Purgatorio · Canto XXVII ·
Purgatorio XXVII — The Pilgrim and the Fire
Reading Divine Comedy · canto 61 of 100 · Purgatorio, Canto XXVII
Before reading
The wall of fire that has burned through the last two cantos must now be crossed. There is no other way to the summit. The angel of chastity stands on the far edge and sings a beatitude that promises nothing except that the pilgrim must enter the flame. The canto is short, terrifying, and contains the last speech Virgil ever makes.
Where the canto sits
This is the threshold canto between the seven cornices and the Earthly Paradise — the last canto of the purgative mountain proper. After this, Virgil's office is over. The garden at the summit belongs to a different kind of guide, and the Commedia is preparing the reader, in the small movements of this canto, for the change. The third dream (Leah and Rachel), the angel's blessing, the last upward climb, and the famous final speech of Virgil are all crowded into a single canto. Pay attention to how much the poem can do in 142 lines.
What it helps to know
The fire has to be crossed. The poem makes the necessity absolute — no one farther goes, souls sanctified, if first the fire bite not — and the pilgrim's terror is given a depth it has not had since the dark wood of canto I. Virgil's argument for him to enter is patient, then technical, then a single rhetorical move that none of his philosophy could prepare. He names Beatrice. The name does what no reasoning could.
The chant the souls sing inside the fire as the pilgrim crosses is Beati mundo corde — Blessed are the pure of heart. On the far side, a different voice sings Venite, benedicti Patris mei — Come, ye blessed of my Father: the words of Christ in Matthew 25 to the saved at the Last Judgment. The terrace is sung out on the language of the general judgment, not the particular. The poem is signalling that the pilgrim, in crossing this fire, has done what every blessed soul must one day do.
The third dream comes that night. Dante has dreamed once at the gate of Purgatory (canto IX, the eagle) and once on the terrace of sloth (canto XIX, the femmina balba, the stammering siren). The third dream — Leah and Rachel — comes as the dawn before the summit. Both women are Old Testament figures from Genesis 29: Jacob's two wives, Leah the elder and fertile, Rachel the younger and beloved. By a tradition that goes back to St Gregory, Leah is the active life and Rachel the contemplative life. The dream tells the pilgrim, by figures, what the next stage of the journey will require.
The final speech of Virgil contains a verb worth knowing in advance. Te sovra te corono e mitrio — I crown and mitre thee over thyself. To crown and mitre is a coronation gesture combining the temporal authority (the crown) with the spiritual (the mitre). Virgil is delegating both kinds of authority to the pilgrim's own will. The reading is severe. The Holy Roman Emperor wore the crown; the Pope wore the mitre. Dante, the exile, is here being told that he is sovereign over himself in both kinds. The political theology of Monarchia (Dante's prose treatise on the two powers) is being condensed into a single verb.
What to read for
Listen to the structure of Virgil's argument with the terrified pilgrim. He begins with reassurance, moves to reminder (if I on Geryon have safely guided thee), and ends with the only argument that works. Pay attention to how many lines each move takes.
Listen for the moment Virgil enters the fire ahead of Dante. The poem records what Virgil keeps talking about inside the flame. The detail is small and unforgettable.
Listen for the dream. Leah's song is short and contains an image — the mirror — that connects the dream to the next dream Dante will not have, because the next vision will be waking and will be a real woman.
Listen for the final speech. The verb at the end — I crown and mitre thee — is the climax. Then there is nothing more from Virgil. The next time Virgil's name appears in the poem, it will be because he has gone.
From here on: illustrations and analysis. The three images below are scenes from the canto, and after them comes the close reading — famous lines quoted in full, paradoxes explained, political and theological freight unpacked. If you have not yet read the canto, stop here — read it, then come back.
After reading
What the canto did
The wall of fire was crossed. The angel of chastity sang the beatitude on its far side; an interior voice sang the welcoming words of Christ to the saved. A short third dream came in the night — Leah and Rachel, the two lives. At dawn the climb resumed. At the very top of the stair, Virgil delivered a coronation of the pilgrim's will, the last speech he is ever permitted to give in the Commedia. The canto is 142 lines long and it contains the end of one entire arc of the poem. From the next canto onward, the Commedia has a different shape.
The fire and the only argument that worked
The pilgrim's terror at the wall of fire is greater than his terror at anything else in the Inferno — e'en such became I, when I heard him, as he is who is put into the grave. Virgil tries patience: here may indeed be torment, but not death. Tries reminder: if I on Geryon have safely guided thee, what shall I do now I am nearer God? Tries proof: draw near to it, and put it to the proof with thine own hands upon thy garment's hem. The pilgrim does not move. Virgil tries philosophy and the philosophy is not enough. Then he says one sentence, and the sentence is the canto's psychological centre.
Twixt Beatrice and thee there is this wall.
Five words and a name. The pilgrim's obduracy being softened, he turns to Virgil hearing the name that in my memory evermore is welling. The fire is the same fire it was before the name was spoken; the will that has to cross it is different. The whole Inferno's training in fear has been displaced, in a single sentence, by a longing strong enough to overrule it.
There is a smaller detail in the same scene that the canto leaves quietly placed. Once Dante is inside the fire, Virgil keeps speaking to him — and my sweet Father, to encourage me, discoursing still of Beatrice went on, saying: Her eyes I seem to see already! Virgil, by the Commedia's scheme, has never seen Beatrice's eyes and will never see them; he is in Limbo, and Beatrice came down to him only once, in Inferno II. The line Her eyes I seem to see already is a small lie of love — Virgil is using a vision he cannot have to coax the pilgrim he loves through a fire he himself will never need to cross. The canto does not call attention to this. It lets the asymmetry stand.
