Divine Comedy: Paradise | Page 6

have within them?Dispose unto their ends and their effects.
Thus do these organs of the world proceed,?As thou perceivest now, from grade to grade;?Since from above they take, and act beneath.
Observe me well, how through this place I come?Unto the truth thou wishest, that hereafter?Thou mayst alone know how to keep the ford
The power and motion of the holy spheres,?As from the artisan the hammer's craft,?Forth from the blessed motors must proceed.
The heaven, which lights so manifold make fair,?From the Intelligence profound, which turns it,?The image takes, and makes of it a seal.
And even as the soul within your dust?Through members different and accommodated?To faculties diverse expands itself,
So likewise this Intelligence diffuses?Its virtue multiplied among the stars.?Itself revolving on its unity.
Virtue diverse doth a diverse alloyage?Make with the precious body that it quickens,?In which, as life in you, it is combined.
From the glad nature whence it is derived,?The mingled virtue through the body shines,?Even as gladness through the living pupil.
From this proceeds whate'er from light to light?Appeareth different, not from dense and rare:?This is the formal principle that produces,
According to its goodness, dark and bright."
Paradiso: Canto III
That Sun, which erst with love my bosom warmed,?Of beauteous truth had unto me discovered,?By proving and reproving, the sweet aspect.
And, that I might confess myself convinced?And confident, so far as was befitting,?I lifted more erect my head to speak.
But there appeared a vision, which withdrew me?So close to it, in order to be seen,?That my confession I remembered not.
Such as through polished and transparent glass,?Or waters crystalline and undisturbed,?But not so deep as that their bed be lost,
Come back again the outlines of our faces?So feeble, that a pearl on forehead white?Comes not less speedily unto our eyes;
Such saw I many faces prompt to speak,?So that I ran in error opposite?To that which kindled love 'twixt man and fountain.
As soon as I became aware of them,?Esteeming them as mirrored semblances,?To see of whom they were, mine eyes I turned,
And nothing saw, and once more turned them forward?Direct into the light of my sweet Guide,?Who smiling kindled in her holy eyes.
"Marvel thou not," she said to me, "because?I smile at this thy puerile conceit,?Since on the truth it trusts not yet its foot,
But turns thee, as 'tis wont, on emptiness.?True substances are these which thou beholdest,?Here relegate for breaking of some vow.
Therefore speak with them, listen and believe;?For the true light, which giveth peace to them,?Permits them not to turn from it their feet."
And I unto the shade that seemed most wishful?To speak directed me, and I began,?As one whom too great eagerness bewilders:
"O well-created spirit, who in the rays?Of life eternal dost the sweetness taste?Which being untasted ne'er is comprehended,
Grateful 'twill be to me, if thou content me?Both with thy name and with your destiny."?Whereat she promptly and with laughing eyes:
"Our charity doth never shut the doors?Against a just desire, except as one?Who wills that all her court be like herself.
I was a virgin sister in the world;?And if thy mind doth contemplate me well,?The being more fair will not conceal me from thee,
But thou shalt recognise I am Piccarda,?Who, stationed here among these other blessed,?Myself am blessed in the slowest sphere.
All our affections, that alone inflamed?Are in the pleasure of the Holy Ghost,?Rejoice at being of his order formed;
And this allotment, which appears so low,?Therefore is given us, because our vows?Have been neglected and in some part void."
Whence I to her: "In your miraculous aspects?There shines I know not what of the divine,?Which doth transform you from our first conceptions.
Therefore I was not swift in my remembrance;?But what thou tellest me now aids me so,?That the refiguring is easier to me.
But tell me, ye who in this place are happy,?Are you desirous of a higher place,?To see more or to make yourselves more friends?"
First with those other shades she smiled a little;?Thereafter answered me so full of gladness,?She seemed to burn in the first fire of love:
"Brother, our will is quieted by virtue?Of charity, that makes us wish alone?For what we have, nor gives us thirst for more.
If to be more exalted we aspired,?Discordant would our aspirations be?Unto the will of Him who here secludes us;
Which thou shalt see finds no place in these circles,?If being in charity is needful here,?And if thou lookest well into its nature;
Nay, 'tis essential to this blest existence?To keep itself within the will divine,?Whereby our very wishes are made one;
So that, as we are station above station?Throughout this realm, to all the realm 'tis pleasing,?As to the King, who makes his will our will.
And his will is our peace; this is the sea?To which is moving onward whatsoever?It doth create, and all that nature makes."
Then it was clear to me how everywhere?In heaven is Paradise, although the grace?Of good supreme there rain not in one measure.
But as