Paradise, Canto XIX

Appeared before me with its wings outspread

The beautiful image that in sweet fruition

Made jubilant the interwoven souls;

Appeared a little ruby each, wherein

Ray of the sun was burning so enkindled

That each into mine eyes refracted it.

And what it now behoves me to retrace

Nor voice has e'er reported, nor ink written,

Nor was by fantasy e'er comprehended;

For speak I saw, and likewise heard, the beak,

And utter with its voice both 'I' and 'My,'

When in conception it was 'We' and 'Our.'

And it began: "Being just and merciful

Am I exalted here unto that glory

Which cannot be exceeded by desire;

And upon earth I left my memory

Such, that the evil-minded people there

Commend it, but continue not the story."

So doth a single heat from many embers

Make itself felt, even as from many loves

Issued a single sound from out that image.

Whence I thereafter: "O perpetual flowers

Of the eternal joy, that only one

Make me perceive your odours manifold,

Exhaling, break within me the great fast

Which a long season has in hunger held me,

Not finding for it any food on earth.

Well do I know, that if in heaven its mirror

Justice Divine another realm doth make,

Yours apprehends it not through any veil.

You know how I attentively address me

To listen; and you know what is the doubt

That is in me so very old a fast."

Even as a falcon, issuing from his hood,

Doth move his head, and with his wings applaud him,

Showing desire, and making himself fine,

Saw I become that standard, which of lauds

Was interwoven of the grace divine,

With such songs as he knows who there rejoices.

Then it began: "He who a compass turned

On the world's outer verge, and who within it

Devised so much occult and manifest,

Could not the impress of his power so make

On all the universe, as that his Word

Should not remain in infinite excess.

And this makes certain that the first proud being,

Who was the paragon of every creature,

By not awaiting light fell immature.

And hence appears it, that each minor nature

Is scant receptacle unto that good

Which has no end, and by itself is measured.

In consequence our vision, which perforce

Must be some ray of that intelligence

With which all things whatever are replete,

Cannot in its own nature be so potent,

That it shall not its origin discern

Far beyond that which is apparent to it.

Therefore into the justice sempiternal

The power of vision that your world receives,

As eye into the ocean, penetrates;

Which, though it see the bottom near the shore,

Upon the deep perceives it not, and yet

'Tis there, but it is hidden by the depth.

There is no light but comes from the serene

That never is o'ercast, nay, it is darkness

Or shadow of the flesh, or else its poison.

Amply to thee is opened now the cavern

Which has concealed from thee the living justice

Of which thou mad'st such frequent questioning.

For saidst thou: 'Born a man is on the shore

Of Indus, and is none who there can speak

Of Christ, nor who can read, nor who can write;

And all his inclinations and his actions

Are good, so far as human reason sees,

Without a sin in life or in discourse:

He dieth unbaptised and without faith;

Where is this justice that condemneth him?

Where is his fault, if he do not believe?'

Now who art thou, that on the bench wouldst sit

In judgment at a thousand miles away,

With the short vision of a single span?

Truly to him who with me subtilizes,

If so the Scripture were not over you,

For doubting there were marvellous occasion.

O animals terrene, O stolid minds,

The primal will, that in itself is good,

Ne'er from itself, the Good Supreme, has moved.

So much is just as is accordant with it;

No good created draws it to itself,

But it, by raying forth, occasions that."

Even as above her nest goes circling round

The stork when she has fed her little ones,

And he who has been fed looks up at her,

So lifted I my brows, and even such

Became the blessed image, which its wings

Was moving, by so many counsels urged.

Circling around it sang, and said: "As are

My notes to thee, who dost not comprehend them,

Such is the eternal judgment to you mortals."

Those lucent splendours of the Holy Spirit

Grew quiet then, but still within the standard

That made the Romans reverend to the world.

It recommenced: "Unto this kingdom never

Ascended one who had not faith in Christ,

Before or since he to the tree was nailed.

But look thou, many crying are, 'Christ, Christ!'

Who at the judgment shall be far less near

To him than some shall be who knew not Christ.

Such Christians shall the Ethiop condemn,

When the two companies shall be divided,

The one for ever rich, the other poor.

What to your kings may not the Persians say,

When they that volume opened shall behold

In which are written down all their dispraises?

There shall be seen, among the deeds of Albert,

That which ere long shall set the pen in motion,

For which the realm of Prague shall be deserted.

There shall be seen the woe that on the Seine

He brings by falsifying of the coin,

Who by the blow of a wild boar shall die.

There shall be seen the pride that causes thirst,

Which makes the Scot and Englishman so mad

That they within their boundaries cannot rest;

Be seen the luxury and effeminate life

Of him of Spain, and the Bohemian,

Who valour never knew and never wished;

Be seen the Cripple of Jerusalem,

His goodness represented by an I,

While the reverse an M shall represent;

Be seen the avarice and poltroonery

Of him who guards the Island of the Fire,

Wherein Anchises finished his long life;

And to declare how pitiful he is

Shall be his record in contracted letters

Which shall make note of much in little space.

And shall appear to each one the foul deeds

Of uncle and of brother who a nation

So famous have dishonoured, and two crowns.

And he of Portugal and he of Norway

Shall there be known, and he of Rascia too,

Who saw in evil hour the coin of Venice.

O happy Hungary, if she let herself

Be wronged no farther! and Navarre the happy,

If with the hills that gird her she be armed!

And each one may believe that now, as hansel

Thereof, do Nicosia and Famagosta

Lament and rage because of their own beast,

Who from the others' flank departeth not."