# Purgatory Canto 20

*Exported from [Holy-Writings.com](https://www.holy-writings.com/) on 2026-06-18 — 1 clipping.*

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> 
> Canto XX
> 
> Argument
> 
>      Among those of the fifth cornice, Hugh Capet records illustrious examples
> of voluntary poverty and of bounty; then tells who himself is, and speaks of
> his descendants on the French throne; and, lastly, adds some noted instances
> of avarice. When he has ended, the mountain shakes, and all the spirits sing
> "Glory to God."
> 
> Ill strives the will, 'gainst will more wise that strives:
> His pleasure therefore to mine own preferr'd,
> I drew the sponge yet thirsty from the wave.
> Onward I moved: he also onward moved,
> Who led me, coasting still, wherever place
> Along the rock was vacant; as a man
> Walks near the battlements on narrow wall.
> For those on the other part, who drop by drop
> Wring out their all - infecting malady,
> Too closely press the verge. Accurst be thou,
> Inveterate wolf![1] whose gorge ingluts more prey,
> Than every beast beside, yet is not fill'd;
> So bottomless thy maw. Ye spheres of Heaven!
> To whom there are, as seems, who attribute
> All change in mortal state, when is the day
> Of his appearing,[2] for whom fate reserves
> To chase her hence? With wary steps and slow
> We pass'd; and I attentive to the shades,
> Whom piteously I heard lament and wail;
> And, 'midst the wailing, one before us heard
> Cry out "O blessed Virgin!" as a dame
> In the sharp pangs of childbed; and "How poor
> Thou wast," it added, "witness that low roof
> Where thou didst lay thy sacred burden down.
> O good Fabricius! thou didst virtue choose
> With poverty, before great wealth with vice."
> 
> [1: "Wolf." Avarice.]
> 
> [2: He is thought to allude to Can Grande della Scala. See Hell,
> Canto i. 98.]
> 
> The words so pleased me, that desire to know
> The spirit, from whose lip they seem'd to come,
> Did draw me onward. Yet it spake the gift
> Of Nicholas,[3] which on the maidens he
> 
> [3: An angel having revealed to him that the father of a family was
> so impoverished as to resolve on exposing the chastity of his three daughters
> to sale, Nicholas threw in at the window of their house three bags of money,
> containing a sufficient portion for each of them.]
> 
> Bounteous bestow'd, to save their youthful prime
> Unblemish'd. "Spirit! who dost speak of deeds
> So worthy, tell me who thou wast," I said,
> "And why thou dost with single voice renew
> Memorial of such praise. That boon vouchsafed
> Haply shall meet reward; if I return
> To finish the short pilgrimage of life,
> Still speeding to its close on restless wing."
> 
> "I," answer'd he, "will tell thee; not for help,
> Which thence I look for; but that in thyself
> Grace so exceeding shines, before thy time
> Of mortal dissolution. I was root[4]
> Of that ill plant, whose shade such poison sheds
> O'er all the Christian land, that seldom thence
> Good fruit is gather'd. Vengeance soon should come,
> Had Ghent and Douay, Lille and Bruges power;[5]
> And vengeance I of Heaven's great Judge implore.
> Hugh Capet was I hight: from me descend
> The Philips and the Louis, of whom France
> Newly is govern'd: born of one, who plied
> The slaughterer's trade[6] at Paris. When the race
> Of ancient kings had vanish'd (all save one[7]
> Wrapt up in sable weeds) within my gripe
> I found the reins of empire, and such powers
> Of new acquirement, with full store of friends,
> That soon the widow'd circlet of the crown
> Was girt upon the temples of my son,[8]
> He, from whose bones the anointed race begins.
> 
> [4: "Root." Hugh Capet, ancestor of Philip IV.]
> 
> [5: These cities had lately been seized by Philip IV. The spirit
> intimates the approaching defeat of the French army by the Flemings, in the
> battle of Courtrai, which happened in 1302.]
> 
> [6: "The slaughterer's trade." This reflection on the birth of his
> ancestor induced Francis I to forbid the reading of Dante in his dominions.
