Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

Whence he again: “Now say, would it be worse
For men on earth were they not citizens?”
“Yes,” I replied; “and here I ask no reason.”

“And can they be so, if below they live not
Diversely unto offices diverse?
No, if your master writeth well for you.”

So came he with deductions to this point;
Then he concluded: “Therefore it behoves
The roots of your effects to be diverse.

Hence one is Solon born, another Xerxes,
Another Melchisedec, and another he
Who, flying through the air, his son did lose.

Revolving Nature, which a signet is
To mortal wax, doth practise well her art,
But not one inn distinguish from another;

Thence happens it that Esau differeth
In seed from Jacob; and Quirinus comes
From sire so vile that he is given to Mars.

A generated nature its own way
Would always make like its progenitors,
If Providence divine were not triumphant.

Now that which was behind thee is before thee;
But that thou know that I with thee am pleased,
With a corollary will I mantle thee.

Evermore nature, if it fortune find
Discordant to it, like each other seed
Out of its region, maketh evil thrift;

And if the world below would fix its mind
On the foundation which is laid by nature,
Pursuing that, ’twould have the people good.

But you unto religion wrench aside
Him who was born to gird him with the sword,
And make a king of him who is for sermons;

Therefore your footsteps wander from the road.”

Paradiso: Canto IX

Beautiful Clemence, after that thy Charles
Had me enlightened, he narrated to me
The treacheries his seed should undergo;

But said: “Be still and let the years roll round;”
So I can only say, that lamentation
Legitimate shall follow on your wrongs.

And of that holy light the life already
Had to the Sun which fills it turned again,
As to that good which for each thing sufficeth.

Ah, souls deceived, and creatures impious,
Who from such good do turn away your hearts,
Directing upon vanity your foreheads!

And now, behold, another of those splendours
Approached me, and its will to pleasure me
It signified by brightening outwardly.

The eyes of Beatrice, that fastened were
Upon me, as before, of dear assent
To my desire assurance gave to me.

“Ah, bring swift compensation to my wish,
Thou blessed spirit,” I said, “and give me proof
That what I think in thee I can reflect!”

Whereat the light, that still was new to me,
Out of its depths, whence it before was singing,
As one delighted to do good, continued:

“Within that region of the land depraved
Of Italy, that lies between Rialto
And fountain-heads of Brenta and of Piava,

Rises a hill, and mounts not very high,
Wherefrom descended formerly a torch
That made upon that region great assault.

Out of one root were born both I and it;
Cunizza was I called, and here I shine
Because the splendour of this star o’ercame me.

But gladly to myself the cause I pardon
Of my allotment, and it does not grieve me;
Which would perhaps seem strong unto your vulgar.

Of this so luculent and precious jewel,
Which of our heaven is nearest unto me,
Great fame remained; and ere it die away

This hundredth year shall yet quintupled be.
See if man ought to make him excellent,
So that another life the first may leave!

And thus thinks not the present multitude
Shut in by Adige and Tagliamento,
Nor yet for being scourged is penitent.

But soon ’twill be that Padua in the marsh
Will change the water that Vicenza bathes,
Because the folk are stubborn against duty;

And where the Sile and Cagnano join
One lordeth it, and goes with lofty head,
For catching whom e’en now the net is making.

Feltro moreover of her impious pastor
Shall weep the crime, which shall so monstrous be
That for the like none ever entered Malta.

Ample exceedingly would be the vat
That of the Ferrarese could hold the blood,
And weary who should weigh it ounce by ounce,

Of which this courteous priest shall make a gift
To show himself a partisan; and such gifts
Will to the living of the land conform.

Above us there are mirrors, Thrones you call them,
From which shines out on us God Judicant,
So that this utterance seems good to us.”

Here it was silent, and it had the semblance
Of being turned elsewhither, by the wheel
On which it entered as it was before.

The other joy, already known to me,
Became a thing transplendent in my sight,
As a fine ruby smitten by the sun.

Through joy effulgence is acquired above,
As here a smile; but down below, the shade
Outwardly darkens, as the mind is sad.

“God seeth all things, and in Him, blest spirit,
Thy sight is,” said I, “so that never will
Of his can possibly from thee be hidden;

Thy voice, then, that for ever makes the heavens
Glad, with the singing of those holy fires
Which of their six wings make themselves a cowl,

Wherefore does it not satisfy my longings?
Indeed, I would not wait thy questioning
If I in thee were as thou art in me.”

“The greatest of the valleys where the water
Expands itself,” forthwith its words began,
“That sea excepted which the earth engarlands,

Between discordant shores against the sun
Extends so far, that it meridian makes
Where it was wont before to make the horizon.

I was a dweller on that valley’s shore
’Twixt Ebro and Magra that with journey short
Doth from the Tuscan part the Genoese.

With the same sunset and same sunrise nearly
Sit Buggia and the city whence I was,
That with its blood once made the harbour hot.

Folco that people called me unto whom
My name was known; and now with me this heaven
Imprints itself, as I did once with it;

For more the daughter of Belus never burned,
Offending both Sichaeus and Creusa,
Than I, so long as it became my locks,

Nor yet that Rodophean, who deluded
was by Demophoon, nor yet Alcides,
When Iole he in his heart had locked.

Yet here is no repenting, but we smile,
Not at the fault, which comes not back to mind,
But at the power which ordered and foresaw.

Here we behold the art that doth adorn
With such affection, and the good discover
Whereby the world above turns that below.

But that thou wholly satisfied mayst bear
Thy wishes hence which in this sphere are born,
Still farther to proceed behoveth me.

