Paradiso, Canto 2
Dante Alighieri · Italian original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Paradiso II opens with a demanding address to readers: those in little boats should turn back from the unprecedented sea, while the few who have fed early on the bread of angels may follow the poet's wake and will marvel more than the Argonauts did at Jason. The innate thirst for the deiform realm carries Dante and Beatrice almost as swiftly as visible heaven moves, and Beatrice directs him to thank God for joining them to the first star, the Moon. The Moon receives them like an eternal pearl receiving light without being broken; Dante leaves the physical problem of body entering body unresolved so that desire may burn more strongly for seeing how human nature and God are united. He thanks God and asks Beatrice about the dark marks of the Moon that generate the folklore of Cain. Beatrice smiles and teaches that sense and reason have limits; Dante proposes the rare-and-dense theory, and she refutes it through the variety of the fixed stars, eclipse logic, and a mirror experiment. Once the false account is stripped away like snow under sunlight, Beatrice explains the true cause: being and influence descend by ordered degrees through the heavens, the holy spheres receive motion and power from blessed movers, and each heavenly body takes an image from its governing intelligence like a seal. Different formal virtues make different alloys with the bodies they enliven, so the apparent differences from light to light arise from formal principle rather than from density and rarity.
Narrative arc
- Dante warns unprepared readers back to shore and invites the trained few into the unprecedented voyage
- Concreated thirst carries the poets swiftly to the Moon, and Beatrice directs gratitude to God
- The Moon receives them like an eternal pearl, and bodily penetration points toward the Incarnation and faith
- Dante asks about the lunar marks, states the rare-and-dense theory, and Beatrice begins correcting reason after sense
- Beatrice refutes the physical-density explanation through stellar variety, eclipse reasoning, and a mirror experiment
- Beatrice clears Dante's intellect like snow under sunlight and explains ordered influence from the higher spheres
- Angel-governed motion, seal-impress, and varied formal virtue produce the Moon's dark and bright appearances
Central themes
- will
- peace
- heavenly order
Dante warns unprepared readers back to shore and invites the trained few into the unprecedented voyage II.1–18
1O voi che siete in piccioletta barca,
desiderosi d’ascoltar, seguiti
dietro al mio legno che cantando varca,
tornate a riveder li vostri liti:
5non vi mettete in pelago, ché forse,
perdendo me, rimarreste smarriti.
L’acqua ch’io prendo già mai non si corse;
Minerva spira, e conducemi Appollo,
e nove Muse mi dimostran l’Orse.
10Voialtri pochi che drizzaste il collo
per tempo al pan de li angeli, del quale
vivesi qui ma non sen vien satollo,
metter potete ben per l’alto sale
vostro navigio, servando mio solco
15dinanzi a l’acqua che ritorna equale.
Que’ glorïosi che passaro al Colco
non s’ammiraron come voi farete,
quando Iasón vider fatto bifolco.
1O you who are in a little boat,
eager to listen, having followed
behind my vessel that crosses singing,
turn back to see your shores again:
5do not put yourselves onto the open sea, for perhaps,
losing me, you would remain bewildered.
The water I take has never yet been crossed;
Minerva breathes, and Apollo guides me,
and nine Muses show me the Bears.
10You other few, who lifted your necks
betimes toward the bread of angels, on which
one lives here, yet never comes away sated,
may well set your vessel upon
the deep salt sea, keeping within my wake
15before the water returns level.
Those glorious ones who passed to Colchis
did not marvel as you will do,
when they saw Jason made a plowman.
Commentary
The canto is a second Paradiso proem: Dante distinguishes unprepared readers from the few trained on the bread of angels, frames poetry as sea voyage, and counters Ulysses pressure through divinely guided Argo/Jason imagery.
II.1–3 The reader warning deliberately keeps the small-boat image concrete before the canto opens into technical cosmology.
II.1–3 The reader warning deliberately keeps the small-boat image concrete before the canto opens into technical cosmology. Line 1: The reader warning deliberately keeps the small-boat image concrete before the canto opens into technical cosmology.
