Canto XXIII

the pulpit shall be interdicted To the unblushing womankind of Florence To go about displaying breast and paps. What savages were e’er, what Saracens, Who stood in need, to make them covered go, Of spiritual or other discipline? But if the shameless women were assured Of what swift Heaven prepares for them, already Wide open would they have their mouths to howl; For if my foresight here deceive me not, They shall be sad ere he has bearded cheeks Who now is hushed to sleep with lullaby. O brother, now no longer hide thee from me; See that not only I, but all these people Are gazing there, where thou dost veil the sun.” Whence I to him: “If thou bring back to mind What thou with me hast been and I with thee, The present memory will be grievous still. Out of that life he turned me back who goes In front of me, two days agone when round The sister of him yonder showed herself,” And to the sun I pointed. “Through the deep Night of the truly dead has this one led me, With this true flesh, that follows after him. Thence his encouragements have led me up, Ascending and still circling round the mount That you doth straighten, whom the world made crooked. He says that he will bear me company, Till I shall be where Beatrice will be; There it behoves me to remain without him. This is Virgilius, who thus says to me,” And him I pointed at; “the other is That shade for whom just now shook every slope Your realm, that from itself discharges him.”