The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri

Casto I. PARADISE. 263 Should bring forth joyaunce in the glad regard Of Belphos' deity, the Peneian leaf, When any one does thirst for its reward. Great flame may follow from a spark but brief ; After me haply with a voice of might, •* Others may win reply from Cyrrha's chief. To mortals rises aye on different site The great lamp of the world ; but when it rears Where with three crosses circles four unite, In happiest course, with most propitious stars ^ Conjoined it issues, and the mundane leaven Most with its influence seals, and prepares. Had made the morning there, and here the even, Such a conjunction, and was clad in white Yon hemisphere, the rest all darkly paven, ** When Beatrice turned within my sight Towards the left, to gaze upon the sun ; Ne'er gazed so long an eagle on the height. And as reflected ray is wont to run From the direct, upwards again to soar, '^ As pilgrim eager to return alone, So that her action, through my eyes did pour Upon my thought, and fashioned mine, that near The sun I gazed, beyond mere mortal power. Much there is lawful which is not so here ** Unto our virtue, guerdon of the place Made for humanity the chosen sphere. I could not bear it long, but yet such space. That all around me I beheld it gleam Like iron glowing from the fire's embrace, ^ And to the day there suddenly did seem A new day joined, as though G-od's power had blazed Upon the sky another sun to beam. Upon the eternal spheres, with eyes that gazed Stood Beatrix, and I my vision laid ^ On her, turned hither from the height that dazed ; Line 32. "The Peneian leaf, the laurel, meed of mighty conquerors and poets sage." — Spenser, b. i., can. 1, st. 9. Line 36. ^rrha, a city at Uie foot of Parnassus, devoted to Apollo. Line 89. When the sun rises in such a manner that the circles of the horizon, the zodiac, the equator, and the equinoctial colure join, the last three intersecting each other so as to form three crosses, it is in the const-ellation of Aries, and produces the most favourable influences ; in such a oox^junction was it rising on the earthly Paradise, and setting on the other hemisphere, when Beatrice and Dante launched upwards to the spheres. Line 56. Dante being on the terrestrial Paradise had his faculties so attempered that he was able to look at the sun in a way impossible on the inhabited hemisphere.

264 PARADISE. . CAvtd I. Within my soul her look such influence made. Such as when G-laucus tasted of the grass, And grew a sea-god in the ocean bed. By words cannot be told how one does pass ^® From human thus, the example must suffice For whom experience is preserved by grace. If I were fashioned only in such guise As you madest newly, love that rulest the sky, You know'st, who with your light did make me rise. ^* What time the sphere, which you, loved deity, Dost ever whirl, attracted all my gaze, With its heaven-watched and tempered melody. That portion of the sky seemed all ablaze With the sun's flame, that never rain or stream ^ Upon the earth such widespread lake could raise. The newness of the sound, and the bright gleam To search their causes kindled such a glow I ne'er had felt an ardour so extreme. Whence she, who saw me as myself I know, " To still the perturbation of my mind, Spake, ere the question to my lips could go : And thus began : ** Yourself you makest blind With your false fancy, that you can not see What you would see, if this were thrown behind. ** On earth you are not, as you think'st to be ; And lightning flying from its native sphere Ne*er coursed as swift as hitherwards do flee." If from my primal doubt I was made clear By those few words she uttered smiling bright, '* I fell into another greater snare ; And said : " Content already I alight From my great wonder, but am how beguiled To think how I mount o'er these bodies light." When she had given a pitying sigh, her mild ^^ Eyes she directed towards me, with a face As of a mother o'er a raving child, And thus continued : " All the things in space Have order 'midst themselves ; and hence arrayed Bears the universe its God-like trace. ^^ Here, high created beings see the shade Of the Eternal Power, the sole design For which this rule of order has been made. In the order, which I tell you of, incline All natures, though in different lot each tends "*^ Nearer or farther from their source divine. Line 79. They were passing through the sphere of Gxe, beneath the moon.

CiNTo II. PARADISE. 265 Hence they move onwards to their different ends, Through the great sea of being, and each one Is borne there by the instinct Nature lends. This carries up the fire towards the moon : "* This in the hearts of mortal kind does move : This binds and gathers up the earth alone : Nor creatures only, whose low organs prove Their want of intellect, shoots forth this bow, But those that have both intellect and love. ^*® The Providence which all things fits so, The empyrean stills in its own light, In which the swiftest whirling Heaven does glow : ^nd hither now, as to our promised site, Bears us the potent virtue of that string. ^^ Which to a gladsome mark aye shoots aright. 'Tis true the form intentions will not bring At times unto the purposed will of art. Because the matter fails in answering : So from this Heavenward course there may depart ^*^ Created thing at times, who has the power Thus driven, to bend aside to other port, (Just as one may behold fall down in shower Fire from the cloud), if the first impetus By false delight to earth be twisted lower. ^ You should not think with wonder marvellous Of thv ascent, but as a stream which fell Down to the deeps from mount precipitous. Marvel would be for you, from obstacle When freed, if you had downwards fallen amain, ^*® As though on earth the living fire could dwell." Then towards the Heaven she turned her face again. Line 119. The bow of instinct, and again in line 125. Line 130. The soul, abnsing its liberty of will, may desert the Heavenward course on which its instinct sends it, as fire, instead of rising, falls at times on earth from the lightning cload.