ST. BERNARD NOW reveals the order of the division of the arena of the Rose. A line of souls bisects the Rose vertically, separating those who believed in Christ before His coming from those who believed afterwards. The Virgin is in the highest seat and heads the half of the line containing Hebrew women (Christ to come); St. John the Baptist heads the half comprised of male saints (Christ already come). When St. Bernard instructs the Pilgrim to focus his gaze on the Virgin in order to acquire sufficient strength to contemplate Christ, he sees the angel Gabriel hail her with outspread wings, and all the souls respond with song. Then St. Bernard points out the position of other prominent souls: Adam and Moses; St. Peter and St. John the Evangelist; St. Anne, the mother of the Virgin; and St. Lucy, who, by inviting Beatrice to come to the aid of her lover, set the Divine Comedy in motion. Having indicated that little time remains to complete the journey, St. Bernard instructs the Pilgrim to direct his sight to God, and begins his prayer to the Virgin that she may provide the grace necessary to complete the final stage of the journey.
Rapt in love’s Bliss, that contemplative soul generously assumed the role of guide as he began to speak these holy words:
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“The wound which Mary was to close and heal she there, who sits so lovely at her feet, would open wider then and prick the flesh.
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And sitting there directly under her among the thrones of the third tier is Rachel, and, there, see Beatrice by her side.
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4-6. When Mary gave birth to Christ she provided the means of healing the wound of original sin. She “who sits so lovely at her feet” (5) is Eve, who disobeyed God and surrendered to the serpent.
Sarah, Rebecca, Judith, and then she,
who was the great-grandmother of the singer who cried for his sin: ’Miserere mei, ’
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you see them all as I go down from tier to tier and name them in their order, petal by petal, downward through the Rose.
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Down from the seventh row, as up to it, was a descending line of Hebrew women that parted all the petals of the Rose;
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according to the ways in which the faith viewed Christ, these women constitute the wall dividing these ranks down the sacred stairs.
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On this side where the flower is full bloomed to its last petal, sit the souls of those who placed their faith upon Christ yet to come;
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on that side where all of the semi-circles are broken by the empty scats, sit those who turned their face to Christ already come.
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And just as on this side the glorious throne of Heaven’s lady with the other seats below it form this great dividing wall,
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so, facing her, the throne of the great John who, ever holy, suffered through the desert, and martyrdom, then Hell for two more years,
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and under him, chosen to mark the line, Francis, Benedict, Augustine and others descend from round to round as far as here.
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10. Sarah was Abraham’s wife and the mother of Isaac. Rebecca was the daughter of Bethuel and the sister of Laban. She was married to Isaac and bore Esau and Jacob. Judith was the daughter of Meraris. She murdered Holofernes (Nebuchadnezzar’s general) while he slept and thus saved Bethulia, which was under siege by the Assyrians. After the Assyrians fled the city Judith was celebrated by the Jews as their deliverer.
11-12. Ruth was the wife of Boaz and great-grandmother of David (the “singer”), author of the psalm of penitence, the Miserere mei (“have mercy on me, ” Psalm 51).
Now marvel at the greatness of God’s plan: this garden shall be full in equal number of this and that aspect of the one faith.
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And know that downward from the center row which cuts the two dividing walls midway, no soul through his own merit earned his seat,
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but through another’s, under fixed conditions, for all these spirits were absolved of sin before they reached the age to make free choice.
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You need only to look upon their faces and listen to the young sound of their voices to see and hear this clearly for yourself.
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But you have doubts, doubts you do not reveal, so now I will untie the tangled knot in which your searching thoughts have bound you tight.
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Within the vastness of this great domain no particle of chance can find a place— no more than sorrow, thirst, or hunger can—
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for all that you see here has been ordained by the eternal law with such precision that ring and finger are a perfect fit.
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And, therefore, all these souls of hurried comers to the true life are not ranked sine causa some high, some low, according to their merit.
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The King, through whom this kingdom is at rest in so much love and in so much delight that no will dares to wish for any more,
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creating all minds in His own mind’s bliss, endows each with as much grace as He wishes, at His own pleasure—let this fact suffice.
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59. Sine causa is a Latin legal expression meaning “without cause. ”
And Holy Scriptures set this down for you clear and expressly, speaking of those twins whose anger flared while in their mother’s womb;
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so, it is fitting that God’s lofty light crown them with grace, as much as each one merits, according to the color of their hair.
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Thus, through no merit of their own good works are they ranked differently; the difference is only in God’s gift of original grace.
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During mankind’s first centuries on earth for innocent children to achieve salvation, only the faith of parents was required;
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but then, when man’s first age came to an end, all males had to be circumcised to give innocent wings the strength to fly to Heaven;
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but when the age of grace came down to man, then, without perfect baptism in Christ, such innocence to Limbo was confined.