The third dream
The pilgrim sleeps that night on the stair, like a goat watched by herdsmen. The third dream comes just before dawn — the hour when Citherea (Venus, as morning star) first beams from the East. A youthful and beautiful lady walks in a meadow gathering flowers and singing. She names herself: Leah. She is making a garland for her own pleasure — I please me at the mirror, here I deck me — and her sister Rachel sits all day at her looking-glass, gazing at her own beauteous eyes. Her, seeing, and me, doing satisfies.
Since at least St Gregory the Great, Leah and Rachel had been read as the active life and the contemplative life — the two modes of Christian existence. The dream prepares the pilgrim, by figures, for what comes next. The lady he will meet in the Earthly Paradise (Matelda, in canto XXVIII) will be a real-world Leah; the lady he will meet on the chariot (Beatrice, in canto XXX) will be a real-world Rachel. The dream is rehearsing the morning. The pilgrim wakes; the dawn that has been promised is at the upper edge of the sky; the two great Masters are already risen.
The coronation
The pilgrim climbs the last steps with flight in his pinions. At the topmost step Virgil stops, fixes his eyes on him, and gives the speech that is his last. The speech is fifteen lines long and is the Commedia's most condensed political theology.
The temporal fire and the eternal, son, thou hast seen, and to a place art come where of myself no farther I discern. Virgil names the limit of his own vision in a single tercet. By intellect and art I here have brought thee; take thine own pleasure for thy guide henceforth. The two means by which Virgil has guided — intellect (the natural reason of the philosopher) and art (the craft of the poet) — are explicitly handed over to Dante's own pleasure. Beyond the steep ways and the narrow art thou. The mountain is climbed.
Then: Free and upright and sound is thy free-will, and error were it not to do its bidding; thee o'er thyself I therefore crown and mitre. Te sovra te corono e mitrio. The verb pairs the two powers Dante had spent his prose treatise Monarchia keeping distinct — the crown of the temporal sovereign and the mitre of the spiritual one. To crown and mitre someone over himself is to declare him sovereign in both kinds within his own person. The political theology of the late thirteenth-century Holy Roman Empire — the argument that Pope and Emperor are each supreme in their own sphere — is here applied not to a state but to a soul. The pilgrim's will, having been purified by seven cornices, is now competent to be its own pope and its own emperor.
The line has been read two ways and the canto permits both. The orthodox reading: the purified will is restored to the freedom Adam had before the fall, and Virgil is announcing this restoration. The more searching reading: Virgil, who as the symbol of natural reason and of empire could not crown a soul with the mitre, has been forced into a gesture that exceeds him — he is delegating to Dante a sovereignty Virgil himself does not possess, and the speech is the moment Virgil hands over an authority he is borrowing. On either reading, the result is the same. Virgil is finished. He will not speak again.
Famous and meaningful passages
The angel's beatitude.
Outside the flame he stood upon the verge, And chanted forth, Beati mundo corde, In voice by far more living than our own. (Purg. XXVII.7–9)
Matthew 5:8: Blessed are the pure of heart. The terrace of lust is sung out on the beatitude that promises the vision of God.
The grave-simile.
Wherefore e'en such became I, when I heard him, As he is who is put into the grave. (Purg. XXVII.14–15)
The pilgrim's terror given a degree it has not had since the dark wood. The body of the still-living pilgrim figured as a corpse.
The name that broke the wall.
Seeing me stand still motionless and stubborn, Somewhat disturbed he said: Now look thou, Son, Twixt Beatrice and thee there is this wall. (Purg. XXVII.34–36)
Five words and a name. The argument that worked.
The small lie inside the fire.
And my sweet Father, to encourage me, Discoursing still of Beatrice went on, Saying: Her eyes I seem to see already! (Purg. XXVII.52–54)
Virgil borrowing a vision he does not have to bring the pilgrim through.
The voice on the far side.
Venite, benedicti Patris mei, Sounded within a splendour, which was there Such it o'ercame me, and I could not look. (Purg. XXVII.58–60)
Matthew 25:34, the words of Christ to the saved at the Last Judgment. The pilgrim is being addressed in the words of the general welcome.
The dream.
Know whosoever may my name demand That I am Leah, and go moving round My beauteous hands to make myself a garland. To please me at the mirror, here I deck me, But never does my sister Rachel leave Her looking-glass, and sitteth all day long. To see her beauteous eyes as eager is she, As I am to adorn me with my hands; Her, seeing, and me, doing satisfies. (Purg. XXVII.100–108)
The active and contemplative lives in a single dream. The two ladies of the morning rehearsed as the two ladies of the garden.
The handing-over.
By intellect and art I here have brought thee; Take thine own pleasure for thy guide henceforth; Beyond the steep ways and the narrow art thou. (Purg. XXVII.130–132)
The two means of the guidance — intellect and art — explicitly transferred to the pilgrim's pleasure.
The coronation.
Expect no more or word or sign from me; Free and upright and sound is thy free-will, And error were it not to do its bidding; Thee o'er thyself I therefore crown and mitre! (Purg. XXVII.139–142)
Te sovra te corono e mitrio. The pilgrim made sovereign in both powers over his own person. Virgil's last words in the Commedia.
What to watch for
Watch the next canto for a figure who walks in a meadow singing — Matelda. The third dream was rehearsing her.
Watch for the absence of Virgil's voice. He will follow the pilgrim into the next two cantos in silence. The canto after that will record his disappearance without showing it.
Watch the verb corono. Beatrice will appear under a corona of olive in canto XXX — and the crowning that Virgil performed in this canto will be retaken, with a different authority, by the woman who is about to arrive.
This post is part of Reading Divine Comedy, a slow daily companion to Dante's Commedia in the Longfellow translation — read one canto at a time, with a short orientation before and a close reading after. From Inferno I to Paradiso XXXIII.