De ruina Mundi

The Burden of Divine Providence

The speaker grapples with the apparent triumph of vice and the decay of virtue while trusting in God's hidden providence.

Except that it is still true—and so I believe, Ruler of the world—that your providence is infinite; nor could I ever believe otherwise, because I see it from experience. At times I would grow far colder than snow, seeing the world turned upside down, and every virtue and every noble custom snuffed out completely.¹ I can't find a living light, nor even anyone who is ashamed of their vices: some deny you; some say you're dreaming.² But I believe you hold back, O highest King, for a heavier punishment of their great faults; or else the last day that makes hell tremble is already near, and you are waiting for it. Virtue will never return to us. In this place, anyone who is God's enemy is held in high esteem. Cato goes as a beggar; the scepter has fallen into a pirate's hands; St. Peter is cast to the ground; here lust and every kind of plunder abound—I don't know how heaven itself doesn't come undone.³

The Hypocrisy of the Powerful

A sharp critique of corrupt leaders and clergy who flaunt their vices while the faithful are marginalized.

Don't you see how proud that satirical Mattone is—and how he's a river of vices?⁴ So that my heart is consumed with fierce indignation. Ah! Look at that catamite and that pimp, dressed in purple—a play-actor the crowd follows and the blind world adores!⁵ Doesn't it still fill you with indignation that that lustful pig thrives and steals the high praise that belongs to you—flatterers and parasites—while your own people are banished from land to land?⁶

The Triumph of Greed and Fraud

A lament for a society that rewards plunder and deceit while punishing the innocent.

Happy these days is the one who lives by plunder, and who feeds most on other people's blood; who strips the widow and her wards still in swaddling clothes, and who races to bring the poor to ruin!⁷ That soul is refined and rare who gains the most by fraud or force; whoever despises heaven, and Christ with it, and is always scheming to drive others into the depths—him the world honors: the one whose books and papers are packed with thefts, and who best knows the craft of every kind of wrongdoing.⁸⁹

The Ruin of Rome and the Loss of Virtue

The speaker mourns the moral collapse of Rome and the general abandonment of the straight path, finding hope only in the afterlife.

The earth is so crushed under every vice that it will never lift the burden from itself: its head, Rome, is going down into the dust, never to return to its great office. O Brutus, and you, Fabricius—what grief you must feel if you’ve heard of this other great ruin!¹⁰ Catiline is not enough, nor Sulla, Marius, Caesar, or Nero: but here men and women—every person—strives to do it some harm.¹¹ The age of piety and the age of chastity are gone. Virtue goes begging and never takes flight; that is the cry of the common crowd and the blind, wicked people.¹² Usury is now called philosophy, and everyone just turns their back on doing good; there is no one left who walks the straight path. So the worth still left in me freezes solid—except that one hope won't let it leave me altogether, for I know that in the life to come it will be plain which soul was noble, and who raised their wings to a more graceful style.¹³

A Song for the Few

The poem concludes with an envoy warning the truth to avoid the corrupt halls of power.

Song, be careful not to lean on purple; stay away from palaces and loggias, and let your message speak only to a few—for to the whole world you'll be an enemy.¹⁴

Read the original Latin

Se non che pur è vero e così credo, Rettor del mondo, che infinita sia Toa providenzia; nè già mai potria Creder contra, perchè ab experto el vedo; Talor serìa via più che neve fredo, Vedendo sotto sopra volto el mondo, Et esser spenta al fondo Ogne virtute et ogne bel costume. Non trovo un vivo lume, Nè pur chi de’ soi vizii se vergogni: Chi te nega, chi dice che tu sogni.

Ma credo che ritardi, o Re superno, A magior pena de’ soi gran defetti; On pur ch’è forsi appresso, e tu l’aspetti, L’estremo dì che fa tremar l’inferno. A noi virtù non tornarà in eterno. Quivi se estima chi è de Dio nemico. va mendico; Ne le man di pirata è gionto il scetro: A terra va San Pietro; Quivi lussuria et ogne preda abunda: Che non so come il ciel non si confunda.

