De valle et pena superborum
The Valley of the Proud
Trembling, the soul and angel approach a deep, dark, sulfurous valley filled with the wailing of the damned and foul smoke rising from corpses.
But as they went forward step by step, trembling with fear, they came to an exceedingly deep valley. It was exceedingly foul and dark. The soul itself couldn't see how deep it was, but it could hear a sulfurous sound. And it could hear the wailing of the multitude suffering in the depths. A foul smoke rose up from the sulfur and from the corpses, surpassing all the torments it had seen before.
The Narrow Bridge of Trial
A single-foot-wide plank stretches a thousand paces across the valley; many fall, yet only one stranger priest crosses safely, bearing a palm and clothed in a Slavic garment.
A plank — the longest one — stretched from one mountain to another like a bridge, spanning the valley. It was a thousand paces long. In width, though, it was only a foot across. No one could cross that bridge unless they were chosen. He watched many fall from it; yet no one made it across unharmed except for one priest. That priest, though, was a stranger. He was carrying a palm. Dressed in a Slavic garment, he crossed fearlessly ahead of everyone else — the first to do so.1
Terror, Lament, and Angelic Reassurance
Seeing the narrow path and the destruction below, the soul cries out in anguish, but the angel comforts her, warns of further suffering, and leads her safely across.
Then that soul, seeing the narrow path, and knowing the everlasting destruction below, said to the angel: Alas for me, wretched!2 'Who will free me,' she said, 'from this journey of death?'3 He, looking at her with a cheerful countenance, answered, saying: 'Don't be afraid. You will indeed be freed from this one, but after it you will suffer another.' And going ahead, he held her and led her unharmed beyond the bridge.4
Naming the Punishment and Moving On
Once past the bridge, the soul joyfully asks whose torments those were; the angel identifies the valley as the place of the proud and the sulfurous mountain as the punishment of traitors, then urges her onward to things beyond comparison.
And after passing through the crooked way, the soul, almost at ease, said joyfully to the angel: 'Please, lord, if you're willing, tell me: whose souls are those torments we just saw?' And the angel turned to her: 'That valley, utterly dreadful, is the place of the proud; but that rotting, sulfurous mountain is the punishment of traitors.' And he added: Let's move on until we reach things beyond all these, things beyond comparison.5
Read the original Latin
Sed illis pre timore pedetemptim pergentibus; venerunt ad vallem valde profundam. putridam nimis ac tenebrosam. Cuius profunditatem ipsa quidem anima videre non poterat; sonitum autem sulphurei. et ululatus multitudinis in imis patientis audire valebat. Fumus vero de sulphure et de cadaveribus sursum insurgebat fetidus; qui omnes superabat penas quas viderat prius.
Tabula autem longissima ab uno monte in alium in modum pontis se supra vallem extenderat. qui mille passus in longitudine. in latitudine vero unius pedis mensuram habebat. Quem pontem transire nisi electus nemo poterat. De quo vidit multos cadere; neminem autem preter presbiterum unum illesum pertransire. Erat autem ille presbiter peregrinus. portans palmam. et indutus sclavinio; et ante omnes intrepidus pertransibat primus.
Tunc illa anima videns artam semitam. et subtus sempiternum cognoscens interitum; dixit ad angelum. 'Heu mihi misere. quis me liberabit' inquit 'de itinere mortis huius?' Ille autem hilari vultu eam respiciens; respondit dicens. 'Ne timeas ab ista quidem liberaberis; sed post hanc aliam patieris.' Et precedens tenuit eam; et ultra pontem duxit illesam.
Et post transitum pravi itineris quasi secura; dixit ad angelum anima leta. 'Obsecro domine si placet indica mihi quarum animarum sunt ista que vidimus modo tormenta?' Et angelus ad eam. 'Ista vallis valde horribilis locus est superborum; mons vero putridus atque sulphureus pena est insidiatorum.'
Et adiunxit. 'Eamus donec ad alia his incomparabilia perveniamus.'
Notes
- 1 ↩sclavinio is an uncertain loanword; rendered as 'Slavic garment' following the candidate gloss. The precise garment type is unclear.
- 2 ↩misere likely vocative of miser, a direct address to oneself in misery; could also be adverbial 'wretchedly'. Vocative reading fits the cry.
- 3 ↩Echoes Psalm 48:15 (Vulgate): 'De manu mortis liberabit eos'; candidate allusion, not a direct quotation.
- 4 ↩illesam is an uncertain form, likely a variant of illaesa/illesa 'unharmed'. Translation follows the most plausible intended sense.
- 5 ↩The comparative construction donec ad alia his incomparabilia perveniamus is compressed; his is taken as ablative of comparison with incomparabilia, and alia as a substantive, yielding 'other things, incomparable by comparison with these.'
Visions of Tondal (Les Visions du chevalier Tondal) companion
Tondal came back and changed how he lived daily. That's the whole point.
Chosen Portion builds the daily practice Tondal's vision demanded: a morning reading that keeps eternity in view.
The Visio was written 'for the edification of many' as a spur to daily amendment of life, and Chosen Portion supplies that daily spur with a morning reading and evening examen.
- A daily portion from historic texts on living well and dying well
- The complete 27-chapter Visions of Tondal in modern readable English
- A built-in daily examen prompt — 2 minutes at day's end