II.1 The reader warning deliberately keeps the small-boat image concrete before the canto opens into technical cosmology. The reader warning deliberately keeps the small-boat image concrete before the canto opens into technical cosmology.
II.7–9 Minerva, Apollo, and the Muses keep pagan poetic navigation inside a Christian ascent without making them the final source of vision.
II.7–9 Minerva, Apollo, and the Muses keep pagan poetic navigation inside a Christian ascent without making them the final source of vision. Line 8: Minerva, Apollo, and the Muses keep pagan poetic navigation inside a Christian ascent without making them the final source of vision.
II.8 Minerva, Apollo, and the Muses keep pagan poetic navigation inside a Christian ascent without making them the final source of vision. Minerva, Apollo, and the Muses keep pagan poetic navigation inside a Christian ascent without making them the final source of vision.
II.10–12 The lifted-neck image belongs to the prepared few; the translation keeps the bodily hunger posture before the bread of angels.
II.10–12 The lifted-neck image belongs to the prepared few; the translation keeps the bodily hunger posture before the bread of angels. Line 10: The lifted-neck image belongs to the prepared few; the translation keeps the bodily hunger posture before the bread of angels.
II.10 The lifted-neck image belongs to the prepared few; the translation keeps the bodily hunger posture before the bread of angels. The lifted-neck image belongs to the prepared few; the translation keeps the bodily hunger posture before the bread of angels.
II.16–18 The Colchis/Jason comparison raises the voyage beyond Ulysses by making the poet's furrow a providentially guided course rather than a mad flight.
II.16–18 The Colchis/Jason comparison raises the voyage beyond Ulysses by making the poet's furrow a providentially guided course rather than a mad flight. Line 16: The Colchis/Jason comparison raises the voyage beyond Ulysses by making the poet's furrow a providentially guided course rather than a mad flight.
II.16 The Colchis/Jason comparison raises the voyage beyond Ulysses by making the poet's furrow a providentially guided course rather than a mad flight. The Colchis/Jason comparison raises the voyage beyond Ulysses by making the poet's furrow a providentially guided course rather than a mad flight.
Concreated thirst carries the poets swiftly to the Moon, and Beatrice directs gratitude to God II.19–30
19La concreata e perpetüa sete
20del deïforme regno cen portava
veloci quasi come ’l ciel vedete.
Beatrice in suso, e io in lei guardava;
e forse in tanto in quanto un quadrel posa
e vola e da la noce si dischiava,
25giunto mi vidi ove mirabil cosa
mi torse il viso a sé; e però quella
cui non potea mia cura essere ascosa,
volta ver’ me, sì lieta come bella,
«Drizza la mente in Dio grata», mi disse,
30«che n’ha congiunti con la prima stella».
19The concreated and perpetual thirst
20for the deiform realm was bearing us
swift, almost as you see the heaven move.
Beatrice looked upward, and I gazed on her;
and perhaps in as much time as a bolt rests
and flies and from the notch is released,
25I saw myself arrived where a wondrous thing
turned my face toward itself; and therefore she
from whom my care could not be hidden,
turned toward me, as glad as she was beautiful:
"Direct your mind gratefully to God," she said to me,
30"who has joined us with the first star."
Commentary
Concreated thirst and the deiform realm are the motive force of ascent. The translation keeps desire as innate and rightly ordered while Beatrice immediately redirects wonder into gratitude to God.
II.19–21 Concreated thirst names an innate desire built with the creature, now ordered toward the deiform realm rather than distorted appetite. The heaven's movement is supplied in English because the comparison depends on visib.
II.19–21 Concreated thirst names an innate desire built with the creature, now ordered toward the deiform realm rather than distorted appetite. Line 19: Concreated thirst names an innate desire built with the creature, now ordered toward the deiform realm rather than distorted appetite. Line 21: The heaven's movement is supplied in English because the comparison depends on visible celestial motion.
II.19 Concreated thirst names an innate desire built with the creature, now ordered toward the deiform realm rather than distorted appetite. Concreated thirst names an innate desire built with the creature, now ordered toward the deiform realm rather than distorted appetite.