Non vedi tu il satirico Mattone Quanto è superbo, et è di vizii un fiume? Che di gran sdegno il cor mi se consume. Deh! mira quel cinedo e quel lenone Di porpora vestito, un istrione Che ’l vulgo segue e il cieco mondo adora! Non ti ven sdegno ancora, Che quel lussurioso porco gode, E le toe alte lode Usurpa, assentatori e parasciti; E i toi di terra in terra son banditi?

Felice or mai chi vive di rapina, E chi de l’altrui sangue più se pasce, Chi vedoe spoglia e soi pupilli in fasce, E chi di povri corre a la ruina! Quella anima è gentil e peregrina, Che per fraude o per forza fa più acquisto; Chi spreza il ciel cum Cristo, E sempre pensa altrui cacciar al fondo: Colui onora el mondo, Che ha pien di latrocinii libri e carte, E chi d’ogne mal far sa meglio l’arte.

La terra è sì oppressa da ogne vizio, Che mai da sè non levarà la soma: A terra se ne va il suo capo, Roma, Per mai più non tornar al grande offizio. O quanta doglia hai Bruto e tu Fabrizio, Se hai intesa questa altra gran ruina! Non basta Catilina, Non Silla, Mario, Cesaro o Nerone: Ma quivi omini e done, Ogn’om si sforza dargli qualche guasto. Passato è il tempo pio e il tempo casto.

Virtù mendica, mai non alzi l’ale: Grida il vulgo e la cieca giente ria. L’usura si chiama or filosofia; Al far bene ogn’om volta pur le spale: Non è chi vada or mai per dritto cale. Tal che ’l valor se agiaza che me avanzia: Se non che, una speranzia Pur al tutto nol lassa far partita, Ch’io sciò che in l’altra vita Ben si vedrà qual alma fo gentile; E chi alziò l’ale a più legiadro stile.

Canzion, fa che sia acorta, Che a purpureo color tu non te apoggie; Fugi palazi e logie, E fa che toa ragion a pochi dica: Chè a tuto el mondo tu serai nemica.

Notes

1 ↩Opening connective can read as concessive 'except that / only that' (adopted here) or as 'if it were not that'; both keep the speaker's faith in infinite providence as the counterweight to the world's ruin.
2 ↩Rendered as 'living light' (a living spiritual light / enlightened soul); could also be heard as 'a single living light' of guidance left in the world.
3 ↩Supplied source begins 'va mendico' without a subject. Guasti 1862 / Wikisource reads 'Catone va mendico' (Cato goes begging); the name was lost when the AutoreCitato template was stripped at ingest. Translation restores Catone.
4 ↩Mattone is kept as a proper name/nickname in the Italian; its historical referent is uncertain.
5 ↩cinedo is sharp sexual invective (from Greek kinaidos); rendered 'catamite' to keep the moral force without modern slang. porpora points to high clerical rank (cardinal purple).
6 ↩assentatori e parasciti is read as the corrupt retinue in apposition to the scandal (the pig's court of flatterers and parasites), not as a second finite subject; verbs gode/Usurpa remain singular with porco.
7 ↩The praise is bitterly ironic: Savonarola lists the plunderer, the blood-feeder, the despoiler of widows and orphans, and the destroyer of the poor as the world's 'happy' ones.
8 ↩peregrina is rendered as 'rare' (extraordinary/select) with gentil ('refined'/'noble'); the pair is ironic, not literally about pilgrimage or foreignness.
9 ↩libri e carte pien di latrocinii: ledgers, deeds, and papers full of robberies—records of legalized plunder, not literary books alone.
10 ↩Brutus and Fabricius stand as classical exemplars of Roman civic virtue; the apostrophe contrasts their age with present collapse.
11 ↩"dargli qualche guasto": "gli" most naturally points back to Rome (the head/city under ruin); less likely a generic "the world."
12 ↩mai non alzi l'ale may be read as third-person about Virtue (never lifts her wings) or as the crowd's taunt/imperative (never raise your wings). The rendering takes Virtue as subject, which fits the moral lauda of the chapter.
13 ↩legiadro stile keeps the poet's sense of a finer, more graceful moral/spiritual manner of life, not merely literary style.
14 ↩“Purpureo color” (purple) stands for worldly rank, power, and luxury—the imperial/royal dye—not mere fabric dye.

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