Note 673 — CANTO XXVI.

Happy star: See note, Inf. xv. 55. Dante seems to have been uncertain what credence to give to the claims of astrology. In a passage of the Purgatorio (xvi. 67) he tries to establish that whatever influence the stars may possess over us we can never, except with our own consent, be influenced by them to evil.—His sorrow here, as elsewhere, is not wholly a feeling of pity for the suffering shades, but is largely mingled with misgivings for himself. The punishment of those to whose sins he feels no inclination he always beholds with equanimity. Here, as he looks down upon the false counsellors and considers what temptations there are to misapply intellectual gifts, he is smitten with dread lest his lot should one day be cast in that dismal valley and he find cause to regret that the talent of genius was ever committed to him. The memory even of what he saw makes him recollect himself and resolve to be wary. Then, as if to justify the claim to superior powers thus clearly implied, there comes a passage which in the original is of uncommon beauty.