Thou fain wouldst know who is within this light
That here beside me thus is scintillating,
Even as a sunbeam in the limpid water.

Then know thou, that within there is at rest
Rahab, and being to our order joined,
With her in its supremest grade ’tis sealed.

Into this heaven, where ends the shadowy cone
Cast by your world, before all other souls
First of Christ’s triumph was she taken up.

Full meet it was to leave her in some heaven,
Even as a palm of the high victory
Which he acquired with one palm and the other,

Because she favoured the first glorious deed
Of Joshua upon the Holy Land,
That little stirs the memory of the Pope.

Thy city, which an offshoot is of him
Who first upon his Maker turned his back,
And whose ambition is so sorely wept,

Brings forth and scatters the accursed flower
Which both the sheep and lambs hath led astray
Since it has turned the shepherd to a wolf.

For this the Evangel and the mighty Doctors
Are derelict, and only the Decretals
So studied that it shows upon their margins.

On this are Pope and Cardinals intent;
Their meditations reach not Nazareth,
There where his pinions Gabriel unfolded;

But Vatican and the other parts elect
Of Rome, which have a cemetery been
Unto the soldiery that followed Peter

Shall soon be free from this adultery.”

Paradiso: Canto X

Looking into his Son with all the Love
Which each of them eternally breathes forth,
The Primal and unutterable Power

Whate’er before the mind or eye revolves
With so much order made, there can be none
Who this beholds without enjoying Him.

Lift up then, Reader, to the lofty wheels
With me thy vision straight unto that part
Where the one motion on the other strikes,

And there begin to contemplate with joy
That Master’s art, who in himself so loves it
That never doth his eye depart therefrom.

Behold how from that point goes branching off
The oblique circle, which conveys the planets,
To satisfy the world that calls upon them;

And if their pathway were not thus inflected,
Much virtue in the heavens would be in vain,
And almost every power below here dead.

If from the straight line distant more or less
Were the departure, much would wanting be
Above and underneath of mundane order.

Remain now, Reader, still upon thy bench,
In thought pursuing that which is foretasted,
If thou wouldst jocund be instead of weary.

I’ve set before thee; henceforth feed thyself,
For to itself diverteth all my care
That theme whereof I have been made the scribe.

The greatest of the ministers of nature,
Who with the power of heaven the world imprints
And measures with his light the time for us,

With that part which above is called to mind
Conjoined, along the spirals was revolving,
Where each time earlier he presents himself;

And I was with him; but of the ascending
I was not conscious, saving as a man
Of a first thought is conscious ere it come;

And Beatrice, she who is seen to pass
From good to better, and so suddenly
That not by time her action is expressed,

How lucent in herself must she have been!
And what was in the sun, wherein I entered,
Apparent not by colour but by light,

I, though I call on genius, art, and practice,
Cannot so tell that it could be imagined;
Believe one can, and let him long to see it.

And if our fantasies too lowly are
For altitude so great, it is no marvel,
Since o’er the sun was never eye could go.

Such in this place was the fourth family
Of the high Father, who forever sates it,
Showing how he breathes forth and how begets.

And Beatrice began: “Give thanks, give thanks
Unto the Sun of Angels, who to this
Sensible one has raised thee by his grace!”

Never was heart of mortal so disposed
To worship, nor to give itself to God
With all its gratitude was it so ready,

As at those words did I myself become;
And all my love was so absorbed in Him,
That in oblivion Beatrice was eclipsed.

Nor this displeased her; but she smiled at it
So that the splendour of her laughing eyes
My single mind on many things divided.

Lights many saw I, vivid and triumphant,
Make us a centre and themselves a circle,
More sweet in voice than luminous in aspect.

Thus girt about the daughter of Latona
We sometimes see, when pregnant is the air,
So that it holds the thread which makes her zone.

Within the court of Heaven, whence I return,
Are many jewels found, so fair and precious
They cannot be transported from the realm;

And of them was the singing of those lights.
Who takes not wings that he may fly up thither,
The tidings thence may from the dumb await!

As soon as singing thus those burning suns
Had round about us whirled themselves three times,
Like unto stars neighbouring the steadfast poles,

Ladies they seemed, not from the dance released,
But who stop short, in silence listening
Till they have gathered the new melody.

And within one I heard beginning: “When
The radiance of grace, by which is kindled
True love, and which thereafter grows by loving,

Within thee multiplied is so resplendent
That it conducts thee upward by that stair,
Where without reascending none descends,

Who should deny the wine out of his vial
Unto thy thirst, in liberty were not
Except as water which descends not seaward.

Fain wouldst thou know with what plants is enflowered
This garland that encircles with delight
The Lady fair who makes thee strong for heaven.

Of the lambs was I of the holy flock
Which Dominic conducteth by a road
Where well one fattens if he strayeth not.

He who is nearest to me on the right
My brother and master was; and he Albertus
Is of Cologne, I Thomas of Aquinum.

If thou of all the others wouldst be certain,
Follow behind my speaking with thy sight
Upward along the blessed garland turning.

That next effulgence issues from the smile
Of Gratian, who assisted both the courts
In such wise that it pleased in Paradise.

The other which near by adorns our choir
That Peter was who, e’en as the poor widow,
Offered his treasure unto Holy Church.

The fifth light, that among us is the fairest,
Breathes forth from such a love, that all the world
Below is greedy to learn tidings of it.

Within it is the lofty mind, where knowledge
So deep was put, that, if the true be true,
To see so much there never rose a second.

Thou seest next the lustre of that taper,
Which in the flesh below looked most within
The angelic nature and its ministry.

