From the first hour, to that which cometh next (As the sun changes quarter) to the sixth." CANTO XXVII ARGUMENT.-St. Peter bitterly rebukes the covetousness of his successors in the Apostolic See, while all the heavenly host sympathize in his indignation; they then vanish upward. Beatrice bids Dante again cast his view below. Afterward they are borne into the ninth Heaven, of which she shows him the nature and properties; blaming the perverseness of man, who places his will on low and perishable things. HEN "Glory to the Father, to the Son, TH And to the Holy Spirit," rang aloud Throughout all Paradise; that with the song Exhaustless riches, and unmeasured bliss. Before mine eyes stood the four torches1 lit: When thus I heard: Wonder not, if my hue Be changed; for, while I speak, these shalt thou see All in like manner change with me. My place 1 "Four torches." St. Peter, St. James, St. John, and Adam. 2" That." St. Peter, who looked as the planet Jupiter would, if it assumed At eve or morning, paints an adverse cloud, Of other's failing, shrinks with maiden fear; So clean, the semblance did not alter more. That she might serve for purchase of base gold: Did Sextus, Pius, and Calixtus bleed, 5 And Urban; they, whose doom was not without Which were vouchsafed me, should for ensign serve On the baptized: nor I, for sigil-mark, Which makes me oft to bicker and turn red. In shepherd's clothing, greedy wolves' below "Of Linus, and of Cletus." Bishops of Rome in the first century. 5" Did Sextus, Pius, and Calixtus bleed, And Urban The former two, bishops of the same see, in the second; and the others, in the fourth century. ཐ No purpose was of ours." We did not intend that our successors should take any part in the political divisions among Christians; or that my figure (the seal of St. Peter) should serve as a mark to authorize iniquitous grants and privileges. 7 "Wolves. "Wolves shall succeed to teachers, He al 8 "Cahorsines and Gascons." ludes to Jacques d'Ossa, a native of Cahors, who filled the papal chair in 1316, after it had been two years vacant, and assumed the name of John XXII, and to Clement V, a Gascon. Who through thy mortal weight shalt yet again On upward gazing, said, “Look down and see What circuit thou hast compassed." From the hour1o All the first region overpast I saw, Which from the midmost to the boundary winds, And hitherward the shore,12 where thou, Europa, Then by the spirit, that doth never leave "The she-goat." When the sun is in Capricorn. 10"From the hour." Since he had last looked (see Canto xxii.) he perceived that he had passed from the meridian circle to the eastern horizon; the half of our hemisphere, and a quarter of the heaven. 11" From Gades." See "Hell," Canto xxvi. 106. Its boon influence 12"The shore." Phoenicia, where Europa, the daughter of Agenor, mounted on the back of Jupiter, in his shape of a bull. 18" The sun. " Dante was in the constellation of Gemini, and the sun in Aries. There was, therefore, part of those two constellations, and the whole of Taurus, between them. From the fair nest of Leda1 rapt me forth, What place for entrance Beatrice chose, As by the fifth or half ye count forth ten. The vase, wherein time's roots are plunged, thou seest Look elsewhere for the leaves. O mortal lust! That canst not lift thy head above the waves Which whelm and sink thee down. The will in man Bears goodly blossoms; but its ruddy promise Is, by the dripping of perpetual rain, Made mere abortion: faith and innocence Ere cheeks with down are sprinkled: he, that fasts One, yet a babbler, loves and listens to "Thou, to abate thy wonder, note, that none Bears rule in earth; and its frail family 14" The fair nest of Leda." From the Gemini; thus called, because Leda was the mother of the twins, Castor and Pollux. Are therefore wanderers. Yet before the date, When through the hundredth in his reckoning dropped, From Winter's calendar, these heavenly spheres CANTO XXVIII ARGUMENT.-Still in the ninth Heaven, our Poet is permitted to behold the divine essence; and then sees, in three hierarchies, the nine choirs of angels. Beatrice clears some difficulties which occur to him on this occasion. O she, who doth imparadise my soul, S° Had drawn the veil from off our present life, And bared the truth of poor mortality: When lo! as one who, in a mirror, spies And turneth to resolve him, if the glass Have told him true, and sees the record faithful I well remember, did befall to me, Looking upon the beauteous eyes, whence love So sharp, no lid, unclosing, may bear up Against its keenness. The least star we ken From hence, had seem'd a moon; set by its side, As star by side of star. And so far off, Perchance, as is the halo from the light Which paints it, when most dense the vapor spreads; There wheel'd about the point a circle of fire, 15" Fortune shall be fain." The commentators in general suppose that our Poet here augurs that great reform which he vainly hoped would follow on the arrival of the Emperor Henry VII in Italy. |