerate, in the manner of new trees That are renewed with a new foliage,
Pure and disposed to mount unto the stars.