Within that other little light is smiling
The advocate of the Christian centuries,
Out of whose rhetoric Augustine was furnished.

Now if thou trainest thy mind’s eye along
From light to light pursuant of my praise,
With thirst already of the eighth thou waitest.

By seeing every good therein exults
The sainted soul, which the fallacious world
Makes manifest to him who listeneth well;

The body whence ’twas hunted forth is lying
Down in Cieldauro, and from martyrdom
And banishment it came unto this peace.

See farther onward flame the burning breath
Of Isidore, of Beda, and of Richard
Who was in contemplation more than man.

This, whence to me returneth thy regard,
The light is of a spirit unto whom
In his grave meditations death seemed slow.

It is the light eternal of Sigier,
Who, reading lectures in the Street of Straw,
Did syllogize invidious verities.”

Then, as a horologe that calleth us
What time the Bride of God is rising up
With matins to her Spouse that he may love her,

Wherein one part the other draws and urges,
Ting! ting! resounding with so sweet a note,
That swells with love the spirit well disposed,

Thus I beheld the glorious wheel move round,
And render voice to voice, in modulation
And sweetness that can not be comprehended,

Excepting there where joy is made eternal.

Paradiso: Canto XI

O Thou insensate care of mortal men,
How inconclusive are the syllogisms
That make thee beat thy wings in downward flight!

One after laws and one to aphorisms
Was going, and one following the priesthood,
And one to reign by force or sophistry,

And one in theft, and one in state affairs,
One in the pleasures of the flesh involved
Wearied himself, one gave himself to ease;

When I, from all these things emancipate,
With Beatrice above there in the Heavens
With such exceeding glory was received!

When each one had returned unto that point
Within the circle where it was before,
It stood as in a candlestick a candle;

And from within the effulgence which at first
Had spoken unto me, I heard begin
Smiling while it more luminous became:

“Even as I am kindled in its ray,
So, looking into the Eternal Light,
The occasion of thy thoughts I apprehend.

Thou doubtest, and wouldst have me to resift
In language so extended and so open
My speech, that to thy sense it may be plain,

Where just before I said, ‘where well one fattens,’
And where I said, ‘there never rose a second;’
And here ’tis needful we distinguish well.

The Providence, which governeth the world
With counsel, wherein all created vision
Is vanquished ere it reach unto the bottom,

(So that towards her own Beloved might go
The bride of Him who, uttering a loud cry,
Espoused her with his consecrated blood,

Self-confident and unto Him more faithful,)
Two Princes did ordain in her behoof,
Which on this side and that might be her guide.

The one was all seraphical in ardour;
The other by his wisdom upon earth
A splendour was of light cherubical.

One will I speak of, for of both is spoken
In praising one, whichever may be taken,
Because unto one end their labours were.

Between Tupino and the stream that falls
Down from the hill elect of blessed Ubald,
A fertile slope of lofty mountain hangs,

From which Perugia feels the cold and heat
Through Porta Sole, and behind it weep
Gualdo and Nocera their grievous yoke.

From out that slope, there where it breaketh most
Its steepness, rose upon the world a sun
As this one does sometimes from out the Ganges;

Therefore let him who speaketh of that place,
Say not Ascesi, for he would say little,
But Orient, if he properly would speak.

He was not yet far distant from his rising
Before he had begun to make the earth
Some comfort from his mighty virtue feel.

For he in youth his father’s wrath incurred
For certain Dame, to whom, as unto death,
The gate of pleasure no one doth unlock;

And was before his spiritual court
‘Et coram patre’ unto her united;
Then day by day more fervently he loved her.

She, reft of her first husband, scorned, obscure,
One thousand and one hundred years and more,
Waited without a suitor till he came.

Naught it availed to hear, that with Amyclas
Found her unmoved at sounding of his voice
He who struck terror into all the world;

Naught it availed being constant and undaunted,
So that, when Mary still remained below,
She mounted up with Christ upon the cross.

But that too darkly I may not proceed,
Francis and Poverty for these two lovers
Take thou henceforward in my speech diffuse.

Their concord and their joyous semblances,
The love, the wonder, and the sweet regard,
They made to be the cause of holy thoughts;

So much so that the venerable Bernard
First bared his feet, and after so great peace
Ran, and, in running, thought himself too slow.

O wealth unknown! O veritable good!
Giles bares his feet, and bares his feet Sylvester
Behind the bridegroom, so doth please the bride!

Then goes his way that father and that master,
He and his Lady and that family
Which now was girding on the humble cord;

Nor cowardice of heart weighed down his brow
At being son of Peter Bernardone,
Nor for appearing marvellously scorned;

But regally his hard determination
To Innocent he opened, and from him
Received the primal seal upon his Order.

After the people mendicant increased
Behind this man, whose admirable life
Better in glory of the heavens were sung,

Incoronated with a second crown
Was through Honorius by the Eternal Spirit
The holy purpose of this Archimandrite.

And when he had, through thirst of martyrdom,
In the proud presence of the Sultan preached
Christ and the others who came after him,

And, finding for conversion too unripe
The folk, and not to tarry there in vain,
Returned to fruit of the Italic grass,

On the rude rock ’twixt Tiber and the Arno
From Christ did he receive the final seal,
Which during two whole years his members bore.

When He, who chose him unto so much good,
Was pleased to draw him up to the reward
That he had merited by being lowly,

Unto his friars, as to the rightful heirs,
His most dear Lady did he recommend,
And bade that they should love her faithfully;

And from her bosom the illustrious soul
Wished to depart, returning to its realm,
And for its body wished no other bier.

