CANTO XIISoon as its final word the blessed flameHad rais’d for utterance, straight the holy millBegan to wheel, nor yet had once revolv’d,Or ere another, circling, compass’d it,Motion to motion, song to song, conjoining,Song, that as much our muses doth excel,Our Sirens with their tuneful pipes, as rayOf primal splendour doth its faint reflex.As when, if Juno bid her handmaid forth,Two arches parallel, and trick’d alike,Span the thin cloud, the outer taking birthFrom that within (in manner of that voiceWhom love did melt away, as sun the mist),And they who gaze, presageful call to mindThe compact, made with Noah, of the worldNo more to be o’erflow’d; about us thusOf sempiternal roses, bending, wreath’dThose garlands twain, and to the innermostE’en thus th’ external answered. When the footing,And other great festivity, of song,And radiance, light with light accordant, eachJocund and blythe, had at their pleasure still’d(E’en as the eyes by quick volition mov’d,Are shut and rais’d together), from the heartOf one amongst the new lights mov’d a voice,That made me seem like needle to the star,In turning to its whereabout, and thusBegan: “The love, that makes me beautiful,Prompts me to tell of th’ other guide, for whomSuch good of mine is spoken. Where one is,The other worthily should also be;That as their warfare was alike, alikeShould be their glory. Slow, and full of doubt,And with thin ranks, after its banner mov’dThe army of Christ (which it so clearly costTo reappoint), when its imperial Head,Who reigneth ever, for the drooping hostDid make provision, thorough grace alone,And not through its deserving. As thou heard’st,Two champions to the succour of his spouseHe sent, who by their deeds and words might joinAgain his scatter’d people. In that clime,Where springs the pleasant west-wind to unfoldThe fresh leaves, with which Europe sees herselfNew-garmented; nor from those billows far,Beyond whose chiding, after weary course,The sun doth sometimes hide him, safe abidesThe happy Callaroga, under guardOf the great shield, wherein the lion liesSubjected and supreme. And there was bornThe loving million of the Christian faith,The hollow’d wrestler, gentle to his own,And to his enemies terrible. So repleteHis soul with lively virtue, that when firstCreated, even in the mother’s womb,It prophesied. When, at the sacred font,The spousals were complete ’twixt faith and him,Where pledge of mutual safety was exchang’d,The dame, who was his surety, in her sleepBeheld the wondrous fruit, that was from himAnd from his heirs to issue. And that suchHe might be construed, as indeed he was,She was inspir’d to name him of his owner,Whose he was wholly, and so call’d him Dominic.And I speak of him, as the labourer,Whom Christ in his own garden chose to beHis help-mate. Messenger he seem’d, and friendFast-knit to Christ; and the first love he show’d,Was after the first counsel that Christ gave.Many a time his nurse, at entering foundThat he had ris’n in silence, and was prostrate,As who should say, “My errand was for this.”O happy father! Felix rightly nam’d!O favour’d mother! rightly nam’d Joanna!If that do mean, as men interpret it.Not for the world’s sake, for which now they poreUpon Ostiense and Taddeo’s page,But for the real manna, soon he grewMighty in learning, and did set himselfTo go about the vineyard, that soon turnsTo wan and wither’d, if not tended well:And from the see (whose bounty to the justAnd needy is gone by, not through its fault,But his who fills it basely), he besought,No dispensation for commuted wrong,Nor the first vacant fortune, nor the tenth),That to God’s paupers rightly appertain,But, ’gainst an erring and degenerate world,Licence to fight, in favour of that seed,From which the twice twelve cions gird thee round.Then, with sage doctrine and good will to help,Forth on his great apostleship he far’d,Like torrent bursting from a lofty vein;And, dashing ’gainst the stocks of heresy,Smote fiercest, where resistance was most stout.Thence many rivulets have since been turn’d,Over the garden Catholic to leadTheir living waters, and have fed its plants.“If such one wheel of that two-yoked car,Wherein the holy church defended her,And rode triumphant through the civil broil.Thou canst not doubt its fellow’s excellence,Which Thomas, ere my coming, hath declar’dSo courteously unto thee. But the track,Which its smooth fellies made, is now deserted:That mouldy mother is where late were lees.His family, that wont to trace his path,Turn backward, and invert their steps; erelongTo rue the gathering in of their ill crop,When the rejected tares in vain shall askAdmittance to the barn. I question notBut he, who search’d our volume, leaf by leaf,Might still find page with this inscription on’t,‘I am as I was wont.’ Yet such were notFrom Acquasparta nor Casale, whenceOf those, who come to meddle with the text,One stretches and another cramps its rule.Bonaventura’s life in me behold,From Bagnororegio, one, who in dischargeOf my great offices still laid asideAll sinister aim. Illuminato here,And Agostino join me: two they were,Among the first of those barefooted meek ones,Who sought God’s friendship in the cord: with themHugues of Saint Victor, Pietro Mangiadore,And he of Spain in his twelve volumes shining,Nathan the prophet, MetropolitanChrysostom, and Anselmo, and, who deign’dTo put his hand to the first art, Donatus.Raban is here: and at my side there shinesCalabria’s abbot, Joachim , endow’dWith soul prophetic. The bright courtesyOf friar Thomas, and his goodly lore,Have mov’d me to the blazon of a peerSo worthy, and with me have mov’d this throng.”
