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."

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.

130

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.

140

245

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,

10

35

SO

25

30