Think now what man was he, who was a fit
Companion over the high seas to keep
The bark of Peter to its proper bearings.

And this man was our Patriarch; hence whoever
Doth follow him as he commands can see
That he is laden with good merchandise.

But for new pasturage his flock has grown
So greedy, that it is impossible
They be not scattered over fields diverse;

And in proportion as his sheep remote
And vagabond go farther off from him,
More void of milk return they to the fold.

Verily some there are that fear a hurt,
And keep close to the shepherd; but so few,
That little cloth doth furnish forth their hoods.

Now if my utterance be not indistinct,
If thine own hearing hath attentive been,
If thou recall to mind what I have said,

In part contented shall thy wishes be;
For thou shalt see the plant that’s chipped away,
And the rebuke that lieth in the words,

‘Where well one fattens, if he strayeth not.’”

Paradiso: Canto XII

Soon as the blessed flame had taken up
The final word to give it utterance,
Began the holy millstone to revolve,

And in its gyre had not turned wholly round,
Before another in a ring enclosed it,
And motion joined to motion, song to song;

Song that as greatly doth transcend our Muses,
Our Sirens, in those dulcet clarions,
As primal splendour that which is reflected.

And as are spanned athwart a tender cloud
Two rainbows parallel and like in colour,
When Juno to her handmaid gives command,

(The one without born of the one within,
Like to the speaking of that vagrant one
Whom love consumed as doth the sun the vapours,)

And make the people here, through covenant
God set with Noah, presageful of the world
That shall no more be covered with a flood,

In such wise of those sempiternal roses
The garlands twain encompassed us about,
And thus the outer to the inner answered.

After the dance, and other grand rejoicings,
Both of the singing, and the flaming forth
Effulgence with effulgence blithe and tender,

Together, at once, with one accord had stopped,
(Even as the eyes, that, as volition moves them,
Must needs together shut and lift themselves,)

Out of the heart of one of the new lights
There came a voice, that needle to the star
Made me appear in turning thitherward.

And it began: “The love that makes me fair
Draws me to speak about the other leader,
By whom so well is spoken here of mine.

’Tis right, where one is, to bring in the other,
That, as they were united in their warfare,
Together likewise may their glory shine.

The soldiery of Christ, which it had cost
So dear to arm again, behind the standard
Moved slow and doubtful and in numbers few,

When the Emperor who reigneth evermore
Provided for the host that was in peril,
Through grace alone and not that it was worthy;

And, as was said, he to his Bride brought succour
With champions twain, at whose deed, at whose word
The straggling people were together drawn.

Within that region where the sweet west wind
Rises to open the new leaves, wherewith
Europe is seen to clothe herself afresh,

Not far off from the beating of the waves,
Behind which in his long career the sun
Sometimes conceals himself from every man,

Is situate the fortunate Calahorra,
Under protection of the mighty shield
In which the Lion subject is and sovereign.

Therein was born the amorous paramour
Of Christian Faith, the athlete consecrate,
Kind to his own and cruel to his foes;

And when it was created was his mind
Replete with such a living energy,
That in his mother her it made prophetic.

As soon as the espousals were complete
Between him and the Faith at holy font,
Where they with mutual safety dowered each other,

The woman, who for him had given assent,
Saw in a dream the admirable fruit
That issue would from him and from his heirs;

And that he might be construed as he was,
A spirit from this place went forth to name him
With His possessive whose he wholly was.

Dominic was he called; and him I speak of
Even as of the husbandman whom Christ
Elected to his garden to assist him.

Envoy and servant sooth he seemed of Christ,
For the first love made manifest in him
Was the first counsel that was given by Christ.

Silent and wakeful many a time was he
Discovered by his nurse upon the ground,
As if he would have said, ‘For this I came.’

O thou his father, Felix verily!
O thou his mother, verily Joanna,
If this, interpreted, means as is said!

Not for the world which people toil for now
In following Ostiense and Taddeo,
But through his longing after the true manna,

He in short time became so great a teacher,
That he began to go about the vineyard,
Which fadeth soon, if faithless be the dresser;

And of the See, (that once was more benignant
Unto the righteous poor, not through itself,
But him who sits there and degenerates,)

Not to dispense or two or three for six,
Not any fortune of first vacancy,
‘Non decimas quae sunt pauperum Dei,’

He asked for, but against the errant world
Permission to do battle for the seed,
Of which these four and twenty plants surround thee.

Then with the doctrine and the will together,
With office apostolical he moved,
Like torrent which some lofty vein out-presses;

And in among the shoots heretical
His impetus with greater fury smote,
Wherever the resistance was the greatest.

Of him were made thereafter divers runnels,
Whereby the garden catholic is watered,
So that more living its plantations stand.

If such the one wheel of the Biga was,
In which the Holy Church itself defended
And in the field its civic battle won,

Truly full manifest should be to thee
The excellence of the other, unto whom
Thomas so courteous was before my coming.

But still the orbit, which the highest part
Of its circumference made, is derelict,
So that the mould is where was once the crust.

His family, that had straight forward moved
With feet upon his footprints, are turned round
So that they set the point upon the heel.

And soon aware they will be of the harvest
Of this bad husbandry, when shall the tares
Complain the granary is taken from them.

Yet say I, he who searcheth leaf by leaf
Our volume through, would still some page discover
Where he could read, ‘I am as I am wont.’

’Twill not be from Casal nor Acquasparta,
From whence come such unto the written word
That one avoids it, and the other narrows.

Bonaventura of Bagnoregio’s life
Am I, who always in great offices
Postponed considerations sinister.