II.21 The heaven's movement is supplied in English because the comparison depends on visible celestial motion. The heaven's movement is supplied in English because the comparison depends on visible celestial motion.
II.22–24 The bolt sequence preserves Dante's reversed order of rest, flight, and release as a Paradiso compression of near-instant ascent.
II.22–24 The bolt sequence preserves Dante's reversed order of rest, flight, and release as a Paradiso compression of near-instant ascent. Line 23: The bolt sequence preserves Dante's reversed order of rest, flight, and release as a Paradiso compression of near-instant ascent.
II.23 The bolt sequence preserves Dante's reversed order of rest, flight, and release as a Paradiso compression of near-instant ascent. The bolt sequence preserves Dante's reversed order of rest, flight, and release as a Paradiso compression of near-instant ascent.
The Moon receives them like an eternal pearl, and bodily penetration points toward the Incarnation and faith II.31–45
31Parev’ a me che nube ne coprisse
lucida, spessa, solida e pulita,
quasi adamante che lo sol ferisse.
Per entro sé l’etterna margarita
35ne ricevette, com’ acqua recepe
raggio di luce permanendo unita.
S’io era corpo, e qui non si concepe
com’ una dimensione altra patio,
ch’esser convien se corpo in corpo repe,
40accender ne dovria più il disio
di veder quella essenza in che si vede
come nostra natura e Dio s’unio.
Lì si vedrà ciò che tenem per fede,
non dimostrato, ma fia per sé noto
45a guisa del ver primo che l’uom crede.
31It seemed to me that a cloud covered us,
luminous, dense, solid, and polished,
like diamond struck by the sun.
Within itself the eternal pearl
35received us, as water receives
a ray of light while remaining whole.
If I was a body, and here one cannot conceive
how one dimension could bear another,
as must be if body creeps into body,
40this should kindle in us all the more the desire
to see that essence in which one sees
how our nature and God were made one.
There will be seen what we hold by faith,
not demonstrated, but it will be self-known
45like the first truth that man believes.
Commentary
Comparison sharpened the Moon as cloud, diamond, eternal pearl, and intact water receiving light. The body-in-body question remains unresolved physically because Dante uses it to intensify desire for the Incarnation mystery and beatific self-evidence.
II.31–33 The Moon is rendered through cloud, diamond, pearl, and water imagery so physical transparency and intellectual penetration remain joined.
II.31–33 The Moon is rendered through cloud, diamond, pearl, and water imagery so physical transparency and intellectual penetration remain joined. Line 31: The Moon is rendered through cloud, diamond, pearl, and water imagery so physical transparency and intellectual penetration remain joined.
II.31 The Moon is rendered through cloud, diamond, pearl, and water imagery so physical transparency and intellectual penetration remain joined. The Moon is rendered through cloud, diamond, pearl, and water imagery so physical transparency and intellectual penetration remain joined.
II.37–39 Dante raises bodily presence as a problem rather than resolving it; the line points beyond physics toward the Incarnation analogy in lines 40-45.
II.37–39 Dante raises bodily presence as a problem rather than resolving it; the line points beyond physics toward the Incarnation analogy in lines 40-45. Line 37: Dante raises bodily presence as a problem rather than resolving it; the line points beyond physics toward the Incarnation analogy in lines 40-45.
II.37 Dante raises bodily presence as a problem rather than resolving it; the line points beyond physics toward the Incarnation analogy in lines 40-45. Dante raises bodily presence as a problem rather than resolving it; the line points beyond physics toward the Incarnation analogy in lines 40-45.
II.40–42 The union of human nature and God anticipates the final vision; the line stays doctrinally explicit rather than becoming generic mystery.
II.40–42 The union of human nature and God anticipates the final vision; the line stays doctrinally explicit rather than becoming generic mystery. Line 42: The union of human nature and God anticipates the final vision; the line stays doctrinally explicit rather than becoming generic mystery.
II.42 The union of human nature and God anticipates the final vision; the line stays doctrinally explicit rather than becoming generic mystery. The union of human nature and God anticipates the final vision; the line stays doctrinally explicit rather than becoming generic mystery.
