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Translated by Henry Francis Cary Selections from “The Divine Comedy” Paradise: Canto XIV.
AND lo! forthwith there rose up round about | |
| A lustre, over that already there; | |
| Of equal clearness, like the brightening up | |
| Of the horizon. As at evening hour | |
| Of twilight, new appearances through heaven | 5 |
| Peer with faint glimmer, doubtfully descried; | |
| So, there, new substances methought, began | |
| To rise in view beyond the other twain, | |
| And wheeling, sweep their ampler circuit wide. | |
| O genuine glitter of eternal Beam! | 10 |
| With what a sudden whiteness did it flow, | |
| O’erpowering vision in me. But so fair, | |
| So passing lovely, Beatrice showed, | |
| Mind cannot follow it, nor words express | |
| Her infinite sweetness. Thence mine eyes regained | 15 |
| Power to look up; and I beheld myself, | |
| Sole with my lady, to more lofty bliss | |
| Translated: for the star, with warmer smile | |
| Impurpled, well denoted our ascent. | |
| With all the heart, and with that tongue which speaks | 20 |
| The same in all, an holocaust I made | |
| To God befitting the new grace vouchsafed. | |
| And from my bosom had not yet upsteamed | |
| The fuming of that incense, when I knew | |
| The rite accepted. With such mighty sheen | 25 |
| And mantling crimson, in two listed rays | |
| The splendors shot before me, that I cried, | |
| “God of Sabaoth! that dost prank them thus!” | |
| As leads the galaxy from pole to pole, | |
| Distinguished into greater lights and less, | 30 |
| Its pathway, which the wisest fail to spell; | |
| So thickly studded, in the depth of Mars, | |
| Those rays described the venerable sign, | |
| That quadrants in the round conjoining frame. | |
| Here memory mocks the toil of genius. Christ | 35 |
| Beamed on that cross; and pattern fails me now. | |
| But whoso takes his cross, and follows Christ, | |
| Will pardon me for that I leave untold, | |
| When in the fleckered dawning he shall spy | |
| The glitterance of Christ. From horn to horn, | 40 |
| And ’tween the summit and the base, did move | |
| Lights, scintillating, as they met and passed. | |
| Thus oft are seen with ever-changeful glance, | |
| Straight or athwart, now rapid and now slow, | |
| The atomies of bodies, long or short, | 45 |
| To move along the sunbeam, whose slant line | |
| Checkers the shadow interposed by art | |
| Against the noontide heat. And as the chime | |
| Of minstrel music, dulcimer, and harp | |
| With many strings, a pleasant dinning makes | 50 |
| To him, who heareth not distinct the note; | |
| So from the lights, which there appeared to me, | |
| Gathered along the cross a melody, | |
| That, indistinctly heard, with ravishment | |
| Possessed me. Yet I marked it was a hymn | 55 |
| Of lofty praises; for there came to me | |
| “Arise,” and “Conquer,” as to one who hears | |
| And comprehends not. Me such ecstasy | |
| O’ercame, that never, till that hour, was thing | |
| That held me in so sweet imprisonment. | 60 |
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