Here are Illuminato and Agostino,
Who of the first barefooted beggars were
That with the cord the friends of God became.

Hugh of Saint Victor is among them here,
And Peter Mangiador, and Peter of Spain,
Who down below in volumes twelve is shining;

Nathan the seer, and metropolitan
Chrysostom, and Anselmus, and Donatus
Who deigned to lay his hand to the first art;

Here is Rabanus, and beside me here
Shines the Calabrian Abbot Joachim,
He with the spirit of prophecy endowed.

To celebrate so great a paladin
Have moved me the impassioned courtesy
And the discreet discourses of Friar Thomas,

And with me they have moved this company.”

Paradiso: Canto XIII

Let him imagine, who would well conceive
What now I saw, and let him while I speak
Retain the image as a steadfast rock,

The fifteen stars, that in their divers regions
The sky enliven with a light so great
That it transcends all clusters of the air;

Let him the Wain imagine unto which
Our vault of heaven sufficeth night and day,
So that in turning of its pole it fails not;

Let him the mouth imagine of the horn
That in the point beginneth of the axis
Round about which the primal wheel revolves,—

To have fashioned of themselves two signs in heaven,
Like unto that which Minos’ daughter made,
The moment when she felt the frost of death;

And one to have its rays within the other,
And both to whirl themselves in such a manner
That one should forward go, the other backward;

And he will have some shadowing forth of that
True constellation and the double dance
That circled round the point at which I was;

Because it is as much beyond our wont,
As swifter than the motion of the Chiana
Moveth the heaven that all the rest outspeeds.

There sang they neither Bacchus, nor Apollo,
But in the divine nature Persons three,
And in one person the divine and human.

The singing and the dance fulfilled their measure,
And unto us those holy lights gave need,
Growing in happiness from care to care.

Then broke the silence of those saints concordant
The light in which the admirable life
Of God’s own mendicant was told to me,

And said: “Now that one straw is trodden out
Now that its seed is garnered up already,
Sweet love invites me to thresh out the other.

Into that bosom, thou believest, whence
Was drawn the rib to form the beauteous cheek
Whose taste to all the world is costing dear,

And into that which, by the lance transfixed,
Before and since, such satisfaction made
That it weighs down the balance of all sin,

Whate’er of light it has to human nature
Been lawful to possess was all infused
By the same power that both of them created;

And hence at what I said above dost wonder,
When I narrated that no second had
The good which in the fifth light is enclosed.

Now ope thine eyes to what I answer thee,
And thou shalt see thy creed and my discourse
Fit in the truth as centre in a circle.

That which can die, and that which dieth not,
Are nothing but the splendour of the idea
Which by his love our Lord brings into being;

Because that living Light, which from its fount
Effulgent flows, so that it disunites not
From Him nor from the Love in them intrined,

Through its own goodness reunites its rays
In nine subsistences, as in a mirror,
Itself eternally remaining One.

Thence it descends to the last potencies,
Downward from act to act becoming such
That only brief contingencies it makes;

And these contingencies I hold to be
Things generated, which the heaven produces
By its own motion, with seed and without.

Neither their wax, nor that which tempers it,
Remains immutable, and hence beneath
The ideal signet more and less shines through;

Therefore it happens, that the selfsame tree
After its kind bears worse and better fruit,
And ye are born with characters diverse.

If in perfection tempered were the wax,
And were the heaven in its supremest virtue,
The brilliance of the seal would all appear;

But nature gives it evermore deficient,
In the like manner working as the artist,
Who has the skill of art and hand that trembles.

If then the fervent Love, the Vision clear,
Of primal Virtue do dispose and seal,
Perfection absolute is there acquired.

Thus was of old the earth created worthy
Of all and every animal perfection;
And thus the Virgin was impregnate made;

So that thine own opinion I commend,
That human nature never yet has been,
Nor will be, what it was in those two persons.

Now if no farther forth I should proceed,
‘Then in what way was he without a peer?’
Would be the first beginning of thy words.

But, that may well appear what now appears not,
Think who he was, and what occasion moved him
To make request, when it was told him, ‘Ask.’

I’ve not so spoken that thou canst not see
Clearly he was a king who asked for wisdom,
That he might be sufficiently a king;

’Twas not to know the number in which are
The motors here above, or if ‘necesse’
With a contingent e’er ‘necesse’ make,

‘Non si est dare primum motum esse,’
Or if in semicircle can be made
Triangle so that it have no right angle.

Whence, if thou notest this and what I said,
A regal prudence is that peerless seeing
In which the shaft of my intention strikes.

And if on ‘rose’ thou turnest thy clear eyes,
Thou’lt see that it has reference alone
To kings who’re many, and the good are rare.

With this distinction take thou what I said,
And thus it can consist with thy belief
Of the first father and of our Delight.

And lead shall this be always to thy feet,
To make thee, like a weary man, move slowly
Both to the Yes and No thou seest not;

For very low among the fools is he
Who affirms without distinction, or denies,
As well in one as in the other case;

Because it happens that full often bends
Current opinion in the false direction,
And then the feelings bind the intellect.

Far more than uselessly he leaves the shore,
(Since he returneth not the same he went,)
Who fishes for the truth, and has no skill;

And in the world proofs manifest thereof
Parmenides, Melissus, Brissus are,
And many who went on and knew not whither;

Thus did Sabellius, Arius, and those fools
Who have been even as swords unto the Scriptures
In rendering distorted their straight faces.

Nor yet shall people be too confident
In judging, even as he is who doth count
The corn in field or ever it be ripe.