> Hugh Capet, who came to the throne of France in 987, was, however, the
> grandson of Robert, who was the brother of Eudes, King of France in 888; and
> it may, therefore, well be questioned whether by Beccaio di Parigi is meant
> literally one who carried on the trade of a butcher, at Paris, and whether the
> sanguinary disposition of Hugh Capet's father is not stigmatized by this
> opprobrious appellation.]
> 
> [7: The posterity of Charlemain, the second race of French monarchs,
> had failed, with the exception of Charles of Lorraine, who is said, on account
> of the melancholy temper of his mind, to have always clothed himself in black.
> Venturi suggests that Dante may have confounded him with Childeric III, the
> last of the Merovingian, or first, race, who was deposed and made a monk in
> 751.]
> 
> [8: Hugh Capet caused his son Robert to be crowned at Orleans.]
> 
> Till the great dower of Provence[9] had removed
> The stains, that yet obscured our lowly blood,
> Its sway indeed was narrow; but howe'er
> It wrought no evil: there, with force and lies,
> Began its rapine: after, for amends,
> Poitou it seized, Navarre and Gascony.
> To Italy came Charles; and for amends,
> Young Conradine,[10] an innocent victim, slew;
> And sent the angelic teacher[11] back to Heaven,
> Still for amends. I see the time at hand,
> That forth from France invites another Charles[12]
> To make himself and kindred better known.
> Unarm'd he issues, saving with that lance,
> Which the arch - traitor tilted with,[13] and that
> He carries with so home a thrust, as rives
> The bowels of poor Florence. No increase
> Of territory hence, but sin and shame
> Shall be his guerdon; and so much the more
> As he more lightly deems of such foul wrong.
> I see the other[14] (who a prisoner late
> 
> [9: "The great dower of Provence." Louis IX and his brother Charles
> of Anjou married two of the four daughters of Raymond Berenger, Count of
> Provence. See Paradise, c. vi. 135.]
> 
> [10: "Young Conradine." Charles of Anjou put Conradino to death in
> 1268, and became King of Naples.]
> 
> [11: "The angelic teacher." Thomas Aquinas. He was reported to have
> been poisoned by a physician, who wished to ingratiate himself with Charles of
> Anjou. "In the year 1323, at the end of July, by the said Pope John and by his
> cardinals, was canonized at Avignon, Thomas Aquinas, of the order of Saint
> Dominic, a master in divinity and philosophy. A man most excellent in all
> science, and who expounded the sense of Scripture better than anyone since the
> time of Augustin. He lived in the time of Charles I, King of Sicily; and going
> to the council at Lyons, it is said that he was killed by a physician of the
> said king, who put poison for him into some sweetmeats, thinking to ingratiate
> himself with King Charles, because he was of the lineage of the Lords of
> Aquino, who had rebelled against the king, and doubting lest he should be made
> cardinal; whence the Church of God received great damage. He died at the abbey
> of Fossanova, in Campagna." G. Villani, lib. ix.]
> 
> [12: "Another Charles." Charles of Valois, brother of Philip IV, was
> sent by Pope Boniface VIII to settle the disturbed state of Florence. In
> consequence of the measures he adopted for that purpose, our Poet and his
> friends were condemned to exile and death.]
> 
> [13: "_______ with that lance." If I remember right, in one of the
> old romances, Judas is represented tilting with our Saviour.]
> 
> [14: "The other." Charles, King of Naples, the eldest son of Charles
> of Anjou, having, contrary to the directions of his father, engaged with
> Ruggieri de Lauria, the admiral of Peter of Arragon, was made prisoner, and
> carried into Sicily, June, 1284. He afterward, in consideration of a large sum
> of money, married his daughter to Azzo VIII, Marquis of Ferrara.]
> 
> Had stept on shore) exposing to the mart
> His daughter, whom he bargains for, as do
> The Corsairs for their slaves. O avarice!
> What canst thou more, who hast subdued our blood
> So wholly to thyself, they feel no care
> Of their own flesh? To hide with direr guilt
> Past ill and future, lo! the flower - de - luce[15]
> Enters Alagna; in his Vicar Christ
> Himself a captive, and his mockery
> Acted again. Lo! to his holy lip
> The vinegar and gall once more applied;
> And he 'twixt living robbers doom'd to bleed.
