document.write("When I had journeyed half of our life\\\'s way,<br />I found myself within a shadowed forest,<br />for I had lost the path that does not stray.<br /><br />Ah, it is hard to speak of what it was,<br />that savage forest, dense and difficult,<br />which even in recall renews my fear:<br /><br />so bitter-death is hardly more severe!<br />But to retell the good discovered there,<br />I\\\'ll also tell the other things I saw.<br /><br />I cannot clearly say how I had entered<br />the wood; I was so full of sleep just at<br />the point where I abandoned the true path.<br /><br />But when I\\\'d reached the bottom of a hill-<br />it rose along the boundary of the valley<br />that had harassed my heart with so much fear-<br /><br />I looked on high and saw its shoulders clothed<br />already by the rays of that same planet<br />which serves to lead men straight along all roads.<br /><br /><br />At this my fear was somewhat quieted;<br />for through the night of sorrow I had spent,<br />the lake within my heart felt terror present.<br /><br /><br />And just as he who, with exhausted breath,<br />having escaped from sea to shore, turns back<br />to watch the dangerous waters he has quit,<br /><br />so did my spirit, still a fugitive,<br />turn back to look intently at the pass<br />that never has let any man survive.<br /><br /><br />I let my tired body rest awhile.<br />Moving again, I tried the lonely slope-<br />my firm foot always was the one below.<br /><br /><br />And almost where the hillside starts to rise-<br />look there!-a leopard, very quick and lithe,<br />a leopard covered with a spotted hide.<br /><br /><br />He did not disappear from sight, but stayed;<br />indeed, he so impeded my ascent<br />that I had often to turn back again.<br /><br /><br />The time was the beginning of the morning;<br />the sun was rising now in fellowship<br />with the same stars that had escorted it<br /><br /><br />when Divine Love first moved those things of beauty;<br />so that the hour and the gentle season<br />gave me good cause for hopefulness on seeing<br /><br /><br /><br />that beast before me with his speckled skin;<br />but hope was hardly able to prevent<br />the fear I felt when I beheld a lion.<br /><br /><br /><br />His head held high and ravenous with hunger-<br />even the air around him seemed to shudder-<br />this lion seemed to make his way against me.<br /><br /><br />And then a she-wolf showed herself; she seemed<br />to carry every craving in her leanness;<br />she had already brought despair to many.<br /><br /><br /><br />The very sight of her so weighted me<br />with fearfulness that I abandoned hope<br />of ever climbing up that mountain slope.<br /><br />Even as he who glories while he gains<br />will, when the time has come to tally loss,<br />lament with every thought and turn despondent,<br /><br />so was I when I faced that restless beast<br />which, even as she stalked me, step by step<br />had thrust me back to where the sun is speechless.<br /><br />While I retreated down to lower ground,<br />before my eyes there suddenly appeared<br />one who seemed faint because of the long silence.<br /><br />When I saw him in that vast wilderness,<br />\\\"Have pity on me,\\\" were the words I cried,<br />\\\"whatever you may be-a shade, a man.\\\"<br /><br />He answered me: \\\"Not man; I once was man.<br />Both of my parents came from Lombardy,<br />and both claimed Mantua as native city.<br /><br />And I was born, though late, sub Julio,<br />and lived in Rome under the good Augustus-<br />the season of the false and lying gods.<br /><br />I was a poet, and I sang the righteous<br />son of Anchises who had come from Troy<br />when flames destroyed the pride of Ilium.<br /><br />But why do you return to wretchedness?<br />Why not climb up the mountain of delight,<br />the origin and cause of every joy?\\\"<br /><br />\\\"And are you then that Virgil, you the fountain<br />that freely pours so rich a stream of speech?\\\"<br />I answered him with shame upon my brow.<br /><br />\\\"O light and honor of all other poets,<br />may my long study and the intense love<br />that made me search your volume serve me now.<br /><br />You are my master and my author, you-<br />the only one from whom my writing drew<br />the noble style for which I have been honored.<br /><br />You see the beast that made me turn aside;<br />help me, o famous sage, to stand against her,<br />for she has made my blood and pulses shudder,\\\"<br /><br /><br />\\\"It is another path that you must take,\\\"<br />he answered when he saw my tearfulness,<br />\\\"if you would leave this savage wilderness;<br /><br /><br />the beast that is the cause of your outcry<br />allows no man to pass along her track,<br />but blocks him even to the point of death;<br /><br /><br />her nature is so squalid, so malicious<br />that she can never sate her greedy will;<br />when she has fed, she\\\'s hungrier than ever.<br />She mates with many living souls and shall<br />yet mate with many more, until the Greyhound<br />arrives, inflicting painful death on her.<br /><br /><br /><br />That Hound will never feed on land or pewter,<br />but find his fare in wisdom, love, and virtue;<br />his place of birth shall be between two felts.<br /><br />He will restore low-lying Italy for which<br />the maid Camilla died of wounds,<br />and Nisus, Turnus, and Euryalus.<br /><br />And he will hunt that beast through every city<br />until he thrusts her back again to Hell,<br />for which she was first sent above by envy.<br /><br />Therefore, I think and judge it best for you<br />to follow me, and I shall guide you, taking<br />you from this place through an eternal place,<br /><br />where you shall hear the howls of desperation<br />and see the ancient spirits in their pain,<br />as each of them laments his second death;<br /><br />and you shall see those souls who are content<br />within the fire, for they hope to reach-<br />whenever that may be-the blessed people.<br /><br />If you would then ascend as high as these,<br />a soul more worthy than I am will guide you;<br />I\\\'ll leave you in her care when I depart,<br /><br />because that Emperor who reigns above,<br />since I have been rebellious to His law,<br />will not allow me entry to His city.<br /><br />He governs everywhere, but rules from there;<br />there is His city, His high capital:<br />o happy those He chooses to be there!\\\"<br /><br />And I replied: \\\"O poet-by that God<br />whom you had never come to know-I beg you,<br />that I may flee this evil and worse evils,<br /><br />to lead me to the place of which you spoke,<br />that I may see the gateway of Saint Peter<br />and those whom you describe as sorrowful.\\\"<br /><br /><br />Then he set out, and I moved on behind him.");