For I have seen all winter long the thorn
First show itself intractable and fierce,
And after bear the rose upon its top;

And I have seen a ship direct and swift
Run o’er the sea throughout its course entire,
To perish at the harbour’s mouth at last.

Let not Dame Bertha nor Ser Martin think,
Seeing one steal, another offering make,
To see them in the arbitrament divine;

For one may rise, and fall the other may.”

Paradiso: Canto XIV

From centre unto rim, from rim to centre,
In a round vase the water moves itself,
As from without ’tis struck or from within.

Into my mind upon a sudden dropped
What I am saying, at the moment when
Silent became the glorious life of Thomas,

Because of the resemblance that was born
Of his discourse and that of Beatrice,
Whom, after him, it pleased thus to begin:

“This man has need (and does not tell you so,
Nor with the voice, nor even in his thought)
Of going to the root of one truth more.

Declare unto him if the light wherewith
Blossoms your substance shall remain with you
Eternally the same that it is now;

And if it do remain, say in what manner,
After ye are again made visible,
It can be that it injure not your sight.”

As by a greater gladness urged and drawn
They who are dancing in a ring sometimes
Uplift their voices and their motions quicken;

So, at that orison devout and prompt,
The holy circles a new joy displayed
In their revolving and their wondrous song.

Whoso lamenteth him that here we die
That we may live above, has never there
Seen the refreshment of the eternal rain.

The One and Two and Three who ever liveth,
And reigneth ever in Three and Two and One,
Not circumscribed and all things circumscribing,

Three several times was chanted by each one
Among those spirits, with such melody
That for all merit it were just reward;

And, in the lustre most divine of all
The lesser ring, I heard a modest voice,
Such as perhaps the Angel’s was to Mary,

Answer: “As long as the festivity
Of Paradise shall be, so long our love
Shall radiate round about us such a vesture.

Its brightness is proportioned to the ardour,
The ardour to the vision; and the vision
Equals what grace it has above its worth.

When, glorious and sanctified, our flesh
Is reassumed, then shall our persons be
More pleasing by their being all complete;

For will increase whate’er bestows on us
Of light gratuitous the Good Supreme,
Light which enables us to look on Him;

Therefore the vision must perforce increase,
Increase the ardour which from that is kindled,
Increase the radiance which from this proceeds.

But even as a coal that sends forth flame,
And by its vivid whiteness overpowers it
So that its own appearance it maintains,

Thus the effulgence that surrounds us now
Shall be o’erpowered in aspect by the flesh,
Which still to-day the earth doth cover up;

Nor can so great a splendour weary us,
For strong will be the organs of the body
To everything which hath the power to please us.”

So sudden and alert appeared to me
Both one and the other choir to say Amen,
That well they showed desire for their dead bodies;

Nor sole for them perhaps, but for the mothers,
The fathers, and the rest who had been dear
Or ever they became eternal flames.

And lo! all round about of equal brightness
Arose a lustre over what was there,
Like an horizon that is clearing up.

And as at rise of early eve begin
Along the welkin new appearances,
So that the sight seems real and unreal,

It seemed to me that new subsistences
Began there to be seen, and make a circle
Outside the other two circumferences.

O very sparkling of the Holy Spirit,
How sudden and incandescent it became
Unto mine eyes, that vanquished bore it not!

But Beatrice so beautiful and smiling
Appeared to me, that with the other sights
That followed not my memory I must leave her.

Then to uplift themselves mine eyes resumed
The power, and I beheld myself translated
To higher salvation with my Lady only.

Well was I ware that I was more uplifted
By the enkindled smiling of the star,
That seemed to me more ruddy than its wont.

With all my heart, and in that dialect
Which is the same in all, such holocaust
To God I made as the new grace beseemed;

And not yet from my bosom was exhausted
The ardour of sacrifice, before I knew
This offering was accepted and auspicious;

For with so great a lustre and so red
Splendours appeared to me in twofold rays,
I said: “O Helios who dost so adorn them!”

Even as distinct with less and greater lights
Glimmers between the two poles of the world
The Galaxy that maketh wise men doubt,

Thus constellated in the depths of Mars,
Those rays described the venerable sign
That quadrants joining in a circle make.

Here doth my memory overcome my genius;
For on that cross as levin gleamed forth Christ,
So that I cannot find ensample worthy;

But he who takes his cross and follows Christ
Again will pardon me what I omit,
Seeing in that aurora lighten Christ.

From horn to horn, and ’twixt the top and base,
Lights were in motion, brightly scintillating
As they together met and passed each other;

Thus level and aslant and swift and slow
We here behold, renewing still the sight,
The particles of bodies long and short,

Across the sunbeam move, wherewith is listed
Sometimes the shade, which for their own defence
People with cunning and with art contrive.

And as a lute and harp, accordant strung
With many strings, a dulcet tinkling make
To him by whom the notes are not distinguished,

So from the lights that there to me appeared
Upgathered through the cross a melody,
Which rapt me, not distinguishing the hymn.

Well was I ware it was of lofty laud,
Because there came to me, “Arise and conquer!”
As unto him who hears and comprehends not.

So much enamoured I became therewith,
That until then there was not anything
That e’er had fettered me with such sweet bonds.

Perhaps my word appears somewhat too bold,
Postponing the delight of those fair eyes,
Into which gazing my desire has rest;

But who bethinks him that the living seals
Of every beauty grow in power ascending,
And that I there had not turned round to those,

Can me excuse, if I myself accuse
To excuse myself, and see that I speak truly:
For here the holy joy is not disclosed,

Because ascending it becomes more pure.

