Notes.
31 The voice is that of Saint Benedict
(480-543) who founded the monastery of Monte Cassino and who drew up the rules of worship
and life on which Western monasticism is based.
49 Macarius is most likely the Younger of
Alexandria (d. 404) who established monastic rule in the East. Romualdus of Ravenna (d.
1027?), a member of the Onesti family, founded the reformed-Benedictine monastery of
Camaldoli in the Casentino outside Florence.
70 Saint Benedict refers to the passage in
Genesis 18:12.
88 In Acts 3:6, Peter states that neither
gold nor silver were important in his community, while Benedict's order was based on fasts
and prayers, and Saint Francis' on humility.
111 Gemini, the sign after Taurus the Bull.
is the constellation under which Dante was born. It is again the Twins of line 151.
139 The Moon is the daughter of Latona.
143 The son of Hyperion is the Sun; Maia is
the mother of Mercury and Dione the mother of’ Venus. Jove is Jupiter; Mars is his
son and Saturn his father (l. 146). |
|
-
Struck with amazement, I turned to my guide,
- Like
a small child that always runs back where
- The
person it trusts most is to be found.
-
- And
she, like a mother who is quick to calm
- 5
Her pale and panting son with her soft voice
- Which
often reassures him, said to me,
-
-
"Do you not know that you are now in heaven?
- Do
you not know that heaven is all holy,
- And
that what is done here springs from true zeal?
-
- 10
"Now you can comprehend how they by song
- And I
by smiling would have changed your soul,
- When
just this shout has moved you so profoundly.
-
-
"By this cry, had you understood their prayers,
- You
might have known already of the vengeance
- 15
Which you shall see down there before you die.
-
-
"The sword of heaven does not cut in haste
- Nor
strike too late, except in the opinion
- Of
those who wait in fear or longing for it.
-
-
"But turn now to the others gathered here,
- 20
For you will notice many famous spirits,
- If
you direct your gaze as I instruct you."
-
- Just
as she pleased, I turned my eyes and saw
- A
hundred little spheres which all together
- Made
themselves beautiful with rays they shared.
-
- 25
I stood as someone curbing in himself
- The
prick of his desire, who does not dare
- To
question, he so dreads to overdo.
-
- And
the most brilliant and magnificent
- Of
those bright pearls came forward from its cluster
- 30
To make content my wish concerning it.
-
- Then
I heard from within it, "Could you see,
- As I
can see, the love that burns among us,
- You
would have found expression for your thoughts.
-
-
"But that more waiting may not hold you from
- 35
Your goal on high, I will make my response,
- Just
to the thought that you keep to yourself.
-
-
"The mountain on whose slope Cassino lies,
- Was,
on its summit, visited of old
- By a
deluded and perverted people,
-
- 40
"And I am he who was the first to carry
- Up
there the name of Him who brought to earth
- The
truth that lifts us up so loftily,
-
-
"And such abundant grace shone down on me
- That
I led the surrounding towns away
- 45
From impious cults which have seduced the world.
-
-
"These other flames were all contemplatives
-
Enkindled by the heat which brings to birth
- The
sanctifying flowers and their fruits.
-
-
"Here is Macarius, here is Romualdus,
- 50
Here are my brothers who kept steadfast hearts
- And
planted their feet within the cloister walls."
-
- And I
told him, "The affection you display
- In
speaking to me, and the kindliness
- That
I observe in every glowing spirit,
-
- 55
"Have made my confidence spread as the sun
- Opens
the rose when it becomes full-blown
- And
its heart swells with fresh capacity.
-
-
"I therefore beg you, father, to assure me,
- If I
am able to obtain such grace,
- 60
That I may look upon your unveiled figure."
-
- He
then said, "Brother, your exalted longing
- Shall
be fulfilled up in the final sphere
- Where
mine and all desires are fulfilled.
-
-
"There every wish is perfect, ripe, and whole.
- 65
There only, in that highest point of heaven,
- Is
every part where it has always rested.