Dante asks about the lunar marks, states the rare-and-dense theory, and Beatrice begins correcting reason after sense II.46–63
46Io rispuosi: «Madonna, sì devoto
com’ esser posso più, ringrazio lui
lo qual dal mortal mondo m’ha remoto.
Ma ditemi: che son li segni bui
50di questo corpo, che là giuso in terra
fan di Cain favoleggiare altrui?».
Ella sorrise alquanto, e poi «S’elli erra
l’oppinïon», mi disse, «d’i mortali
dove chiave di senso non diserra,
55certo non ti dovrien punger li strali
d’ammirazione omai, poi dietro ai sensi
vedi che la ragione ha corte l’ali.
Ma dimmi quel che tu da te ne pensi».
E io: «Ciò che n’appar qua sù diverso
60credo che fanno i corpi rari e densi».
Ed ella: «Certo assai vedrai sommerso
nel falso il creder tuo, se bene ascolti
l’argomentar ch’io li farò avverso.
46I replied: "My lady, as devoutly
as much as I can, I thank him
who has removed me from the mortal world.
But tell me: what are the dark marks
50of this body, which down there on earth
make people tell fables about Cain?"
She smiled a little, and then, "If the opinion
of mortals errs," she said to me, "where
the key of sense does not unlock,
55surely the arrows of wonder should not
pierce you now, since, following the senses,
you see that reason has short wings.
But tell me what you think of it yourself."
And I: "What appears different to us up here
60I think the rare and dense bodies cause."
And she: "Certainly you will see your belief
drowned deep in falsehood, if you listen well
to the argument I shall make against it.
Commentary
The passage moves from Dante's question about Cain and the lunar marks to Beatrice's epistemological correction: sense is a key with limits, and reason has short wings when it merely follows sense.
II.49–51 The lunar marks reopen the Cain/moon folklore from Inferno XX, now under Beatrice's correction of sensory and rational limits.
II.49–51 The lunar marks reopen the Cain/moon folklore from Inferno XX, now under Beatrice's correction of sensory and rational limits. Line 49: The lunar marks reopen the Cain/moon folklore from Inferno XX, now under Beatrice's correction of sensory and rational limits.
II.49 The lunar marks reopen the Cain/moon folklore from Inferno XX, now under Beatrice's correction of sensory and rational limits. The lunar marks reopen the Cain/moon folklore from Inferno XX, now under Beatrice's correction of sensory and rational limits.
II.55–57 Wonder is not rejected; it is disciplined when reason follows sense beyond its range.
II.55–57 Wonder is not rejected; it is disciplined when reason follows sense beyond its range. Line 55: Wonder is not rejected; it is disciplined when reason follows sense beyond its range.
II.55 Wonder is not rejected; it is disciplined when reason follows sense beyond its range. Wonder is not rejected; it is disciplined when reason follows sense beyond its range.
II.58–60 Dante states the rare/dense theory that Beatrice will refute; the wording remains plainly physical to set up the formal-causal correction.
II.58–60 Dante states the rare/dense theory that Beatrice will refute; the wording remains plainly physical to set up the formal-causal correction. Line 59: Dante states the rare/dense theory that Beatrice will refute; the wording remains plainly physical to set up the formal-causal correction.
II.59 Dante states the rare/dense theory that Beatrice will refute; the wording remains plainly physical to set up the formal-causal correction. Dante states the rare/dense theory that Beatrice will refute; the wording remains plainly physical to set up the formal-causal correction.
Beatrice refutes the physical-density explanation through stellar variety, eclipse reasoning, and a mirror experiment II.64–105
64La spera ottava vi dimostra molti
65lumi, li quali e nel quale e nel quanto
notar si posson di diversi volti.
Se raro e denso ciò facesser tanto,
una sola virtù sarebbe in tutti,
più e men distributa e altrettanto.
70Virtù diverse esser convegnon frutti
di princìpi formali, e quei, for ch’uno,
seguiterieno a tua ragion distrutti.
