The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864

And who, by seeing, sightless doth become,
So I became before that latest fire, [122] (#x5_x_5_i353)
While it was said, "Why dost thou daze thyself
To see a thing which here has no existence? [124] (#x5_x_5_i354)
Earth upon earth my body is, and shall be
With all the others there, until our number
With the eternal proposition tallies; [127] (#x5_x_5_i355)
With the two garments in the blessed cloister [128] (#x5_x_5_i356)
Are the two lights alone that have ascended: [129] (#x5_x_5_i357)
And this shalt thou take back into your world." [130] (#x5_x_5_i358)
And at this utterance the flaming circle
Grew quiet, with the dulcet intermingling
Of sound that by the trinal breath was made, [133] (#x5_x_5_i359)
As to escape from danger or fatigue
The oars that erst were in the water beaten
Are all suspended at a whistle's sound.
Ah, how much in my mind was I disturbed,
When I turned round to look on Beatrice,
At not beholding her, although I was
Close at her side and in the Happy World!

[Line 1: This "Divina Commedia," in which human science or Philosophy is symbolized in Virgil, and divine science or Theology in Beatrice.

"Fiorenza la Bella," Florence the Fair. In one of his Canzoni, Dante says,—

"O mountain-song of mine, thou goest thy way;
Florence my town thou shalt perchance behold,
Which bars me from itself,
Devoid of love and naked of compassion."]

[Line 9: This allusion to the Church of San Giovanni, "il mio bel San Giovanni," as Dante calls it elsewhere, (Inf. xix. 17,) is a fitting prelude to the Canto in which St. John is to appear. Like the "laughing of the grass" in Canto xxx. 77, it is a "foreshadowing preface," ombrifero prefazio, of what follows.

See Canto xxiv. 150;

"So, giving me its benediction, singing,
Three times encircled me, when I was silent,
The apostolic light."]

[Line 14: St. Peter. "That we should be a kind of first-fruits of his creatures." Epistle of St. James, i. 18.]

[Line 18: St. James. Pilgrimages are made to his tomb at Compostella in Galicia.]

[Line 30: The General Epistle of St. James, called the Epistola Cattolica, i. 17. "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights." Our Basilica: Paradise: the Church Triumphant.]

[Line 33: Peter, James, and John, representing the three theological virtues, Faith, Hope, and Charity, and distinguished above the other apostles by clearer manifestations of their Master's favor.]

[Line 34: St. James speaks.]

[Line 37: The three Apostles, luminous above him, overwhelming him with light.]

[Line 38: "I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help." Psalm cxxi. 1.]

[Line 42: The most august spirits of the Celestial City.]

[Line 49: Beatrice.]

[Line 54: In God,

"Where everything beholds itself depicted."

Canto xxiv. 42.]

[Line 56: To come from earth to heaven.]

[Line 58: "Say what it is," and "whence it came to thee."]

[Line 67: "Est spes certa expectatio futuræ beatitudinis, veniens ex Dei gratia et meritis præcedentibus." Petrus Lombardus, Magister Sententiarum.]

[Line 72: The Psalmist David.]

[Line 74: The Book of Psalms, or Songs of God.]

[Line 75: "And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee." Psalm ix. 10.]

[Line 78: Your rain: that is, of David and yourself.]

[Line 89: "The mark of the high calling and election sure."]

[Line 92: The twofold garments are the glorified spirit and the glorified body.]

[Line 95: St. John, in the Apocalypse, vii. 9. "A great multitude which no man could number … clothed with white robes."]

[Line 99: Dances and songs commingled; the circling choirs, the celestial choristers.]

[Line 100: St. John the Evangelist.]

[Line 102: In winter the constellation Cancer rises at sunset; and if it had one star as bright as this, it would turn night into day.]

[Line 105: Such as vanity, ostentation, or the like.]

[Line 107: St. Peter and St. James are joined by St. John.]

[Line 114: Christ. "Then saith he to the disciple, 'Behold thy mother!' And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home." St. John, xix. 27.]

[Line 122: St. John.]

[Line 124: "If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee."]

[Line 127: Till the predestined number of the elect is complete.]