Authors: Dante
‘And let this always be as lead upon your feet
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to make you slow, just like a weary man, in moving,
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whether to yes or no, unless you see both clearly.
‘For he ranks low among the fools
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who, without making clear distinctions,
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affirms or denies in one case or another,
‘since it often happens that a hasty opinion
inclines one to the erring side, and then
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fondness for it fetters the working of the mind.
‘He who casts off from shore to fish for truth
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without the necessary skill does not return the same
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as he sets out, but worse, and all in vain.
‘Clear proof of this was given to the world
by Parmenides, Melissus, Bryson, and others,
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who went to sea without a port in mind.
‘Such were Sabellius and Arius and the fools
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who misread Scripture as a sword reflecting
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the distorted image of a face upon its blade.
‘Let the people, then, not be too certain
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in their judgments, like those that harvest in their minds
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corn still in the field before it ripens.
‘For I have seen the briar first look dry and thorny
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right through all the winter’s cold,
‘and once I saw a ship, which had sailed straight
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and swift upon the sea through all its voyage,
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sinking at the end as it made its way to port.
‘Let not Dame Bertha and Master Martin,
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when they see one steal and another offer alms,
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think that they behold them with God’s wisdom,
THE SUN; MARS
From center to rim, as from rim to center,
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the water in a rounded vessel moves
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as it is struck from outside or within.
This thought, just as I phrase it,
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dropped into my mind the very instant
because of the like effects that sprang
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from his speech and from the words of Beatrice,
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who, responding, graciously began:
‘This man has need, but does not tell of it
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either by word or yet in thought,
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because he seeks the root of still another truth.
‘Tell him if the light that blooms
and makes your substance radiant shall remain
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with you eternally the way it shines today,
‘and, if it remains, tell him how,
when all of you are visible once more,
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this would not prove distressing to your sight.’
As, impelled and drawn by heightened joy,
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dancers in a round may raise their voices,
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their pleasure showing in their movements,
so, at that eager and devout appeal,
the holy circles showed new joy in wheeling
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as well as in their wondrous song.
Whoever here on earth laments that we must die
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to find our life above knows not the fresh relief
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found there in these eternal showers.
That ever-living One and Two and Three
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who reigns forever in Three and Two and One,
was sung three times by each and every one
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of these spirits, and with such melody
reply: ‘Just as long as the festival of Paradise
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shall last, that is how long our love
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shall dress us in this radiance.
‘Its brightness answers to our ardor,
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the ardor to our vision, and that is given
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in greater measure of grace than we deserve.
‘When we put on again our flesh,
glorified and holy, then our persons
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will be more pleasing for being all complete,
‘so that the light, granted to us freely
by the Highest Good, shall increase,
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the light that makes us fit to see Him.
‘From that light, vision must increase,
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and love increase what vision kindles,
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and radiance increase, which comes from love.
‘But like a coal that shoots out flame
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and in its glowing center still outshines it
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so that it does not lose its own appearance,
‘just so this splendor that enfolds us now
will be surpassed in brightness by the flesh
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that earth as yet still covers.
‘Nor will such shining have the power to harm us,
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for our body’s organs shall be strengthened
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to deal with all that can delight us.’
So quick and eager seemed to me both choirs
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to say their
Amen
that they clearly showed
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their desire for their dead bodies,
not perhaps for themselves alone, but for their mothers,
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for their fathers, and for others whom they loved
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before they all became eternal flames.