Paradiso (7 page)
Authors: Dante
That sun which first made warm my breast with love
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had now disclosed, by proof and refutation,
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3
the sweet and lovely features of the truth.
but then appeared a sight
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which so drew my attention
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that my confession quickly slipped from mind.
As through clear, transparent glass
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or through still and limpid water,
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not so deep that its bed is lost from view,
the outlines of our faces are returned
so faint a pearl on a pallid forehead
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comes no less clearly to our eyes,
I saw many such faces eager to speak,
at which I fell into the error opposite to that
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which inflamed a man to love a fountain.
As soon as I became aware of them,
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believing them to be reflections,
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I turned around to see from whom they came
and, seeing nothing, I returned my gaze
to the light of my sweet guide,
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whose holy eyes were glowing as she smiled.
‘Be not surprised,’ she said, ‘if I am smiling
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at your childish thoughts, since they as yet trust not
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their steps to truth but turn you back,
‘as is their custom, toward emptiness.
These are real beings that you see,
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assigned this place for failing in their vows.
‘Therefore speak with them, listen, and believe,
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for the true light that brings them peace
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does not allow their steps to stray.’
And, addressing myself to the shade
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that seemed most keen to speak, I began,
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like a man muddled by excessive zeal:
‘O spirit made for bliss, who in the beams
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of life eternal savor the sweetness
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that, untasted, cannot be understood,
‘I shall take it as a kindness if you share with me
your name and lot, and the lot of others here.’
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Then she, eager and with smiling eyes:
‘Our love shuts not its doors against just will,
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any more than does the love of God, who wills
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that all His court be like Himself.
‘In the world I was a virgin sister.
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If you search your memory,
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my having grown more fair will not conceal my name
‘and you will recognize me as Piccarda,
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placed here among these other blessèd souls,
‘Our affections, which are inflamed
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only when they please the Holy Spirit,
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take joy in their adherence to His plan,
‘and this our lot, which seems so very low,
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is given us because of vows neglected
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and, in part, no longer valid.’
Then I said to her: ‘From your transfigured faces
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shines forth a divinity I do not know,
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and it transforms the images I can recall.
‘That is why my memory worked so slowly,
but now what you have said has helped me
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and I more readily recall your features.
‘But tell me, do you, who are here content,
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desire to achieve a higher place, where you
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might see still more and make yourselves more dear?’
Along with the other shades, she smiled,
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then answered me with so much gladness
‘Brother, the power of love subdues our will
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so that we long for only what we have
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and thirst for nothing else.
‘If we desired to be more exalted,
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our desires would be discordant
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with His will, which assigns us to this place.
‘That, as you will see, would not befit these circles
if to be ruled by love is here required
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and if you consider well the nature of that love.
‘No, it is the very essence of this blessèd state
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that we remain within the will of God,
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so that our wills combine in unity.
‘Therefore our rank, from height to height,
throughout this kingdom pleases all the kingdom,
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as it delights the King who wills us to His will.
‘And in His will is our peace.
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It is to that sea all things move,
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both what His will creates and that which nature makes.’
Then it was clear to me that everywhere in heaven
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is Paradise, even if the grace of the highest Good
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does not rain down in equal measure.
But, as happens, when one food may satisfy
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while still we crave another, we give thanks
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for the one we have, while asking for the other,
so did I with both word and gesture,
to learn from her about the web through which
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she had not drawn her shuttle to completion.
‘Perfect life and high desert,’ she said to me,
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‘set in a higher sphere a lady by whose rule
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down in your world they take the robe and veil
‘so that till death they wake and sleep
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in union with that Bridegroom who accepts each vow
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that love makes fitting for His pleasure.
‘To follow her, still young, I fled the world
and, cloaking myself in her habit,
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I promised to follow the rule of her order.
‘Then men more used to evil than to good
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carried me off, away from the sweet cloister.
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God knows what after that my life became.
‘And this other splendor who appears to you
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upon my right, who blazes up
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with all the brightness of this sphere:
‘What I told of myself applies to her as well.
She was a sister and, like me, she had the shadow
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of the holy veil torn from her head.
‘But, even after she was cast into the world
against her will and against all proper custom,
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the veil was never loosened from her heart.
‘This is the light of the great Constance,
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who bore to the second blast of Swabia
Thus she spoke to me, and then began to sing
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Ave Maria
, and, still singing, vanished,
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like something heavy through deep water.
My eyes, which watched her as long as they could,
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turned, once she was lost to view,
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to the goal of their greater desire
and were wholly bent on Beatrice.
But she so blazed upon my sight
at first my gaze could not sustain her light
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and that delayed my plying her with questions.
MOON (continues)
[a canto devoted to three questions of Dante]
Daniel
) comforts Dante (
Nebuchadnezzar
)
Plato
’s wrongness (did
he
use metaphor?)
Lawrence
and
Mucius Scaevola
: wills firm