-
-
"That sphere is not in space, it has no pole,
- And
our bright ladder reaches up to it
- So
far that it must vanish from your view.
-
- 70
"The patriarch Jacob saw it stretching
- To
its top rung, when it appeared to him
-
Thronged full of angels pressing up and down.
-
-
"But no one now lifts his foot from the ground
- To
climb it, and my rule is left there like
- 75
Waste scraps of paper to be tossed aside.
-
-
"The walls which formerly enclosed an abbey
- Now
house a den of thieves, and the monks’ cowls
- Are
sacks stuffed to the brim with rotten flour.
-
-
"But even heavy usury violates less
- 80
Against God’s pleasure than the tempting fruit
- That
makes the hearts of monks so mad for it,
-
-
"For what the Church possesses is for all
- The
people who request it in God’s name,
- Not
for relations or others who are worse.
-
- 85
"The flesh of mortal creatures is so soft
- That
good beginnings on earth will not last
- From
seeding of the oak to acorn-bearing.
-
-
"Peter began his movement without gold
- Or
silver; I mine, with prayers and fasting;
- 90
Francis his, with pure humility:
-
-
"And if you look at each of their beginnings,
- And
then look back again to where it strayed,
- You
will see that the white has turned to black.
-
-
"Yet, Jordan driven back against its course
- 95
And the Red Sea divided, when God willed,
- Would
be less wondrous sights than help is here."
-
- These
words he said to me, and then rejoined
- His
company, and the company closed ranks.
- Then
like a whirlwind they were all swooped up.
-
- 100
My own sweet lady, simply with a sign,
-
Thrust me on up the ladder after them,
- My
nature was so vanquished by her power.
-
- Never
on earth, where we descend and climb
- By
nature’s law, has motion been so rapid
- 105 That
it could be compared to my winged flight.
-
- As I
hope, reader, to return to that
-
Solemn triumph for whose sake I often
- Weep
for my sins and beat my breast in sorrow:
-
- You
could not put your finger in the fire
- 110
And pull it out as swiftly as I saw
- The
sign that trails the Bull and stood inside it.
-
- O
stars of glory, O light teeming full
- With
mighty power from which I obtain
- All
of whatever talent I may have,
-
- 115
Rising with you and setting with you was
- The
Sun that is father of all mortal life,
- When
first I felt the air of Tuscany,
-
- And
when the grace was granted then to me
- To
enter the high sphere that wheels you round,
- 120
Your region was the one assigned to me!
-
- To
you my soul devotedly now sighs
- That
she may gain the influencing power
- For
the hard pass which draws her to itself.
-
-
"You are so close now to the final solace,"
- 125
Beatrice began, "that it is necessary
- For
your eyes to be vigilant and clear.
-
-
"And so, before you go in any farther,
- Look
down and see how vast a universe
- I
have already set beneath your feet,
-
- 130
"So that your heart, rejoicing to the full,
- May
present itself to the triumphant throng
- Which
comes with joy through this ethereal zone."
-
- I
traveled back in gazing down through all
- The
seven spheres, and then I saw this globe
- 135
So paltry that I smiled at its appearance.
-
- And
that opinion I approve as best
- Which
holds the earth as least, and he whose thought
- Is
elsewhere may be named as truly upright.
-
- I saw
the daughter of Latona glowing
- 140
Without that shadow which was once the reason
- Why I
believed that she was rare and dense.
-
- I
there sustained the bright face of your son,
-
Hyperion; and, Maia and Dione,
- I saw
your children circling close to him.
-
- 145
Then I observed Jove’s tempering between
- His
son and father, and I clearly saw
- The
variations they make in their orbits.
-
- And
all the seven spheres displayed to me
- How
grand they are and how swift in their motion
- 150
And how apart in distance from each other.
-
- As I
revolved with the eternal Twins,
- I saw
revealed from hills to river outlets
- The
threshing-floor that makes us so ferocious.
-
- Then
my eyes turned back to the eyes of beauty.
|
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to Paradiso XXI