The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• The Trinity of Love
• Preface
• Paradiso I
• Paradiso Ii
• Paradiso Iii
• Paradiso Iv
• Paradiso V
• Paradiso Vi
• Paradiso Vii
• Paradiso Viii
• Paradiso Ix
• Paradiso X
• Paradiso Xi
• Paradiso Xii
• Paradiso Xiii
• Paradiso Xiv
• Paradiso Xv
• Paradiso Xvi
• Paradiso Xvii
• Paradiso Xviii
• Paradiso Xix
• Paradiso Xx
• Paradiso Xxi
• Paradiso Xxii
• Paradiso Xxiii
• Paradiso Xxiv
• Paradiso Xxv
• Paradiso Xxvi
• Paradiso Xxvii
• Paradiso Xxviii
• Paradiso Xxix
• Paradiso Xxx
• Paradiso Xxxi
• Paradiso Xxxii
• Paradiso Xxxiii

PARADISO VI

• When Constantine had turned the Eagle back,
• counter the course of heaven its flight pursued
• behind the Ancient who Lavinia wedded,
• a hundred and a hundred years and more
• the Bird of God on Europe’s verge abode,
• hard by the mountains whence it issued first;
• and ’neath the shadow of its sacred plumes
• it governed there the world from hand to hand,
• and, changing thus, reached mine. Caesar I was,
• and am Justinian, he, who by the will
• of that First Love which now I feel, withdrew
• the useless and excessive from the laws.
• And I, before attending to this work,
• believed that Christ one only nature had,
• not more, and was with such a faith content;
• but blessèd Agapètus, who was then
• the highest Shepherd, set me by his words
• upon the pathway of the genuine faith.
• Him I believed, and what was in his faith
• I now see clearly, even as thou dost see
• that contradictions are both false and true.

• As soon as with the Church I moved my feet,
• God, of His Grace, with that great task was pleased
• to inspire me, and thereto I gave me wholly;
• war to my Belisarius I entrusted,
• to whom Heaven’s right hand was so well conjoined,
• it seemed a sign that from it I should rest.

• Here, then, to thy first question ends my answer;
• its nature, though, constrains me to go on
• with something more,
• that thou mayst see how rightly
• against the holy Standard moves both who
• appropriates, and who opposes, it.

• See what great virtue caused it to deserve
• respect; for from that moment it began,
• when Pallas died to give it sovereignty.
• Thou knowest that in Alba it sojourned
• three hundred years and more, till finally
• three against three fought for its sake again;
• thou knowest, too, what from the Sabines’ wrong,
• through seven kings, till Lucretia’s grief, it did,
• conquering the neighboring peoples all around.
• Thou knowest what it did, ’gainst Brennus borne,
• and Pyrrhus, and against the other Kings
• and self-ruled States, by Rome’s elect, whereby
• Torquatus, Quinctius, for his unkempt locks
• surnamed, the Decii and Fabii,
• acquired the fame which gladly I embalm.

• It brought the pride of those Arabians low,
• who traversed, in the wake of Hannibal,
• those Alpine rocks, whence thou, Po, glidest down.
• Scipio and Pompey triumphed under it
• when young; and bitter to that hill it seemed,
• beneath which thou wast born. Then, near the time
• when willed it was by Heaven, that all the world
• should be reduced to its own peaceful state,
• Caesar assumes it at the hest of Rome.
• And that which from the Var unto the Rhine
• it did, the Saône, Isère and Seine perceived,
• and every valley whence the Rhone is filled.
• What next it did, when, issuing from Ravenna,
• it leaped the Rubicon, was such a flight,
• that neither tongue nor pen could follow it.
• Toward Spain it wheeled its host around; then turned
• Durazzo-ward; and smote Pharsalia so,
• that to the torrid Nile the pain was felt.
• Antandros and the Sìmois, whence it started,
• it saw again, and there where Hector lies;
• then, ill for Ptolemy, it roused itself.
• Thence with the speed of lightning it swooped down
• on Juba: toward your West it next turned back,
• for there it heard Pompeian trumpets blow.
• For what it did with its next Standard-bearer,
• Brutus, and Cassius with him, barks in Hell;
• Mòdena and Perugia, too, it grieved.

• Sad Cleopatra, who, before it fleeing,
• took from the asp a dark and sudden death,
• is weeping still for what with him it did.
• With him it reached the distant Red Sea’s shore;
• with him it brought the world to such a state
• of peace, that Janus had his temple closed.
• But what the Sign which causes me to speak,
• had done before, and after was to do,
• throughout the mortal world which owns its sway,
• comes to seem small and dark, if in the hand
• of its third Caesar it be looked upon
• with clearly seeing eyes and spirit pure;
• because the Living Justice which inspires me,
• granted that Sign, when in the latter’s hand,
• the glory of carrying out its wrath’s revenge.
• Now wonder here at what I further tell thee:
• when this was done, with Titus it ran on
• to avenge the avenging of the ancient sin.
• And later, when the tooth of Lombardy
• the Holy Church had bitten, Charles the Great
• came to her help by conquering ’neath its wings.

• Thou now canst judge of those I charged above,
• and of their sins, which all your woes produced.
• Against the public Standard one sets up
• the yellow Fleur-de-lys, while yet another
• appropriates it to a party’s use;
• hence hard it is to see which sinneth most.

• Let, then, the Ghibellines their tricks perform
• under some other sign; for this one he
• e’er follows ill, who it from justice parts!
• Nor let this new Charles smite it with his Guelfs,
• but let him rather fear the taloned claws,
• which from a greater lion once stripped off
• his hide! Often have sons ere now bewailed
• their father’s guilt; hence let none think that God
• will for his Lilies change His Coat-of-arms!

• This little star of ours adorns itself
• with those good spirits who have active been,
• that fame and honor might live after them;
• and when, thus deviating, one’s desires
• tend thitherward, the rays of true love needs
• must upward mount with less intensity.
• But in the balancing of our rewards
• with our deserts, part of our joy consists,
• because we see them as nor more nor less.
• Hereby the Living Justice sweetens so
• our love in us, that it can nevermore
• be turned aside to any kind of wrong.
• Voices that differ make on earth sweet music;
• so in this life of ours its different grades
• produce sweet harmony among these spheres.

• And in the present pearl there shines the light
• of Romeo, he whose beautiful and great
• performance was ungratefully repaid.

• And yet the Provençals who ’gainst him worked,
• laugh not; he, therefore, takes an evil path,
• who to his harm another’s good deeds turns.
• Four daughters, and each one of them a queen,
• had Raymond Berenger; and, though low-born
• and alien, Romeo ’t was did this for him;
• then slandering words led Raymond to demand
• a reckoning of this upright man, who five
• and seven had rendered him for every ten.
• Thereat, though poor and old, he went his way;
• and if the world but knew the heart he had,
• while crust by crust he begged his livelihood,
• much as it praises, it would praise him more!”