Divine Comedy: Paradise | Page 5

has the greatest haste.
And thither now, as to a site decreed,
Bears us away the virtue of that
cord
Which aims its arrows at a joyous mark.
True is it, that as oftentimes the form
Accords not with the intention
of the art,
Because in answering is matter deaf,
So likewise from this course doth deviate
Sometimes the creature,
who the power possesses,
Though thus impelled, to swerve some
other way,
(In the same wise as one may see the fire
Fall from a cloud,) if the
first impetus
Earthward is wrested by some false delight.
Thou shouldst not wonder more, if well I judge,
At thine ascent, than
at a rivulet
From some high mount descending to the lowland.
Marvel it would be in thee, if deprived
Of hindrance, thou wert seated
down below,
As if on earth the living fire were quiet."
Thereat she heavenward turned again her face.
Paradiso: Canto II
O Ye, who in some pretty little boat,
Eager to listen, have been
following
Behind my ship, that singing sails along,
Turn back to look again upon your shores;
Do not put out to sea, lest
peradventure,
In losing me, you might yourselves be lost.
The sea I sail has never yet been passed;
Minerva breathes, and pilots
me Apollo,
And Muses nine point out to me the Bears.
Ye other few who have the neck uplifted
Betimes to th' bread of
Angels upon which
One liveth here and grows not sated by it,

Well may you launch upon the deep salt-sea
Your vessel, keeping
still my wake before you
Upon the water that grows smooth again.
Those glorious ones who unto Colchos passed
Were not so
wonder-struck as you shall be,
When Jason they beheld a ploughman
made!
The con-created and perpetual thirst
For the realm deiform did bear
us on,
As swift almost as ye the heavens behold.
Upward gazed Beatrice, and I at her;
And in such space perchance as
strikes a bolt
And flies, and from the notch unlocks itself,
Arrived I saw me where a wondrous thing
Drew to itself my sight;
and therefore she
From whom no care of mine could be concealed,
Towards me turning, blithe as beautiful,
Said unto me: "Fix gratefully
thy mind
On God, who unto the first star has brought us."
It seemed to me a cloud encompassed us,
Luminous, dense,
consolidate and bright
As adamant on which the sun is striking.
Into itself did the eternal pearl
Receive us, even as water doth receive

A ray of light, remaining still unbroken.
If I was body, (and we here conceive not
How one dimension
tolerates another,
Which needs must be if body enter body,)
More the desire should be enkindled in us
That essence to behold,
wherein is seen
How God and our own nature were united.
There will be seen what we receive by faith,
Not demonstrated, but
self-evident
In guise of the first truth that man believes.
I made reply: "Madonna, as devoutly
As most I can do I give thanks

to Him
Who has removed me from the mortal world.
But tell me what the dusky spots may be
Upon this body, which
below on earth
Make people tell that fabulous tale of Cain?"
Somewhat she smiled; and then, "If the opinion
Of mortals be
erroneous," she said,
"Where'er the key of sense doth not unlock,
Certes, the shafts of wonder should not pierce thee
Now, forasmuch
as, following the senses,
Thou seest that the reason has short wings.
But tell me what thou think'st of it thyself."
And I: "What seems to us
up here diverse,
Is caused, I think, by bodies rare and dense."
And she: "Right truly shalt thou see immersed
In error thy belief, if
well thou hearest
The argument that I shall make against it.
Lights many the eighth sphere displays to you
Which in their quality
and quantity
May noted be of aspects different.
If this were caused by rare and dense alone,
One only virtue would
there be in all
Or more or less diffused, or equally.
Virtues diverse must be perforce the fruits
Of formal principles; and
these, save one,
Of course would by thy reasoning be destroyed.
Besides, if rarity were of this dimness
The cause thou askest, either
through and through
This planet thus attenuate were of matter,
Or else, as in a body is apportioned
The fat and lean, so in like
manner this
Would in its volume interchange the leaves.
Were it the former, in the sun's eclipse
It would be manifest by the
shining through
Of light, as through aught tenuous interfused.
This is not so; hence we must scan the other,
And if it chance the

other I demolish,
Then falsified will thy opinion be.
But if this rarity go not through and through,
There needs must be a
limit, beyond which
Its contrary prevents the further passing,
And thence the foreign radiance is reflected,
Even as a colour cometh
back from glass,
The which behind itself concealeth lead.
Now thou wilt say the sunbeam shows itself
More dimly there than in
the other parts,
By being there reflected farther back.
From this reply experiment will free thee
If e'er thou try it, which is