Late to his rescue
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e temo che non sia già sì smarrito, ch’ io mi sia tardi al soccorso levata, per quel ch’ i’ ho di lui nel cielo udito.
and I fear he may already be so lost that I have risen too late to help him — from what I have heard of him in heaven.
Beatrice fears he may already be so lost that she has risen too late to help him — from what she has heard of him in heaven.
Even the blessed can feel urgency. Beatrice's dread mirrors Dante's own: he feared the journey was madness; she fears her rescue comes too late. Love in this poem is never complacent.
That she has <i>udito</i>, heard, of his straying <i>nel cielo</i> shows Heaven attending to a single soul's danger. The rescue is not abstract providence but personal alarm, and it sends her down at once.
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Inferno 2.64 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/dante-inferno/2.64/