Paradiso: Canto XV

A will benign, in which reveals itself
Ever the love that righteously inspires,
As in the iniquitous, cupidity,

Silence imposed upon that dulcet lyre,
And quieted the consecrated chords,
That Heaven’s right hand doth tighten and relax.

How unto just entreaties shall be deaf
Those substances, which, to give me desire
Of praying them, with one accord grew silent?

’Tis well that without end he should lament,
Who for the love of thing that doth not last
Eternally despoils him of that love!

As through the pure and tranquil evening air
There shoots from time to time a sudden fire,
Moving the eyes that steadfast were before,

And seems to be a star that changeth place,
Except that in the part where it is kindled
Nothing is missed, and this endureth little;

So from the horn that to the right extends
Unto that cross’s foot there ran a star
Out of the constellation shining there;

Nor was the gem dissevered from its ribbon,
But down the radiant fillet ran along,
So that fire seemed it behind alabaster.

Thus piteous did Anchises’ shade reach forward,
If any faith our greatest Muse deserve,
When in Elysium he his son perceived.

“O sanguis meus, O superinfusa
Gratia Dei, sicut tibi, cui
Bis unquam Coeli janua reclusa?”

Thus that effulgence; whence I gave it heed;
Then round unto my Lady turned my sight,
And on this side and that was stupefied;

For in her eyes was burning such a smile
That with mine own methought I touched the bottom
Both of my grace and of my Paradise!

Then, pleasant to the hearing and the sight,
The spirit joined to its beginning things
I understood not, so profound it spake;

Nor did it hide itself from me by choice,
But by necessity; for its conception
Above the mark of mortals set itself.

And when the bow of burning sympathy
Was so far slackened, that its speech descended
Towards the mark of our intelligence,

The first thing that was understood by me
Was “Benedight be Thou, O Trine and One,
Who hast unto my seed so courteous been!”

And it continued: “Hunger long and grateful,
Drawn from the reading of the mighty volume
Wherein is never changed the white nor dark,

Thou hast appeased, my son, within this light
In which I speak to thee, by grace of her
Who to this lofty flight with plumage clothed thee.

Thou thinkest that to me thy thought doth pass
From Him who is the first, as from the unit,
If that be known, ray out the five and six;

And therefore who I am thou askest not,
And why I seem more joyous unto thee
Than any other of this gladsome crowd.

Thou think’st the truth; because the small and great
Of this existence look into the mirror
Wherein, before thou think’st, thy thought thou showest.

But that the sacred love, in which I watch
With sight perpetual, and which makes me thirst
With sweet desire, may better be fulfilled,

Now let thy voice secure and frank and glad
Proclaim the wishes, the desire proclaim,
To which my answer is decreed already.”

To Beatrice I turned me, and she heard
Before I spake, and smiled to me a sign,
That made the wings of my desire increase;

Then in this wise began I: “Love and knowledge,
When on you dawned the first Equality,
Of the same weight for each of you became;

For in the Sun, which lighted you and burned
With heat and radiance, they so equal are,
That all similitudes are insufficient.

But among mortals will and argument,
For reason that to you is manifest,
Diversely feathered in their pinions are.

Whence I, who mortal am, feel in myself
This inequality; so give not thanks,
Save in my heart, for this paternal welcome.

Truly do I entreat thee, living topaz!
Set in this precious jewel as a gem,
That thou wilt satisfy me with thy name.”

“O leaf of mine, in whom I pleasure took
E’en while awaiting, I was thine own root!”
Such a beginning he in answer made me.

Then said to me: “That one from whom is named
Thy race, and who a hundred years and more
Has circled round the mount on the first cornice,

A son of mine and thy great-grandsire was;
Well it behoves thee that the long fatigue
Thou shouldst for him make shorter with thy works.

Florence, within the ancient boundary
From which she taketh still her tierce and nones,
Abode in quiet, temperate and chaste.

No golden chain she had, nor coronal,
Nor ladies shod with sandal shoon, nor girdle
That caught the eye more than the person did.

Not yet the daughter at her birth struck fear
Into the father, for the time and dower
Did not o’errun this side or that the measure.

No houses had she void of families,
Not yet had thither come Sardanapalus
To show what in a chamber can be done;

Not yet surpassed had Montemalo been
By your Uccellatojo, which surpassed
Shall in its downfall be as in its rise.

Bellincion Berti saw I go begirt
With leather and with bone, and from the mirror
His dame depart without a painted face;

And him of Nerli saw, and him of Vecchio,
Contented with their simple suits of buff
And with the spindle and the flax their dames.

O fortunate women! and each one was certain
Of her own burial-place, and none as yet
For sake of France was in her bed deserted.

One o’er the cradle kept her studious watch,
And in her lullaby the language used
That first delights the fathers and the mothers;

Another, drawing tresses from her distaff,
Told o’er among her family the tales
Of Trojans and of Fesole and Rome.

As great a marvel then would have been held
A Lapo Salterello, a Cianghella,
As Cincinnatus or Cornelia now.

To such a quiet, such a beautiful
Life of the citizen, to such a safe
Community, and to so sweet an inn,

Did Mary give me, with loud cries invoked,
And in your ancient Baptistery at once
Christian and Cacciaguida I became.

Moronto was my brother, and Eliseo;
From Val di Pado came to me my wife,
And from that place thy surname was derived.

I followed afterward the Emperor Conrad,
And he begirt me of his chivalry,
So much I pleased him with my noble deeds.

I followed in his train against that law’s
Iniquity, whose people doth usurp
Your just possession, through your Pastor’s fault.