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Now look at that face which resembles Christ the most, for only in its radiance will you be made ready to look at Christ. ”
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I saw such bliss rain down upon her face, bestowed on it by all those sacred minds created to fly through those holy heights,
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that of all things I witnessed to this point nothing had held me more spellbound than this, nor shown a greater likeness unto God;
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and that love which had once before descended now sang, Ave, Maria, gratia plena, before her presence there with wings spread wide.
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68-69. Jacob and Esau were the twin sons of Rebecca and Isaac (see Genesis 25:21-34). St. Bernard mentions them as an example of the mystery of Divine Grace.
79. Man’s “first age” is from the time of Abraham until the birth of Christ.
Response came to this holy prayer of praise from all directions of the Court of Bliss and every face grew brighter with that joy.
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“O holy father, who for my sake deigns to stand down here, so far from the sweet throne destined for you throughout eternity,
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who is that angel who so joyously looks straight into the eyes of Heaven’s Queen, so much in love he seems to burn like fire?”
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Thus, I turned for instruction once again to that one who in Mary’s beauty glowed as does the morning star in fresh sunlight.
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And he: “All loving pride and gracious joy, as much as soul or angel can possess, is all in him, and we would have it so,
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for he it is who bore the palm below to Mary when the Son of God had willed to bear the weight of man’s flesh on Himself.
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Now let your eyes follow my words as I explain to you, and note the great patricians of th
is most just and pious of all realms.
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Those two who sit most blest in their high thrones because they are the closest to the Empress are, as it were, the two roots of our Rose:
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he, sitting on her left side, is that father, the one through whose presumptuous appetite mankind still tastes the bitterness of shame;
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and on her right, you see the venerable Father of Holy Church to whom Christ gave the keys to this beautiful Rose of joy.
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108. Reference to the morning star, Venus, is made in the litany to the Blessed Virgin.
120. Adam is one root of the Rose because from him sprung those who believed in Christ to come; St. Peter is the other because from htm sprung those who believed in Christ who had already come.
And he who prophesied before he died the sad days destined for the lovely Bride whom Christ won for himself with lance and nails
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sits at his side. Beside the other sits the leader of those nurtured on God’s manna, who were a fickle, ingrate, stubborn lot.
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Across from Peter, see there, Anna sits, so happy to be looking at her daughter, she does not move an eye singing Hosanna;
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facing the head of mankind’s family sits Lucy, who first sent your lady to you when you were bent, headlong, on your own ruin.
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But since the time left for your journey’s vision grows short, let us stop here—like the good tailor who cuts the gown according to his cloth,
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and turn our eyes upon the Primal Love so that, looking toward Him, you penetrate His radiance as deep as possible.
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But lest you fall backwards beating your wings, believing to ascend on your own power, we must offer a prayer requesting grace,
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grace from the one who has power to help you. Now, follow me, with all of your devotion, and do not let your heart stray from my words. ”
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And he began to say this holy prayer:
127-130. St. John the Evangelist, author of the Apocalypse, foretold the adversity that would befall the Church. (Cf. Purgatory XXIX, 143-144.) The “lance and nails” (129) refers to the Crucifixion.
130. The “other” is Adam.
CANTO XXXIII
ST. BERNARD LOVINGLY praises the Virgin Mary and then recounts the Pilgrim’s journey through Hell, Purgatory, and the celestial spheres, entreating the Virgin to clear away the obstacles from the Pilgrim’s eyes so that he may behold God’s glory. Bernard then signals the Pilgrim to look upward, but he has already done so, spurred on by his clearer sight. He sees the multiform world bound in a single unity with love. Then, as he gazes into the Divine Light, he sees three rings of three different colors all of which share and are bound by one and the same circumference. The first ring of color reflects the second; both reflect the third: the miracle of the Trinity. Again the poet’s words begin to fail him. He fixes his eyes on the second ring of reflected light and perceives God in the image of man, but he is unable to grasp how the forms coincide. Then with a sudden flash the Pilgrim’s mind is illuminated by the Truth and he feels, now that the ultimate vision has been granted him, his desire and will turning in harmony with Divine Love, “the Love that moves the sun and the other stars. ”
“Oh Virgin Mother, daughter of your son, most humble, most exalted of all creatures chosen of God in His eternal plan,
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you are the one who ennobled human nature to the extent that He did not disdain, Who was its Maker, to make Himself man.
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Within your womb rekindled was the love that gave the warmth that did allow this flower to come to bloom within this timeless peace.
