Now with the one, now with the other nature. Think, Reader, if within myself I marvelled,

When I beheld the thing itself stand still, And in its image it transformed itself. While with amazement filled and jubilant,

My soul was tasting of the food, that while
It satisfies us makes us hunger for it,
Themselves revealing of the highest rank

In bearing, did the other three advance,
Singing to their angelic saraband.
"Turn, Beatrice, O turn thy holy eyes,"
Such was their song, "unto thy faithful one,
Who has to see thee ta'en so many steps.

In

grace do us the grace that thou unveil

Thy face to him, so that he may discern

The second beauty which thou dost conceal." O splendor of the living light eternal !

Who underneath the shadow of Parnassus

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Hath grown so pale, or drunk so at its cistern, He would not seem to have his mind encumbered Striving to paint thee as thou didst appear, Where the harmonious heaven o'ershadowed thee, When in the open air thou didst unveil ?

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CANTO XXXII

So steadfast and attentive were mine eyes
In satisfying their decennial thirst,

That all my other senses were extinct, And upon this side and on that they had Walls of indifference, so the holy smile Drew them unto itself with the old net; When forcibly my sight was turned away Towards my left hand by those goddesses, Because I heard from them a "Too intently!"

And that condition of the sight which is
In eyes but lately smitten by the sun
Bereft me of my vision some short while;
But to the less when sight re-shaped itself,
I the less in reference to the greater
say

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Splendor from which perforce I had withdrawn, 15 I saw upon its right wing wheeled about

The glorious host, returning with the sun

And with the sevenfold flames upon their faces.
As underneath its shields, to save itself,

A squadron turns, and with its banner wheels,
Before the whole thereof can change its front,

That soldiery of the celestial kingdom

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Which marched in the advance had wholly passed us Before the chariot had turned its pole.

Then to the wheels the maidens turned themselves, And the Griffin moved his burden benedight,

But so that not a feather of him fluttered.

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