> Lo! the new Pilate, of whose cruelty
> Such violence cannot fill the measure up,
> With no decree to sanction, pushes on
> Into the temple[16] his yet eager sails.
> 
> [15: "The flower-de-luce." Boniface VIII was seized at Alagna in
> Campagna, by the order of Philip IV, in the year 1303, and soon after died of
> grief. G. Villani, lib. viii. cap. lxiii. "As it pleased God, the heart of
> Boniface being petrified with grief, through the injury he had sustained, when
> he came to Rome, he fell into a strange malady, for he gnawed himself as one
> frantic, and in this state expired." His character is strongly drawn by the
> annalist in the next chapter. Thus, says Landino, was verified the prophecy of
> Celestine respecting him, that he should enter on the popedom like a fox,
> reign like a lion, and die like a dog.]
> 
> [16: It is uncertain whether our Poet alludes still to the event
> mentioned in the preceding note, or to the destruction of the order of the
> Templars in 1310, but the latter appears more probable.]
> 
> "O sovran Master! when shall I rejoice
> To see the vengeance, which Thy wrath, well - pleased,
> In secret silence broods? - While daylight lasts,
> So long what thou didst hear of her, sole spouse
> Of the Great Spirit, and on which thou turn'dst
> To me for comment, is the general theme
> Of all our prayers; but, when it darkens, then
> A different strain we utter; then record
> Pygmalion, whom his gluttonous thirst of gold
> Made traitor, robber, parricide: the woes
> Of Midas, which his greedy wish ensued,
> Mark'd for derision to all future times:
> And the fond Achan,[17] how he stole the prey,
> That yet he seems by Joshua's ire pursued.
> Sapphira with her husband next we blame;
> And praise the forefeet, that with furious ramp
> 
> [17: "Achan." Joshua vii.]
> 
> Spurn'd Heliodorus.[18] All the mountain round
> Rings with the infamy of Thracia's king,[19]
> Who slew his Phrygian charge: and last a shout
> Ascends: 'Declare, O Crassus![20] for thou know'st,
> The flavour of thy gold.' The voice of each
> Now high, now low, as each his impulse prompts,
> Is led through many a pitch, acute or grave.
> Therefore, not singly, I erewhile rehearsed
> That blessedness we tell of in the day:
> But near me, none, beside, his accent raised."
> 
> [18: "Heliodorus." "For there appeared unto them an horse, with a
> terrible rider upon him, and adorned with a very fair covering, and he ran
> fiercely and smote at Heliodorus with his fore feet." 2 Maccabees iii. 25.]
> 
> [19: "Thracia's king." Polymnestor, the murderer of Polydorus. Hell,
> Canto xxx. 19.]
> 
> [20: "Crassus." Marcus Crassus, who fell miserably in the Parthian
> war.]
> 
> From him we now had parted, and essay'd
> With utmost efforts to surmount the way;
> When I did feel, as nodding to its fall,
> The mountain tremble; whence an icy chill
> Seized on me, as on one to death convey'd.
> So shook not Delos, when Latona there
> Couch'd to bring forth the twin - born eyes of Heaven.
> 
> Forthwith from every side a shout arose
> So vehement, that suddenly my guide
> Drew near, and cried: "Doubt not, while I conduct thee."
> "Glory!" all shouted (such the sounds mine ear
> Gather'd from those, who near me swell'd the sounds),
> "Glory in the highest be to God." We stood
> Immovably suspended, like to those,
> The shepherds, who first heard in Bethlehem's field
> That song: till ceased the trembling, and the song
> Was ended: then our hallow'd path resumed,
> Eying the prostrate shadows, who renew'd
> Their custom'd mourning. Never in my breast
> Did ignorance so struggle with desire
> Of knowledge, if my memory do not err,
> As in that moment; nor through haste dared I
> To question, nor myself could aught discern.
> So on I fared, in thoughtfulness and dread.
>
> — *Purgatory Canto 20*