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For all up here you are the noonday torch of charity, and down on earth, for men, the living spring of their eternal hope.
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Lady, you are so great, so powerful, that who seeks grace without recourse to you would have his wish fly upward without wings.
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Not only does your loving kindness rush to those who ask for it, but often times it flows spontaneously before the plea.
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In you is tenderness, in you is pity, in you munificence—in you unites all that is good in God’s created beings.
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This is a man who from the deepest pit of all the universe up to this height has witnessed, one by one, the lives of souls,
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who begs you that you grant him through your grace the power to raise his vision higher still to penetrate the final blessedness.
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And I who never burned for my own vision more than I burn for his, with all my prayers I pray you—and I pray they are enough—
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that you through your own prayers dispel the mist of his mortality, that he may have the Sum of Joy revealed before his eyes.
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I pray you also, Queen who can achieve your every wish, keep his affections sound once he has had the vision and returns.
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Protect him from the stirrings of the flesh: you see, with Beatrice, all the Blest, hands clasped in prayer, are praying for my prayer. ”
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Those eyes so loved and reverenced by God, now fixed on him who prayed, made clear to us how precious true devotion is to her;
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then she looked into the Eternal Light, into whose being, we must believe, no eyes of other creatures pierce with such insight.
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And I who was approaching now the end of all man’s yearning, strained with all the force in me to raise my burning longing high.
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Bernard then gestured to me with a smile that I look up, but I already was instinctively what he would have me be:
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for now my vision as it grew more clear was penetrating more and more the Ray of that exalted Light of Truth Itself.
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And from then on my vision rose to heights higher than words, which fail before such sight, and memory fails, too, at such extremes.
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As he who sees things in a dream and wakes to feel the passion of the dream still there although no part of it remains in mind,
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just such am I: my vision fades and all but ceases, yet the sweetness born of it I still can feel distilling in my heart:
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so imprints on the snow fade in the sun, and thus the Sibyl’s oracle of leaves was swept away and lost into the wind.
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O Light Supreme, so far beyond the reach of mortal understanding, to my mind relend now some small part of Your own Self,
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and give to my tongue eloquence enough to capture just one spark of all Your glory that I may leave for future generations;
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for, by returning briefly to my mind and sounding, even faintly, in my verse, more of Your might will be revealed to men.
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If I had turned my eyes away, I think, from the sharp brilliance of the living Ray which they endured, I would have lost my senses.
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And this, as I recall, gave me more strength to keep on gazing till I could unite my vision with the Infinite Worth I saw.
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0 grace abounding and allowing me to dare to fix my gaze on the Eternal Light, so deep my vision was consumed in It!
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I saw how it contains within its depths all things bound in a single book by love of which creation is the scattered leaves:
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how substance, accident, and their relation were fused in such a way that what I now describe is but a glimmer of that Light.
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I know I saw the universal form, the fusion of all things, for I can feel, while speaking now, my heart leap up in joy.
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One instant brings me more forgetfulness than five and twenty centu
ries brought the quest that stunned Neptune when he saw Argo’s keel.
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And so my mind was totally entranced in gazing deeply, motionless, intent; the more it saw the more it burned to see.
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And one is so transformed within that Light that it would be impossible to think of ever turning one’s eyes from that sight,
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because the good which is the goal of will is all collected there, and outside it all is defective that is perfect there.
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Now, even in the things I do recall my words have no more strength than does a babe wetting its tongue, still at its mother’s breast.
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91-93. The conjoining of substance and accident in God and the union of the temporal and the eternal is what Dante saw at that moment.
Not that within the Living Light there was more than a sole aspect of the Divine which always is what It has always been,
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yet as I learned to see more, and the power of vision grew in me, that single aspect as I changed, seemed to me to change Itself.
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Within Its depthless clarity of substance I saw the Great Light shine into three circles in three clear colors bound in one same space;
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the first seemed to reflect the next like rainbow on rainbow, and the third was like a flame equally breathed forth by the other two.
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How my weak words fall short of my conception, which is itself so far from what I saw that “weak” is much too weak a word to use!
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O Light Eternal fixed in Self alone, known only to Yourself, and knowing Self, You love and glow, knowing and being known!
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That circling which, as I conceived it, shone in You as Your own first reflected light when I had looked deep into It a while,
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seemed in Itself and in Its own Self-color to be depicted with man’s very image. My eyes were totally absorbed in It.
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As the geomeier who tries so hard to square the circle, but cannot discover, think as he may, the principle involved,
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so did I strive with this new mystery: I yearned to know how could our image fit into that circle, how could it conform;
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but my own wings could not take me so high— then a great flash of understanding struck my mind, and suddenly its wish was granted.