Ancor, se raro fosse di quel bruno
cagion che tu dimandi, o d’oltre in parte
75fora di sua materia sì digiuno
esto pianeto, o, sì come comparte
lo grasso e ’l magro un corpo, così questo
nel suo volume cangerebbe carte.
Se ’l primo fosse, fora manifesto
80ne l’eclissi del sol, per trasparere
lo lume come in altro raro ingesto.
Questo non è: però è da vedere
de l’altro; e s’elli avvien ch’io l’altro cassi,
falsificato fia lo tuo parere.
85S’elli è che questo raro non trapassi,
esser conviene un termine da onde
lo suo contrario più passar non lassi;
e indi l’altrui raggio si rifonde
così come color torna per vetro
90lo qual di retro a sé piombo nasconde.
Or dirai tu ch’el si dimostra tetro
ivi lo raggio più che in altre parti,
per esser lì refratto più a retro.
Da questa instanza può deliberarti
95esperïenza, se già mai la provi,
ch’esser suol fonte ai rivi di vostr’ arti.
Tre specchi prenderai; e i due rimovi
da te d’un modo, e l’altro, più rimosso,
tr’ambo li primi li occhi tuoi ritrovi.
100Rivolto ad essi, fa che dopo il dosso
ti stea un lume che i tre specchi accenda
e torni a te da tutti ripercosso.
Ben che nel quanto tanto non si stenda
la vista più lontana, lì vedrai
105come convien ch’igualmente risplenda.
64The eighth sphere displays to you many
65lights, which both in quality and quantity
can be noted with different faces.
If rare and dense alone caused this,
there would be one single power in all,
distributed more, less, or equally.
70Different powers must be fruits
of formal principles; and those, except one,
by your reasoning would be destroyed.
Again, if rarity were the cause
of the darkness you ask about, in some parts
75this planet would lack its matter through and through
or, just as a body portions out
the fat and lean, so would this one
change leaves throughout its volume.
If the first were true, it would be manifest
80in an eclipse of the sun, by transmitting
the light as through any other rare body.
This is not so; therefore we must examine
the other; and if it happens that I cancel it,
your view will be falsified.
85If it is that this rare does not pass through,
there must be a boundary from which
its contrary lets it pass no farther;
and from there another's ray is poured back
just as color returns through glass
90which hides lead behind itself.
Now you will say that the ray appears
darker there than in other parts,
because it is bent farther back.
From this objection experiment can free you,
95if ever you try it,
which is usually the fountain for the streams of your arts.
You will take three mirrors; and set two
away from you at the same distance, and the other, farther off,
let your eyes meet between the first two.
100Turned toward them, arrange that behind your back
a light stand, which kindles all three mirrors
and returns to you from all reflected.
Although in size it does not extend so much,
the farther image, there you will see
105how it must shine equally.
Commentary
The comparison pass supports Beatrice's two-stage refutation of rare/dense causality: stellar variety would collapse to one power, and neither through-rarity nor layered-rarity survives the eclipse and mirror arguments.
II.64–66 The eighth sphere matters because stellar variety requires more than one measurable physical property.
II.64–66 The eighth sphere matters because stellar variety requires more than one measurable physical property. Line 64: The eighth sphere matters because stellar variety requires more than one measurable physical property.
II.64 The eighth sphere matters because stellar variety requires more than one measurable physical property. The eighth sphere matters because stellar variety requires more than one measurable physical property.
II.70–72 Formal principles are kept explicit because they govern Beatrice's whole explanation of varied celestial influence.
II.70–72 Formal principles are kept explicit because they govern Beatrice's whole explanation of varied celestial influence. Line 70: Formal principles are kept explicit because they govern Beatrice's whole explanation of varied celestial influence.
II.70 Formal principles are kept explicit because they govern Beatrice's whole explanation of varied celestial influence. Formal principles are kept explicit because they govern Beatrice's whole explanation of varied celestial influence.
II.76–78 Changing leaves preserves the book/body analogy for alternating layers inside the Moon.
II.76–78 Changing leaves preserves the book/body analogy for alternating layers inside the Moon. Line 78: Changing leaves preserves the book/body analogy for alternating layers inside the Moon.
