The Portable Dante

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Authors: Dante Alighieri
above the gate, and he hears the screams of anguish from the damned souls. Rejected by God and not accepted by the powers of Hell, the first group of souls are “nowhere, ” because of their cowardly refusal to make a choice in life. Their punishment is to follow a banner at a furious pace forever, and to be tormented by flies and hornets. The Pilgrim recognizes several of these shades but mentions
none by name. Next they come to the River Acheron, where they are greeted by the infernal boatman, Charon. Among those doomed souls who are to be ferried across the river, Charon sees the living man and challenges him, but Virgil lets it be known that his companion must pass. Then across the landscape rushes a howling wind, which blasts the Pilgrim out of his senses, and he falls to the ground.
I AM THE WAY INTO THE DOLEFUL CITY,
I AM THE WAY INTO ETERNAL GRIEF,
I AM THE WAY TO A FORSAKEN RACE.
3
JUSTICE IT WAS THAT MOVED MY GREAT CREATOR;
DIVINE OMNIPOTENCE CREATED ME,
AND HIGHEST WISDOM JOINED WITH PRIMAL LOVE.
6
BEFORE ME NOTHING BUT ETERNAL THINGS
WERE MADE, AND I SHALL LAST ETERNALLY.
ABANDON EVERY HOPE, ALL YOU WHO ENTER.
9
I saw these words spelled out in somber colors inscribed along the ledge above a gate; “Master, ” I said, “these words I see are cruel. ”
12
He answered me, speaking with experience: “Now here you must leave all distrust behind; let all your cowardice die on this spot.
15
We are at the place where earlier I said you could expect to see the suffering race of souls who lost the good of intellect. ”
18
Placing his hand on mine, smiling at me in such a way that I was reassured, he led me in, into those mysteries.
21
Here sighs and cries and shrieks of lamentation echoed throughout the starless air of Hell; at first these sounds resounding made me weep:
24
    5-6. Divine Omnipotence, Highest Wisdom, and Primal Love are, respectively, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Thus, the gate of Hell was created by the Trinity moved by Justice.
    18. Souls who have lost sight of God.
tongues confused, a language strained in anguish with cadences of anger, shrill outcries and raucous groans that joined with sounds of hands,
27
raising a whirling storm that turns itself forever through that air of endless black, like grains of sand swirling when a whirlwind blows.
30
And I, in the midst of all this circling horror, began, “Teacher, what are these sounds I hear? What souls are these so overwhelmed by grief?”
33
And he to me: “This wretched state of being is the fate of those sad souls who lived a life but lived it with no blame and with no praise.
36
They are mixed with that repulsive choir of angels neither faithful nor unfaithful to their God, who undecided stood but for themselves.
39
Heaven, to keep its beauty, cast them out, but even Hell itself would not receive them, for fear the damned might glory over them. ”
42
And I. “Master, what torments do they suffer that force them to lament so bitterly?” He answered: “I will tell you in few words:
45
these wretches have no hope of truly dying, and this blind life they lead is so abject it makes them envy every other fate.
48
The world will not record their having been there; Heaven’s mercy and its justice turn from them. Let’s not discuss them; look and pass them by. ”
51
And so I looked and saw a kind of banner rushing ahead, whirling with aimless speed as though it would not ever take a stand;
54
    52-69. In the
Inferno
divine retribution assumes the form of the
contrapasso,
i. e., the just punishment of sin, effected by a process either resembling or contrasting to the sin itself. In this canto the
contrapasso
opposes the sin of neutrality, or inactivity: The souls who in their early lives had no banner, no leader to follow, now run forever after one.
behind it an interminable train of souls pressed on, so many that I wondered how death could have undone so great a number.
57
When I had recognized a few of them, I saw the shade of the

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