Paradiso
Canto XXVII
The lustre clothing the spirit of St. Peter begins to dilate and to redden. This is from indignation at the avarice, ambition, and venality of modern Popes. (“Cahorsins and Gascons,” line 58, refers to Clement V, a Gascon, and John XXII, of Cahors.) The host of spirits vanishes; and Beatrice bids Dante look down for a moment to see how far they had come on their upward journey. Both are then wafted into the ninth heaven, that of the Primum Mobile: Beatrice explains the nature of this sphere, and laments the perversity of mankind, with their desires set upon ignoble things, not from depravity of nature but for lack of right government.
TO THE Father and to the Son and Holy Ghost
Glory!” burst forth from all the heavenly spheres.
So sweet, my spirit in ecstasy was lost.
What I saw seemed a smile of the universe;
So that the intoxicating ecstasy
Entered me both by the eyes and by the ears.
O joy! unutterable felicity!
O life entire in love and peace! and O
Riches assured, from every craving free!
Before mine eyes the four torches a-glow [10][i]10-11. The lights of Peter, James, John, and Adam.—“The one which . . .”: the flame of St. Peter.
Stood; and the one which first to me came near
Began more vivid and intense to grow,
And made itself in aspect to appear
As Jupiter would seem if he and Mars[ii]14-15. If Jupiter would turn red and Mars white.
Were birds and could exchange the plumes they wear.
The Providence, which here for each prepares
The time and the office, had imposed a hush
On every side through all the quiring stars,
When this I heard: “If that I change and flush
Marvel thou not; for thou shalt soon divine [20]
On all these, as I speak, as deep a blush.
He who the place usurpeth that was mine[iii]22. “He who . . .”: Pope Boniface VIII.
On earth, mine, mine, now vacant in the sight
Of the Son of God, has made my grave decline
Into a sewer, well-nigh choked outright
With blood and filth; wherein the Arch-Renegade,[iv]26-27. “The Arch-Renegade”: Satan.—“Down there”: in Hell.
Who fell from here, down there taketh delight.”
With such a colour as on a cloud is laid
At morning or at evening, opposite
The sun, I saw the whole heaven overspread. [30]
And as a virtuous lady, herself quit
Of self-reproach, at other's fault will seem
Abashed, though merely at report of it,
So Beatrice changed her countenance; I deem
Such an eclipse it was that darkened o’er
Heaven, when on earth suffered the Power Supreme.
Then he proceeded; not now as before,
But with a voice so altered in its mood
That even his aspect was not altered more.
“The spouse of Christ was not upon my blood [40][v]40-46. “The spouse of Christ”: the Church.—Linus and Cletus were Bishops of Rome.—Sixtus and the others were also martyrs.
And that of Linus and of Cletus fed,
That for the gain of gold she might be wooed;
But Sixtus, Pius, Calixtus, Urban bled
After much weeping ’mid the faithful band,
That they might gain this blissful life instead.
It was not our will that on the right hand
Of our successors one part of Christ’s flock[vi]47. The two parts “of Christ’s flock” are the Guelfs and the Ghibel lines.
Should be, and one part on the other stand;
Nor that the keys which in my charge I took
Should on a standard be the ensign fown [50]
In battle urged against baptisèd folk;
Nor that my image should for seal be shown
On lying privileges, bought and sold:
I flash and redden, seeing these things done.
From here above preying on every fold
In shepherds’ clothing wolves are seen to slink:
O succour of God, thy hand why dost thou hoJd?
Cahorsins and Gascons make ready to drink[vii]58. See the Argument.
Our blood: O in beginning once so bright,
To what ignoble ending dost thou sink! [60]
But the high Providence, which with Scipio’s might[viii]61. Scipio the younger, who conquered Hannibal.
Rescued the glory of the world for Rome,
Soon will bring help, if I conceive aright.
Open thy mouth, my son, when, overcome
By mortal weight, thou shalt return below,
And what I hide not, do not thou shrink from.”
As in our air the vapours downward snow,[ix]67-72. These lines present the strange picture of an inverted snowstorm.—“The heavenly Goat” is Capricorn.