II.78 Changing leaves preserves the book/body analogy for alternating layers inside the Moon. Changing leaves preserves the book/body analogy for alternating layers inside the Moon.
II.94–96 The mirror experiment is Beatrice's local appeal to experience, not a modern scientific protocol.
II.94–96 The mirror experiment is Beatrice's local appeal to experience, not a modern scientific protocol. Line 94: The mirror experiment is Beatrice's local appeal to experience, not a modern scientific protocol.
II.94 The mirror experiment is Beatrice's local appeal to experience, not a modern scientific protocol. The mirror experiment is Beatrice's local appeal to experience, not a modern scientific protocol.
Beatrice clears Dante's intellect like snow under sunlight and explains ordered influence from the higher spheres II.106–126
106Or, come ai colpi de li caldi rai
de la neve riman nudo il suggetto
e dal colore e dal freddo primai,
così rimaso te ne l’intelletto
110voglio informar di luce sì vivace,
che ti tremolerà nel suo aspetto.
Dentro dal ciel de la divina pace
si gira un corpo ne la cui virtute
l’esser di tutto suo contento giace.
115Lo ciel seguente, c’ha tante vedute,
quell’ esser parte per diverse essenze,
da lui distratte e da lui contenute.
Li altri giron per varie differenze
le distinzion che dentro da sé hanno
120dispongono a lor fini e lor semenze.
Questi organi del mondo così vanno,
come tu vedi omai, di grado in grado,
che di sù prendono e di sotto fanno.
Riguarda bene omai sì com’ io vado
125per questo loco al vero che disiri,
sì che poi sappi sol tener lo guado.
106Now, as under the blows of warm rays
the subject of the snow remains bare
of both its former color and its cold,
so, with you left bare in intellect,
110I wish to inform with light so living
that it will tremble in your sight.
Within the heaven of divine peace
a body turns, and in its power
lies the being of all it contains.
115The following heaven, which has so many sights,
distributes that being through diverse essences,
distinct from it and contained by it.
The other spheres, through various differences,
dispose the distinctions they have within themselves
120to their own ends and seeds.
These organs of the world go on this way,
as you now see, from grade to grade,
receiving from above and working below.
Look well now at how I go
125through this passage toward the truth you desire,
so that later you may know alone to keep the ford.
Commentary
The snow and living-light image is not decorative: error is stripped away so Beatrice can explain an ordered descent of being and influence from the heaven of peace through the world's organs.
II.106–108 The snow image turns the removal of error into a form-change under living light, preparing the doctrinal explanation that follows.
II.106–108 The snow image turns the removal of error into a form-change under living light, preparing the doctrinal explanation that follows. Line 106: The snow image turns the removal of error into a form-change under living light, preparing the doctrinal explanation that follows.
II.106 The snow image turns the removal of error into a form-change under living light, preparing the doctrinal explanation that follows. The snow image turns the removal of error into a form-change under living light, preparing the doctrinal explanation that follows.
II.112–114 The heaven of divine peace points to the Empyrean and the ordered descent of being through the spheres.
II.112–114 The heaven of divine peace points to the Empyrean and the ordered descent of being through the spheres. Line 112: The heaven of divine peace points to the Empyrean and the ordered descent of being through the spheres.
II.112 The heaven of divine peace points to the Empyrean and the ordered descent of being through the spheres. The heaven of divine peace points to the Empyrean and the ordered descent of being through the spheres.
II.121–123 Organs keeps the bodily-instrumental analogy for the world system rather than flattening the spheres into inert machinery.
II.121–123 Organs keeps the bodily-instrumental analogy for the world system rather than flattening the spheres into inert machinery. Line 121: Organs keeps the bodily-instrumental analogy for the world system rather than flattening the spheres into inert machinery.
II.121 Organs keeps the bodily-instrumental analogy for the world system rather than flattening the spheres into inert machinery. Organs keeps the bodily-instrumental analogy for the world system rather than flattening the spheres into inert machinery.
II.124–126 Keeping the ford marks the passage from guided explanation to the pilgrim's future ability to hold the crossing himself.
