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Paradiso
Canto 20
Translated by Robert Hollander
1 When he who floods the whole world with his light
2 sinks steadily from sight within our hemisphere
3 until the day is spent on every side,
4 the sky, lit up before by him alone,
5 suddenly sparkles with a multitude of lights
6 which all reflect a single one.
7 I was reminded of this alteration in the sky
8 when the emblem of the world and of its lords
9 ceased speaking from within its blessèd beak,
10 and all those living lights, shining
11 still more bright, began their songs
12 that slip, and fade, and fall from memory.
13 O sweet love, mantled in a smile,
14 how ardent did you sound within those pipes,
15 filled with the breath of holy thoughts alone!
16 Once the bright and precious stones of the sixth light,
17 which scintillated in their setting there,
18 had silenced their angelic tones,
19 it seemed to me I heard the murmur of a stream,
20 its waters falling crystal clear from rock to rock,
21 revealing the abundance of its source above.
22 And as a sound is given shape
23 at the neck of the lute or by the wind
24 forced through the vent-holes of a bagpipe,
25 so, holding me no longer in suspense,
26 the murmur of the eagle issued through its neck
27 as though it had been hollowed out.
28 There it became a voice and, coming from the beak,
29 it formed the words my heart was waiting for,
30 and on my heart I wrote them down.
31 'The part of me that, in mortal eagles,
32 sees and endures the sun, you now must watch
33 with fixed attention,' were its words to me,
34 'for, from the flames from which I take my form,
35 those that make my eye shine so brightly in my head,
36 those are the very highest spirits in their ranks.
37 'He that blazes as the pupil with a central spark
38 was the one who sang the praises of the Holy Ghost
39 and brought the ark from town to town.
40 'Now he knows the merit of his song,
41 insofar as it derived from his own thought,
42 by the fit reward he now enjoys.
43 'Of the five who arc to form my eyebrow,
44 the one who is closest to my beak
45 consoled the widow when she lost her son.
46 'Now he knows how dear the cost, should one fail
47 to follow Christ, since he has lived
48 both this sweet life and, long ago, that other.
49 'And he that follows on the arc of which I speak,
50 there on its upward curve, delayed his death
51 by offering up his true repentance.
52 'Now he knows God's irrevocable decree
53 remains unaltered even when a worthy prayer postpones
54 what might occur on earth today until tomorrow.
55 'The next one there, with good intent that bore bad fruit,
56 turned Greek, along with both the laws and me,
57 thus yielding his position to the shepherd.
58 'Now he knows that the evil which derived
59 from his good act does him no harm,
60 even if it brought the world to ruin.
61 'And the one you see on the downward arc was William,
62 for whom those lands lament which weep in woe
63 because of living Charles and living Frederick.
64 'Now he knows how Heaven is moved by love
65 for a righteous king, as the effulgence
66 of his aspect still makes plain.
67 'Who in the erring world below would think
68 that Trojan Ripheus should be the fifth
69 among the holy lights along this arc?
70 'Now he knows much the world cannot discern
71 of heavenly grace, although his sight
72 cannot make out the bottom of this sea.'
73 Like the lark that soars in air,
74 first singing, then silent, content and rejoicing
75 in the final joyous sweetness of its song,
76 such did that image seem to me, the very imprint
77 of the eternal Beauty, by whose will
78 all things become that which they truly are.
79 And even though I was as clear in my perplexity
80 as color shows through glass that covers it,
81 my question could not bear to wait its turn in silence,
82 but, by the pressure of its weight,
83 forced from my lips: 'What are these things I see?'
84 For there I saw a glittering revelry of lights.
85 And then, its eye lit up with greater brilliance,
86 the blessèd emblem, to set me free
87 from suspense and wonder, gave its answer:
88 'I see that you believe these things because I say them
89 but fail to see, how, though you believe them,
90 they came to pass, because their cause is hidden.
91 'You are like the man who knows a thing by name
92 but does not understand its quiddity
93 unless another makes that plain to him.
94 'Regnum celorum suffers violence
95 from fervent love and living hope.
96 These conquer the very will of God,
97 'not as man may master man, but conquer it
98 because it would be conquered, and,
99 once conquered, itself conquers by its goodness.
100 'The first living soul in the eyebrow and the fifth
101 make you wonder to find them adorning
102 the dwelling-place of angels.
103 They left their bodies not as gentiles
104 but as Christians, firm in their beliefs, the one
105 before, the other after, the piercing of His feet.
106 'For from Hell, where no one may return
107 to righteous will, the one came back into his bones --
108 this his reward for living hope,
109 'the living hope that furnished power to the prayers
110 addressed to God to raise him from the dead
111 so that his will might find its moving force.
112 'The blessèd soul of whom I speak,
113 back in his flesh for but a while,
114 believed in Him who had the power to help,
115 'and, believing, was kindled to such fire
116 of the one true love that, on his second death,
117 he was deemed worthy to enjoy our happiness.
118 'The other soul, through grace, which wells up
119 from a source so deep there never was a creature
120 who could thrust his vision to its primal spring,
121 'set all his love below on righteousness.
122 And for that reason, from grace to grace,
123 God opened his eyes to our redemption yet to come,
124 'so that he believed and, from that time on,
125 endured no longer paganism's stench
126 but rebuked the wayward peoples for it.
127 'The three ladies you saw near the right-hand wheel
128 served to baptize him one thousand years and more
129 before the sacrament existed.
130 'O predestination, how distant is your root
131 from the gaze of those who cannot grasp
132 the Primal Cause in its entirety!
133 'And you mortals, find some restraint
134 in making judgments, for we, who gaze on God,
135 have yet to know all those who are elect.
136 'And to us this very lack is sweet,
137 because in this good is our good perfected,
138 for that which God wills we will too.'
139 Thus did that holy image,
140 to cure the shortness of my vision,
141 apply sweet medication to my eyes.
142 And, as a practiced lute player will follow
143 a practiced singer with his quivering chords,
144 giving the song a sweeter sound,
145 so, all the while the eagle spoke, as I recall,
146 I kept my eyes on those two blessèd lights and saw,
147 just as blinking eyes keep time as one,
148 they timed their flames' pulsations to the words.
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