Part 13

For God more bounteous was himself to give To make man able to uplift himself, Than if he only of himself had pardoned;

And all the other modes were insufficient For justice, were it not the Son of God Himself had humbled to become incarnate.

Now, to fill fully each desire of thine, Return I to elucidate one place, In order that thou there mayst see as I do.

Thou sayst: ‘I see the air, I see the fire, The water, and the earth, and all their mixtures Come to corruption, and short while endure;

And these things notwithstanding were created;’ Therefore if that which I have said were true, They should have been secure against corruption.

The Angels, brother, and the land sincere In which thou art, created may be called Just as they are in their entire existence;

But all the elements which thou hast named, And all those things which out of them are made, By a created virtue are informed.

Created was the matter which they have; Created was the informing influence Within these stars that round about them go.

The soul of every brute and of the plants By its potential temperament attracts The ray and motion of the holy lights;

But your own life immediately inspires Supreme Beneficence, and enamours it So with herself, it evermore desires her.

And thou from this mayst argue furthermore Your resurrection, if thou think again How human flesh was fashioned at that time

When the first parents both of them were made.”

Paradiso: Canto VIII

The world used in its peril to believe That the fair Cypria delirious love Rayed out, in the third epicycle turning;

Wherefore not only unto her paid honour Of sacrifices and of votive cry The ancient nations in the ancient error,

But both Dione honoured they and Cupid, That as her mother, this one as her son, And said that he had sat in Dido’s lap;

And they from her, whence I beginning take, Took the denomination of the star That woos the sun, now following, now in front.

I was not ware of our ascending to it; But of our being in it gave full faith My Lady whom I saw more beauteous grow.

And as within a flame a spark is seen, And as within a voice a voice discerned, When one is steadfast, and one comes and goes,

Within that light beheld I other lamps Move in a circle, speeding more and less, Methinks in measure of their inward vision.

From a cold cloud descended never winds, Or visible or not, so rapidly They would not laggard and impeded seem

To any one who had those lights divine Seen come towards us, leaving the gyration Begun at first in the high Seraphim.

And behind those that most in front appeared Sounded “Osanna!” so that never since To hear again was I without desire.

Then unto us more nearly one approached, And it alone began: “We all are ready Unto thy pleasure, that thou joy in us.

We turn around with the celestial Princes, One gyre and one gyration and one thirst, To whom thou in the world of old didst say,

‘Ye who, intelligent, the third heaven are moving;’ And are so full of love, to pleasure thee A little quiet will not be less sweet.”

After these eyes of mine themselves had offered Unto my Lady reverently, and she Content and certain of herself had made them,

Back to the light they turned, which so great promise Made of itself, and “Say, who art thou?” was My voice, imprinted with a great affection.