The Portable Dante (60 page)

“A perfect life, great virtue have enshrined a lady high above, ” she said, “whose rule decides the cloak and veil of some on earth,

who wish, till death, to wake and sleep beside that Bridegroom Who accepts all vows of love conforming to his pleasure. From the world

I fled, as a young girl, to follow her, and in her habit’s rule I closed myself, and pledged to always follow in her practice.

Then men, acquainted less with love than hate, took me by force away from that sweet fold, and God, alone, knows what my life became!

This other radiance, here to my right, who shows herself to you as she shines full with all the light of our low sphere, well knows

from her own life what my own words can mean. She was a sister, too; from her head, too, they ripped the shadow of our holy veil.

But even when forced back into the world against her will, against her sacred vows, she always wore the veil over her heart.

She is the light of the great Empress Constance who, wed to Swabia’s second gust of wind, bore him the third and final gust of power.

These words she spoke, and then she started
“Ave, Maria”
to sing and, singing, disappeared as something sinking in deep waters fades,

and I, who had been fixed upon her form until she vanished, turned and set my eyes upon the greater mark of my desire—

in Beatrice I was all absorbed— but her light flashed so deep into my eyes I could not bear the sight, and so at first

I found it difficult to question her.

Between two equal equidistant foods a man, though free to choose, would starve to death before he put his teeth in either one.

So would a lamb between the ravenings of two fierce wolves be caught in fear of both, so would a dog stand fixed between two does.

If, then, I stood there mute, drawn equally by my two doubts, I merit neither blame nor praise—the victim of necessity.

I did not speak, but written on my face was my desire, all of my questioning more vividly than words could have expressed.

Then Beatrice did what Daniel did when he appeased Nebuchadnezzar’s wrath that drove him to such unjust cruelty.

She said: “I see how you are torn between your two desires, so that your eagerness is choking itself into speechlessness.

You think: ‘But if my will for good remains unchanged, how can another’s violent act lessen the measure of my just deserts?’

There is a second doubt that gives you pause: that after death all souls seem to return each to his star, as Plato’s word affirms.

These are the questions that have equal weight, contending with your will to know; I first shall treat the one that is more poisonous.

Not the most Godlike of the Seraphim, not Moses, Samuel, whichever John you choose—I tell you—not Mary herself

has been assigned to any other heaven than that of these shades you have just seen here, and each one’s bliss is equally eternal;

all lend their beauty to the Highest Sphere, sharing one same sweet life to the degree that they feel the eternal breath of God.

These souls appeared here not because this sphere has been allotted them, but as a sign of their less great degree of blessedness.

I speak as one must speak to minds like yours which apprehend only from sense perception what later it makes fit for intellection.

For this same reason Scripture condescends to your intelligence, attributing with other meaning, hands and feet to God;

and Holy Church presents to you archangels with human features: Gabriel and Michael and that one who made Tobit see again.

If what Timaeus says about the souls in Heaven is to be taken literally, it contradicts the truth we witness here:

he says the soul returns to its own star from which, he thinks, it once had been cut off when Nature sent it to substantial form.

Perhaps his words were not meant to be heard exactly as they sound, but make a claim deserving the respect of every man.

If he means that the honor and the blame of each sphere’s influence returns to it, his arrow, then, has hit upon some truth.

This principle, misunderstood, once led the world astray when they bestowed on planets such names as Jove and Mercury and Mars.

The other doubt that still perturbs your mind is not as poisonous, for all its malice could never make you wander from my side.

That in the eyes of mortal men our justice appears to be unjust is proof of faith, not of heretical iniquity.

But since this truth is such that your own powers can understand its meaning easily, I shall explain it to you, as you wish.

Now, if the one who suffers violence contributes nothing to the violent act, he cannot be excused on that account;

for will, if it will not, cannot be quenched but does as nature does within a flame, though violence force it down a thousand times.

The will abets the force when it gives in even a little bit; this their will did, for they could have gone back into the cloister.

Had they been able to maintain their will intact, like that of Lawrence on the grid, and Mucius cruel to his own hand in fire—

it would have forced them back, once they were free, back to the path from which they had been drawn. But such firm will as this is seldom found.

If you have truly taken in my words, you see how they have quashed the argument that never would have ceased to plague your mind.

But now another pass that must be crossed opens before your eyes, and by yourself you would collapse before you could get through.

I certainly have led you to believe that these souls cannot lie, for they exist forever in the sight of Primal Truth;

but then you heard Piccarda say that Constance had never lost devotion to the veil; this must have seemed to contradict my words.

Often, my brother, it occurs that men against their will, to avoid a greater risk, have done that which should never have been done;

so Alcmeon, moved by his father’s prayer, killed his own mother: so as not to fail in piety, he was pitilessly cruel.

You understand, when things like this occur, how will and violence can mix to cause offenses that can never be condoned.

Absolute Will does not consent to wrong, but it consents in so far as it fears, if it draw back, to fall into worse trouble.

And so, Piccarda, in her explanation was speaking of Absolute Will, and I about the other; both of us spoke truth. ”

Such was the flowing of the holy stream that pours down from the Fountain of All Truth that it now laid both of my doubts to rest.

“Beloved of the First Love, lady divine, ” I said then, “you whose words bathe me in warmth, wakening me to life again, the depth

of my deep love is not profound enough to find the thanks your graciousness deserves— may He Who knows and sees all be my answer.

I see man’s mind cannot be satisfied unless it be illumined by that Truth beyond which there exists no other truth.

Within that Truth, once man’s mind reaches it, it rests like a wild beast within its den. And it can reach it—if not, all desire

is vain! So at the foot of truth, like shoots, our doubts spring up; this is a natural force urging us to the top from height to height.

And this gives me the courage that I need, my lady, in all reverence, to ask about a truth that is not clear to me:

would it be possible for those who break their vows to compensate with such good deeds that they would not weigh short upon your scales?”

Then Beatrice looked at me, her eyes sparkling with love and burning so divine, my strength of sight surrendered to her power—

with eyes cast down, I was about to faint.