Authors: Dante
and I saw her eyes so clear, so joyful,
that her aspect in its radiance outshone
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her former glory, even that most recent.
And as, from feeling more delight in doing good,
a man becomes aware from day to day
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of his increasing virtue,
seeing that miracle adorned with greater brightness,
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I became aware my wheeling circles
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through the heavens had grown wider in their arc.
And such a change as passes in a moment
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from the blushing face of a fair-skinned lady,
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unburdened of the reason for her shame,
greeted my eyes once I had turned around,
because of the white radiance of the temperate
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sixth star, which had gathered me into itself.
In that torch of Jupiter I watched
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the sparkling of the love resplendent there
And as birds risen from the river’s edge,
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seeming to celebrate their pleasure in their food,
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form now a rounded arc, and now another shape,
so, radiant within their lights, the holy creatures
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sang as they flew and shaped themselves
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in figures, now
D
, now
I
, now
L
.
At first, singing, they danced to their own tune.
And then, taking on one of these shapes,
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they paused in their movement and were silent.
O divine Pegasean, who bestow glory
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and long life on genius, as, with your help,
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it gives life to towns and kingdoms,
inspire me with your light so that I may set down
their shapes as I conceived them in my mind.
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May your power appear in these few lines.
They then displayed themselves in five times seven
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consonants and vowels, and I saw these letters
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singly, and in the order they were traced.
DILIGITE IUSTITIAM
—these letters,
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placed together, verb and noun, came first,
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QUI IUDICATIS TERRAM
, last.
Then they came to rest in the fifth word’s
M
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so that this place in Jupiter was shining
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as does silver overlaid with gold.
And I saw other lights descend and settle
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on the
M
’s high crest to sing, I think,
Then, as when someone strikes a burning log,
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causing innumerable sparks to fly,
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sparks from which the foolish form their divinations,
just so a thousand lights and more appeared
to rise from there and mount, some more, some less,
When each had settled in its place
I saw an eagle’s head and neck
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take shape out of that overlay of fire.
He who fashions there has need of none to guide Him
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but Himself. Thus we recognize as His
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the form that every bird takes for its nest.
The other blessèd spirits, who seemed at first content
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to turn themselves into a lily on the
M
,
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with gentle motion joined, completing the design.
O lovely star, how many and how bright the jewels
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that showed me that our earthly justice
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comes from that heaven, brilliant with your gems!
Therefore, I entreat the Mind, in which your motion
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and your power begin, to look down on the source
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of smoke that dims your radiant beam,
so that your wrath come down once more
on those who buy and sell within the temple,
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whose walls were built of miracle and martyrdom.
O soldiery of Heaven, whom I contemplate,
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pray for those still on the earth,
It was the custom once to go to war with swords.
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Now wars are fought withholding here and there
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the bread our loving Father keeps from none.
But you who write only to cancel,
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remember this: Peter and Paul, who died
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to save the vineyard you lay waste, still live.
Well may you say: ‘I have so set my heart
on him who chose to live in solitude
and who for a dance was dragged to martyrdom
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that I know neither the Fisherman nor Paul.’
JUPITER
Before my eyes, its open wings outstretched,
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appeared the lovely image of those interwoven souls,
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reveling in sweet enjoyment.
Each one seemed to be a single ruby
in which the sun’s ray burned with such a flame
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it felt as though a sunbeam struck my eyes.
And what I now must tell
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no voice has ever uttered, nor ink ever wrote,