There by that execrable race was I
Released from bonds of the fallacious world,
The love of which defileth many souls,

And came from martyrdom unto this peace.”

Paradiso: Canto XVI

O thou our poor nobility of blood,
If thou dost make the people glory in thee
Down here where our affection languishes,

A marvellous thing it ne’er will be to me;
For there where appetite is not perverted,
I say in Heaven, of thee I made a boast!

Truly thou art a cloak that quickly shortens,
So that unless we piece thee day by day
Time goeth round about thee with his shears!

With ‘You,’ which Rome was first to tolerate,
(Wherein her family less perseveres,)
Yet once again my words beginning made;

Whence Beatrice, who stood somewhat apart,
Smiling, appeared like unto her who coughed
At the first failing writ of Guenever.

And I began: “You are my ancestor,
You give to me all hardihood to speak,
You lift me so that I am more than I.

So many rivulets with gladness fill
My mind, that of itself it makes a joy
Because it can endure this and not burst.

Then tell me, my beloved root ancestral,
Who were your ancestors, and what the years
That in your boyhood chronicled themselves?

Tell me about the sheepfold of Saint John,
How large it was, and who the people were
Within it worthy of the highest seats.”

As at the blowing of the winds a coal
Quickens to flame, so I beheld that light
Become resplendent at my blandishments.

And as unto mine eyes it grew more fair,
With voice more sweet and tender, but not in
This modern dialect, it said to me:

“From uttering of the ‘Ave,’ till the birth
In which my mother, who is now a saint,
Of me was lightened who had been her burden,

Unto its Lion had this fire returned
Five hundred fifty times and thirty more,
To reinflame itself beneath his paw.

My ancestors and I our birthplace had
Where first is found the last ward of the city
By him who runneth in your annual game.

Suffice it of my elders to hear this;
But who they were, and whence they thither came,
Silence is more considerate than speech.

All those who at that time were there between
Mars and the Baptist, fit for bearing arms,
Were a fifth part of those who now are living;

But the community, that now is mixed
With Campi and Certaldo and Figghine,
Pure in the lowest artisan was seen.

O how much better ’twere to have as neighbours
The folk of whom I speak, and at Galluzzo
And at Trespiano have your boundary,

Than have them in the town, and bear the stench
Of Aguglione’s churl, and him of Signa
Who has sharp eyes for trickery already.

Had not the folk, which most of all the world
Degenerates, been a step-dame unto Caesar,
But as a mother to her son benignant,

Some who turn Florentines, and trade and discount,
Would have gone back again to Simifonte
There where their grandsires went about as beggars.

At Montemurlo still would be the Counts,
The Cerchi in the parish of Acone,
Perhaps in Valdigrieve the Buondelmonti.

Ever the intermingling of the people
Has been the source of malady in cities,
As in the body food it surfeits on;

And a blind bull more headlong plunges down
Than a blind lamb; and very often cuts
Better and more a single sword than five.

If Luni thou regard, and Urbisaglia,
How they have passed away, and how are passing
Chiusi and Sinigaglia after them,

To hear how races waste themselves away,
Will seem to thee no novel thing nor hard,
Seeing that even cities have an end.

All things of yours have their mortality,
Even as yourselves; but it is hidden in some
That a long while endure, and lives are short;

And as the turning of the lunar heaven
Covers and bares the shores without a pause,
In the like manner fortune does with Florence.

Therefore should not appear a marvellous thing
What I shall say of the great Florentines
Of whom the fame is hidden in the Past.

I saw the Ughi, saw the Catellini,
Filippi, Greci, Ormanni, and Alberichi,
Even in their fall illustrious citizens;

And saw, as mighty as they ancient were,
With him of La Sannella him of Arca,
And Soldanier, Ardinghi, and Bostichi.

Near to the gate that is at present laden
With a new felony of so much weight
That soon it shall be jetsam from the bark,

The Ravignani were, from whom descended
The County Guido, and whoe’er the name
Of the great Bellincione since hath taken.

He of La Pressa knew the art of ruling
Already, and already Galigajo
Had hilt and pommel gilded in his house.

Mighty already was the Column Vair,
Sacchetti, Giuochi, Fifant, and Barucci,
And Galli, and they who for the bushel blush.

The stock from which were the Calfucci born
Was great already, and already chosen
To curule chairs the Sizii and Arrigucci.

O how beheld I those who are undone
By their own pride! and how the Balls of Gold
Florence enflowered in all their mighty deeds!

So likewise did the ancestors of those
Who evermore, when vacant is your church,
Fatten by staying in consistory.

The insolent race, that like a dragon follows
Whoever flees, and unto him that shows
His teeth or purse is gentle as a lamb,

Already rising was, but from low people;
So that it pleased not Ubertin Donato
That his wife’s father should make him their kin.

Already had Caponsacco to the Market
From Fesole descended, and already
Giuda and Infangato were good burghers.

I’ll tell a thing incredible, but true;
One entered the small circuit by a gate
Which from the Della Pera took its name!

Each one that bears the beautiful escutcheon
Of the great baron whose renown and name
The festival of Thomas keepeth fresh,

Knighthood and privilege from him received;
Though with the populace unites himself
To-day the man who binds it with a border.

Already were Gualterotti and Importuni;
And still more quiet would the Borgo be
If with new neighbours it remained unfed.

The house from which is born your lamentation,
Through just disdain that death among you brought
And put an end unto your joyous life,

Was honoured in itself and its companions.
O Buondelmonte, how in evil hour
Thou fled’st the bridal at another’s promptings!

Many would be rejoicing who are sad,
If God had thee surrendered to the Ema
The first time that thou camest to the city.