Frozen in flakes, at that time when the horn
Of the heavenly Goat is touched by the sun’s glow,
So, jewelling the ether, upward borne [70]
In flakes of fire, those vapours triumphing
Shone, which had come to make with us sojourn.
Their semblances my sight was following,
And followed till the space between increased
So vast, it failed on further flight to wing,
Whereat the Lady, who saw me now released
From gazing up, said to me: “Downward send
Thy sight, and see how far thou hast been displaced.”
From the hour at which I had first looked down, I kenned
That I had moved by now through the whole are [80]
Which the first climate makes from middle to end;[x]81-84. The earth was divided into seven strips, or “climates.”— “Ulysses’ mad adventure”: cf. Inf. XXVI, 90-142.—“This side” is the Phoenician shore, where Europa mounted on the back of Jupiter.
Ulysses’ mad adventure I could mark
Past Cadiz, and this side almost, the shore
Europa left, her sweet load to embark;
And more I had seen of this small threshing-floor,
But now the sun beneath me in his career
Was parted from me by one sign or more.
The enamoured mind, fain ever to confer
With my loved Lady, more than ever sure
Of its want, burned to gaze once more on her. [90]
And all that art or nature makes to allure
The eyes and, feasting them, the mind entrance,
In human lineaments or portraiture,
Combined would seem but insignificance
Beside the divine pleasure I beheld
When I turned toward her smiling countenance.
And power, that in that look abounding welled,
From the fair nest of Leda shot me far[xi]98-99. “The fair nest”: the constellation of Gemini.—“The most swift of heavens”: the ninth, or Primum Mobile.
And into the most swift of heavens propelled.
Its parts, the nearest and remotest, are [100]
So uniform, I have no skill to tell
Which of them Beatrice chose for my place there;
But she to whom my wish was visible,
Began, smiling in such a happiness
That God’s own joy seemed on her lips to dwell:
“The nature of the world which, motionless
At core, the wheeling of the rest maintains,[xii]107. “At core”: on the earth.
Starteth from here the running of the race;
Else this heaven no locality contains
Save the divine mind, whence enkindled glows [110]
The love that turns it and the power it rains.
Light and love clasp it in one circle close,[xiii]112-114. The ninth heaven is surrounded only by the Empyrean, which is the Mind of God.
As it the other spheres; and this circuit
He only who girds it understands and knows.
None other its speed determines; but by it
Are measured all the others, just as ten
Is measured, when to half and fifth part split.
And how Time in such vessel can contain
Its roots, while in the rest its leaves emerge,
May now to thine intelligence be plain. [120]
O Covetousness, so hasty to submerge
Mortals, that each and all are powerless
To draw their eyes forth from thy blinding surge!
The will indeed in men still flourishes;
But drenchings of continual rain convert
Sound plums into a wrinklèd rottenness.
For faith and innocence are in the heart
Of children only; both aside are cast
Before a beard upon the cheeks may start,
Many a stammering child observeth fast [130]
Who, after, when his tongue is freed, will chew
Any food, any month, in glutton haste.
And many a stammerer loves and hearkens to
His mother, who, when full speech in him flows
Longeth to see her buried out of view.
So, soon as it is seen, the white skin grows
Black on the beauteous daughter of him whose sway[xiv]137. “Of him . . .”: the sun, whose “beauteous daughter” is the human race.
With morning comes and with the evening goes.
Then, lest thou make a marvel of such decay,
Think that on earth is now no governance; [140]
Wherefore the human family runs astray.
But ere from winter January advance[xv]142. If an error in the Julian calendar had not been corrected in 1582, the month of January, in the course of less than 90 centuries, would have been pushed into the spring.
To spring, through the hundredth part which ye neglect,
From these high spheres so great a light shall lance
That destiny, which we so long expect,[xvi]145. Once more we have a vague prophecy of violent reformation.
Shall turn the poops to where the prows have stood;
And then the fleet shall steer a course direct,
And a sound fruit shall follow upon the bud.”