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My Lady, who in my anxiety

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"From that point

Beheld me much perplexed, said: Dependent is the heaven and nature all. Behold that circle most conjoined to it,

And know thou, that its motion is so swift Through burning love whereby it is spurred on." And I to her: "If the world were arranged

In the order which I see in yonder wheels,
What's set before me would have satisfied me;
But in the world of sense we can perceive

That evermore the circles are diviner
As they are from the centre more remote
Wherefore if my desire is to be ended

In this miraculous and angelic temple,
That has for confines only love and light,
To hear behoves me still how the example

And the exemplar go not in one fashion, Since for myself in vain I contemplate it." "If thine own fingers unto such a knot

Be insufficient, it is no great wonder,
So hard hath it become for want of trying."
My Lady thus; then said she: "Do thou take
What I shall tell thee, if thou wouldst be sated,
And exercise on that thy subtlety.

The circles corporal are wide and narrow

According to the more or less of virtue
Which is distributed through all their parts.
The greater goodness works the greater weal,
The greater weal the greater body holds,
If perfect equally are all its parts.
Therefore this one which sweeps along with it

The universe sublime, doth correspond
Unto the circle which most loves and knows.
On which account, if thou unto the virtue

Apply thy measure, not to the appearance
Of substances that unto thee seem round,
Thou wilt behold a marvellous agreement,

Of more to greater, and of less to smaller, In every heaven, with its Intelligence." Even as remaineth splendid and serene

The hemisphere of air, when Boreas

Is blowing from that cheek where he is mildest,
Because is purified and resolved the rack

That erst disturbed it, till the welkin laughs
With all the beauties of its pageantry;

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Thus did I likewise, after that my Lady

Had me provided with her clear response,
And like a star in heaven the truth was seen.
And soon as to a stop her words had come,
Not otherwise does iron scintillate

When molten, than those circles scintillated.
Their coruscation all the sparks repeated,

And they so many were, their number makes
More millions than the doubling of the chess.
I heard them sing hosanna choir by choir

To the fixed point which holds them at the Ubi,
And ever will, where they have ever been.
And she, who saw the dubious meditations

Within my mind, "The primal circles," said, "Have shown thee Seraphim and Cherubim. Thus rapidly they follow their own bonds,

To be as like the point as most they can,
And can as far as they are high in vision.
Those other Loves, that round about them go,

Thrones of the countenance divine are called,
Because they terminate the primal Triad.

And thou shouldst know that they all have delight
As much as their own vision penetrates
The Truth, in which all intellect finds rest.

Is founded in the faculty which sees,

From this it may be seen how blessedness

And not in that which loves, and follows next;

And of this seeing merit is the measure,

Which is brought forth by grace, and by good will;
Thus on from grade to grade doth it proceed.

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The second Triad, which is germinating
In such wise in this sempiternal spring,
That no nocturnal Aries despoils,

Perpetually hosanna warbles forth

With threefold melody, that sounds in three
Orders of joy, with which it is intrined.
The three Divine are in this hierarchy,

First the Dominions, and the Virtues next ;
And the third order is that of the Powers.
Then in the dances twain penultimate

The Principalities and Archangels wheel;
The last is wholly of angelic sports.
These orders upward all of them are gazing,
And downward so prevail, that unto God
They all attracted are and all attract.

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And Dionysius with so great desire

To contemplate these Orders set himself,
He named them and distinguished them as I do.
But Gregory afterwards dissented from him;

Wherefore, as soon as he unclosed his eyes
Within this heaven, he at himself did smile.
And if so much of secret truth a mortal

Proffered on earth, I would not have thee marvel,
For he who saw it here revealed it to him,
With much more of the truth about these circles."

CANTO XXIX.