Soon as its final word the blessed flameHad rais’d for utterance, straight the holy millBegan to wheel, nor yet had once revolv’d,Or ere another, circling, compass’d it,Motion to motion, song to song, conjoining,Song, that as much our muses doth excel,Our Sirens with their tuneful pipes, as rayOf primal splendour doth its faint reflex.
As when, if Juno bid her handmaid forth,Two arches parallel, and trick’d alike,Span the thin cloud, the outer taking birthFrom that within (in manner of that voiceWhom love did melt away, as sun the mist),And they who gaze, presageful call to mindThe compact, made with Noah, of the worldNo more to be o’erflow’d; about us thusOf sempiternal roses, bending, wreath’dThose garlands twain, and to the innermostE’en thus th’ external answered. When the footing,And other great festivity, of song,And radiance, light with light accordant, eachJocund and blythe, had at their pleasure still’d(E’en as the eyes by quick volition mov’d,Are shut and rais’d together), from the heartOf one amongst the new lights mov’d a voice,That made me seem like needle to the star,In turning to its whereabout, and thusBegan: “The love, that makes me beautiful,Prompts me to tell of th’ other guide, for whomSuch good of mine is spoken. Where one is,The other worthily should also be;That as their warfare was alike, alikeShould be their glory. Slow, and full of doubt,And with thin ranks, after its banner mov’dThe army of Christ (which it so clearly costTo reappoint), when its imperial Head,Who reigneth ever, for the drooping hostDid make provision, thorough grace alone,And not through its deserving. As thou heard’st,Two champions to the succour of his spouseHe sent, who by their deeds and words might joinAgain his scatter’d people. In that clime,Where springs the pleasant west-wind to unfoldThe fresh leaves, with which Europe sees herselfNew-garmented; nor from those billows far,Beyond whose chiding, after weary course,The sun doth sometimes hide him, safe abidesThe happy Callaroga, under guardOf the great shield, wherein the lion liesSubjected and supreme. And there was bornThe loving million of the Christian faith,The hollow’d wrestler, gentle to his own,And to his enemies terrible. So repleteHis soul with lively virtue, that when firstCreated, even in the mother’s womb,It prophesied. When, at the sacred font,The spousals were complete ’twixt faith and him,Where pledge of mutual safety was exchang’d,The dame, who was his surety, in her sleepBeheld the wondrous fruit, that was from himAnd from his heirs to issue. And that suchHe might be construed, as indeed he was,She was inspir’d to name him of his owner,Whose he was wholly, and so call’d him Dominic.And I speak of him, as the labourer,Whom Christ in his own garden chose to beHis help-mate. Messenger he seem’d, and friendFast-knit to Christ; and the first love he show’d,Was after the first counsel that Christ gave.Many a time his nurse, at entering foundThat he had ris’n in silence, and was prostrate,As who should say, “My errand was for this.”O happy father! Felix rightly nam’d!O favour’d mother! rightly nam’d Joanna!If that do mean, as men interpret it.Not for the world’s sake, for which now they poreUpon Ostiense and Taddeo’s page,But for the real manna, soon he grewMighty in learning, and did set himselfTo go about the vineyard, that soon turnsTo wan and wither’d, if not tended well:And from the see (whose bounty to the justAnd needy is gone by, not through its fault,But his who fills it basely), he besought,No dispensation for commuted wrong,Nor the first vacant fortune, nor the tenth),That to God’s paupers rightly appertain,But, ’gainst an erring and degenerate world,Licence to fight, in favour of that seed,From which the twice twelve cions gird thee round.Then, with sage doctrine and good will to help,Forth on his great apostleship he far’d,Like torrent bursting from a lofty vein;And, dashing ’gainst the stocks of heresy,Smote fiercest, where resistance was most stout.Thence many rivulets have since been turn’d,Over the garden Catholic to leadTheir living waters, and have fed its plants.
“If such one wheel of that two-yoked car,Wherein the holy church defended her,And rode triumphant through the civil broil.Thou canst not doubt its fellow’s excellence,Which Thomas, ere my coming, hath declar’dSo courteously unto thee. But the track,Which its smooth fellies made, is now deserted:That mouldy mother is where late were lees.His family, that wont to trace his path,Turn backward, and invert their steps; erelongTo rue the gathering in of their ill crop,When the rejected tares in vain shall askAdmittance to the barn. I question notBut he, who search’d our volume, leaf by leaf,Might still find page with this inscription on’t,‘I am as I was wont.’ Yet such were notFrom Acquasparta nor Casale, whenceOf those, who come to meddle with the text,One stretches and another cramps its rule.Bonaventura’s life in me behold,From Bagnororegio, one, who in dischargeOf my great offices still laid asideAll sinister aim. Illuminato here,And Agostino join me: two they were,Among the first of those barefooted meek ones,Who sought God’s friendship in the cord: with themHugues of Saint Victor, Pietro Mangiadore,And he of Spain in his twelve volumes shining,Nathan the prophet, MetropolitanChrysostom, and Anselmo, and, who deign’dTo put his hand to the first art, Donatus.Raban is here: and at my side there shinesCalabria’s abbot, Joachim , endow’dWith soul prophetic. The bright courtesyOf friar Thomas, and his goodly lore,Have mov’d me to the blazon of a peerSo worthy, and with me have mov’d this throng.”