II.124–126 Keeping the ford marks the passage from guided explanation to the pilgrim's future ability to hold the crossing himself. Line 126: Keeping the ford marks the passage from guided explanation to the pilgrim's future ability to hold the crossing himself.
II.126 Keeping the ford marks the passage from guided explanation to the pilgrim's future ability to hold the crossing himself. Keeping the ford marks the passage from guided explanation to the pilgrim's future ability to hold the crossing himself.
Angel-governed motion, seal-impress, and varied formal virtue produce the Moon's dark and bright appearances II.127–148
127Lo moto e la virtù d’i santi giri,
come dal fabbro l’arte del martello,
da’ beati motor convien che spiri;
130e ’l ciel cui tanti lumi fanno bello,
de la mente profonda che lui volve
prende l’image e fassene suggello.
E come l’alma dentro a vostra polve
per differenti membra e conformate
135a diverse potenze si risolve,
così l’intelligenza sua bontate
multiplicata per le stelle spiega,
girando sé sovra sua unitate.
Virtù diversa fa diversa lega
140col prezïoso corpo ch’ella avviva,
nel qual, sì come vita in voi, si lega.
Per la natura lieta onde deriva,
la virtù mista per lo corpo luce
come letizia per pupilla viva.
145Da essa vien ciò che da luce a luce
par differente, non da denso e raro;
essa è formal principio che produce,
conforme a sua bontà, lo turbo e ’l chiaro».
127The motion and the power of the holy wheels,
as the hammer's art from the smith,
must proceed from the blessed movers;
130and the heaven which so many lights make beautiful
from the deep mind that turns it
takes the image and makes itself its seal.
And as the soul within your dust
through different members, conformed
135to different powers, unfolds itself,
so the intelligence unfolds its goodness,
multiplied through the stars,
turning itself upon its unity.
A different power makes a different alloy
140with the precious body it enlivens,
in which, as life in you, it binds itself.
Through the glad nature from which it derives,
the power mixed through the body shines
like gladness through a living pupil.
145From it comes what from light to light
appears different, not from dense and rare;
it is the formal principle that produces,
according to its goodness, the dark and the clear.
Commentary
The scholastic vocabulary stays with the Italian: blessed movers, deep mind, seal, intelligence, alloy, and formal principle all remain explicit because they close the canto's correction of physical reductionism.
II.127–129 Holy wheels and blessed movers keep the physical spheres subordinate to angelic intelligence.
II.127–129 Holy wheels and blessed movers keep the physical spheres subordinate to angelic intelligence. Line 127: Holy wheels and blessed movers keep the physical spheres subordinate to angelic intelligence.
II.127 Holy wheels and blessed movers keep the physical spheres subordinate to angelic intelligence. Holy wheels and blessed movers keep the physical spheres subordinate to angelic intelligence.
II.130–132 Seal language preserves the impress of the governing intelligence on the visible heaven.
II.130–132 Seal language preserves the impress of the governing intelligence on the visible heaven. Line 132: Seal language preserves the impress of the governing intelligence on the visible heaven.
II.132 Seal language preserves the impress of the governing intelligence on the visible heaven. Seal language preserves the impress of the governing intelligence on the visible heaven.
II.139–141 Alloy keeps Dante's language of mixed virtue and body rather than modern composition.
II.139–141 Alloy keeps Dante's language of mixed virtue and body rather than modern composition. Line 139: Alloy keeps Dante's language of mixed virtue and body rather than modern composition.
II.139 Alloy keeps Dante's language of mixed virtue and body rather than modern composition. Alloy keeps Dante's language of mixed virtue and body rather than modern composition.
II.145–147 Formal principle names the true cause of difference in light, closing the correction of the rare/dense account.
II.145–147 Formal principle names the true cause of difference in light, closing the correction of the rare/dense account. Line 147: Formal principle names the true cause of difference in light, closing the correction of the rare/dense account.
II.147 Formal principle names the true cause of difference in light, closing the correction of the rare/dense account. Formal principle names the true cause of difference in light, closing the correction of the rare/dense account.