| |
| WHEN, disappearing from our hemisphere, | |
| The world’s enlightener vanishes, and day | |
| On all sides wasteth; suddenly the sky, | |
| Erewhile irradiate only with his beam, | |
| Is yet again unfolded, putting forth | 5 |
| Innumerable lights wherein one shines. | |
| Of such vicissitude in Heaven I thought; | |
| As the great sign, 1 that marshaleth the world | |
| And the world’s leaders, in the blessed beak | |
| Was silent: for that all those living lights, | 10 |
| Waxing in splendour, burst forth into songs, | |
| Such as from memory glide and fall away. | |
| Sweet Love, that doth apparel thee in smiles! | |
| How lustrous was thy semblance in those sparkles, | |
| Which merely are from holy thoughts inspired. | 15 |
| After 2 the precious and bright beaming stones, | |
| That did ingem the sixth light, ceased the chiming | |
| Of their angelic bells; methought I heard | |
| The murmuring of a river, that doth fall | |
| From rock to rock transpicuous, making known | 20 |
| The richness of his spring-head: and as sound | |
| Of cittern, at the fret-board, or of pipe, | |
| Is, at the wind-hole, modulate and tuned; | |
| Thus up the neck, as it were hollow, rose | |
| That murmuring of the eagle; and forthwith | 25 |
| Voice there assumed; and thence along the beak | |
| Issued in form of words, such as my heart | |
| Did look for, on whose tables I inscribed them. | |
| “The part in me, that sees and bears the sun | |
| In mortal eagles,” it began, “must now | 30 |
| Be noted steadfastly: for, of the fires | |
| That figure me, those, glittering in mine eye, | |
| Are chief of all the greatest. This, that shines | |
| Midmost for pupil, was the same who 3 sang | |
| The Holy Spirit’s song, and bare about | 35 |
| The ark from town to town: now doth he know | |
| The merit of his soul-impassion’d strains | |
| By their well-fitted guerdon. Of the five, | |
| That make the circle of the vision, he, 4 | |
| Who to the beak is nearest, comforted | 40 |
| The widow for her son: now doth he know, | |
| How dear it costeth not to follow Christ; | |
| Both from experience of this pleasant life, | |
| And of its opposite. He next, 5 who follows | |
| In the circumference, for the over-arch, | 45 |
| By true repenting slack’d the pace of death: | |
| Now knoweth he, that the decrees of Heaven 6 | |
| Alter not, when, through pious prayer below, | |
| To-day is made to-morrow’s destiny. | |
| The other following, 7 with the laws and me, | 50 |
| To yield the Shepherd room, pass’d o’er 8 to Greece; | |
| From good intent, producing evil fruit: | |
| Now knoweth he, how all the ill, derived | |
| From his well doing, doth not harm him aught; | |
| Though it have brought destruction on the world. | 55 |
| That, which thou seest in the under bow, | |
| Was William, 9 whom that land bewails, which weeps | |
| For Charles and Frederick living: now he knows, | |
| How well is loved in Heaven the righteous king; | |
| Which he betokens by his radiant seeming. | 60 |
| Who, in the erring world beneath, would deem | |
| That Trojan Ripheus, 10 in this round, was set, | |
| Fifth of the saintly splendours? now he knows | |
| Enough of that, which the world cannot see; | |
| The grace divine: albeit e’en his sight | 65 |
| Reach not its utmost depth.” Like to the lark, | |
| That warbling in the air expatiates long, | |
| Then, trilling out his last sweet melody, | |
| Drops, satiate with the sweetness; such appear’d | |
| That image, stampt by the everlasting pleasure, | 70 |
| Which fashions, as they are, all things that be. | |
| I, though my doubting were as manifest, | |
| As is through glass the hue that mantles it, | |
| In silence waited not; for to my lips | |
| “What things are these?” involuntary rush’d, | 75 |
| And forced a passage out: whereat I mark’d | |
| A sudden lightening and new revelry. | |
| The eye was kindled; and the blessed sign, | |
| No more to keep me wondering and suspense, | |
| Replied: “I see that thou believest these things, | 80 |
| Because I tell them, but discern’st not how; | |
| So that thy knowledge waits not on thy faith: | |
| As one, who knows the name of thing by rote, | |
| But is a stranger to its properties, | |
| Till other’s tongue reveal them. Fervent love, | 85 |
| And lively hope, with violence assail | |
| The Kingdom of the Heavens, and overcome | |
| The will of the Most High; not in such sort | |
| As man prevails o’er man; but conquers it, | |
| Because ’tis willing to be conquer’d; still, | 90 |
| Though conquer’d, by its mercy, conquering. | |
| “Those, in the eye who live the first and fifth, | |
| Cause thee to marvel, in that thou behold’st | |
| The region of the Angels deck’d with them. | |
| They quitted not their bodies, as thou deem’st, | 95 |
| Gentiles, but Christians; in firm rooted faith, | |
| This, 11 of the feet in future to be pierced, | |
| That, 12 of feet nail’d already to the Cross. | |
| One from the barrier of the dark abyss, | |
| Where never any with good will returns, | 100 |
| Came back unto his bones. Of lively hope | |
| Such was the meed; of lively hope, that wing’d | |
| The prayers 13 sent up to God for his release, | |
| And put power into them to bend his will. | |
| The glorious Spirit, of whom I speak to thee; | 105 |
| A little while returning to the flesh, | |
| Believed in Him, who had the means to help; | |
| And, in believing, nourish’d such a flame | |
| Of holy love, that at the second death | |
| He was made sharer in our gamesome mirth. | 110 |
| The other, through the riches of that grace, | |
| Which from so deep a fountain doth distil, | |
| As never eye created saw its rising, | |
| Placed all his love below on just and right: | |
| Wherefore, of grace, God oped in him the eye | 115 |
| To the redemption of mankind to come; | |
| Wherein believing, he endured no more | |
| The filth of Paganism, and for their ways | |
| Rebuked the stubborn nations. The three nymphs, 14 | |
| Whom at the right wheel thou beheld’st advancing, | 120 |
| Were sponsors for him, more than thousand years | |
| Before baptizing. O how far removed, | |
| Predestination! is thy root from such | |
| As see not the First Cause entire: and ye, | |
| O mortal men! be wary how ye judge: | 125 |
| For we, who see our Maker, know not yet | |
| The number of the chosen; and esteem | |
| Such scantiness of knowledge our delight: | |
| For all our good is, in that Primal Good, | |
| Concentrate; and God’s will and ours are one.” | 130 |
| So, by that form divine, was given to me | |
| Sweet medicine to clear and strengthen sight. | |
| And, as one handling skilfully the harp, | |
| Attendant on some skilful songster’s voice | |
| Bids the chord vibrate; and therein the song | 135 |
| Acquires more pleasure: so the whilst it spake. | |
| It doth remember me, that I beheld | |
| The pair 15 of blessed luminaries move, | |
| Like the accordant twinkling of two eyes, | |
| Their beamy circlets, dancing to the sounds. | 140 |