AT what time both the children of Latona,
Surmounted by the Ram and by the Scales,
Together make a zone of the horizon,

As long as from the time the zenith holds them
In equipoise, till from that girdle both
Changing their hemisphere disturb the balance,
So long, her face depicted with a smile,

Did Beatrice keep silence while she gazed
Fixedly at the point which had o'ercome me.
Then she began: "I say, and I ask not

What thou dost wish to hear, for I have seen it
Where centres every When and every Ubi.
Not to acquire some good unto himself,

Which is impossible, but that his splendour
In its resplendency may say, 'Subsisto,"

In his eternity outside of time,

Outside all other limits, as it pleased him,
Into new Loves the Eternal Love unfolded.

Nor as if torpid did he lie before;

For neither after nor before proceeded The going forth of God upon these waters. Matter and Form unmingled and conjoined Came into being that had no defect,

E'en as three arrows from a three-stringed bow.
And as in glass, in amber, or in crystal

A sunbeam flashes so, that from its coming
To its full being is no interval,

So from its Lord did the triform effect
Ray forth into its being all together,
Without discrimination of beginning.

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Order was con-created and constructed

In substances, and summit of the world
Were those wherein the pure act was produced.
Pure potentiality held the lowest part;

Midway bound potentiality with act
Such bond that it shall never be unbound.
Jerome has written unto you of angels

Created a long lapse of centuries
Or ever yet the other world was made;
But written is this truth in many places

By writers of the Holy Ghost, and thou
Shalt see it, if thou lookest well thereat.

And even reason seeth it somewhat,

For it would not concede that for so long
Could be the motors without their perfection.

Now dost thou know both where and when these Loves
Created were, and how; so that extinct

In thy desire already are three fires.

Nor could one reach, in counting, unto twenty
So swiftly, as a portion of these angels
Disturbed the subject of your elements.
The rest remained, and they began this art

Which thou discernest, with so great delight
That never from their circling do they cease.
The occasion of the fall was the accursed

Presumption of that One, whom thou hast seen
By all the burden of the world constrained.
Those whom thou here beholdest modest were

To recognise themselves as of that goodness
Which made them apt for so much understanding;

On which account their vision was exalted

By the enlightening grace and their own merit,
So that they have a full and steadfast will.

I would not have thee doubt, but certain be,
'Tis meritorious to receive this grace,
According as the affection opens to it.

Now round about in this consistory

Much mayst thou contemplate, if these my words
Be gathered up, without all further aid.

But since upon the earth, throughout your schools,
They teach that such is the angelic nature
That it doth hear, and recollect, and will,
More will I say, that thou mayst see unmixed
The truth that is confounded there below,
Equivocating in such like prelections.

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These substances, since in God's countenance
They jocund were, turned not away their sight
From that wherefrom not anything is hidden;
Hence they have not their vision intercepted

By object new, and hence they do not need
To recollect, through interrupted thought.
So that below, not sleeping, people dream,

Believing they speak truth, and not believing;
And in the last is greater sin and shame.
Below you do not journey by one path

Philosophising; so transporteth you
Love of appearance and the thought thereof.
And even this above here is endured

With less disdain, than when is set aside
The Holy Writ, or when it is distorted.
They think not there how much of blood it costs
To sow it in the world, and how he pleases
Who in humility keeps close to it.
Each striveth for appearance, and doth make

His own inventions; and these treated are
By preachers, and the Evangel holds its peace.
One sayeth that the moon did backward turn,

In the Passion of Christ, and interpose herself
So that the sunlight reached not down below;
And lies; for of its own accord the light

Hid itself; whence to Spaniards and to Indians,
As to the Jews, did such eclipse respond.
Florence has not so many Lapi and Bindi

As fables such as these, that every year
Are shouted from the pulpit back and forth,
In such wise that the lambs, who do not know,

Come back from pasture fed upon the wind,
And not to see the harm doth not excuse them.

Christ did not to his first disciples say,

'Go forth, and to the world preach idle tales,'
But unto them a true foundation gave;

And this so loudly sounded from their lips,

That, in the warfare to enkindle Faith,
They made of the Evangel shields and lances.
Now men go forth with jests and drolleries

To preach, and if but well the people laugh,
The hood puffs out, and nothing more is asked.

But in the cowl there nestles such a bird,

That, if the common people were to see it,
They would perceive what pardons they confide in,

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