DANTE'S SUBLIME COMEDY: PARADISE: Chapter 8

CHAPTER 8: Venus

Pagans have wrongly thought the brightest star

            at dawn and dusk provoked the wildest love.

            Venus was offered hymns and sacrifice             3

as lover of Mars, playboy Cupid’s mother,

provider of erotic joy beside

sorrow that drove Dido to suicide.                     6

I only knew we’d soared up to love’s sphere

              on seeing Beatrice grew lovelier.

              Bright dancing lights were in that shining globe  9

                                               

like sparks in a flame, like many voices

            harmonized in one great organ tone.

            The lights spun fast and slow like Seraphim          12

                       

 according to (I think) their view of God                                                 

              until, aware of us, a stream of them                                                        

              unwound and comet-like, sped to our side           15

 singing a welcoming hosanna. How                                               

               I wished and always wish to hear that sound!

               The first light said. “May we share happiness?   18

Instruct us, poet, how to please you best.

On Earth you wrote of how our intellects             

            move the third star. We love you much for that.    21

                                     

Pausing, conversing now with you will be

a very blissful interval of rest.”

I looked to my bright guide to find if she               24

accepted this, received her smiling nod,

              so asked, “Please, who are you?” – not words that said

              how glad I was, and yet he knew because           27

I saw his glow increase as he replied,

              “If dazzling joy did not disguise my form

               like smooth cocoon protecting a silk worm         30

you would see Charles Martel, a long-gone friend

              who dwelled too short a time on Earth to stop

            the Whigs and Tories rending Italy.                       33

  

O Florentine, had plague not ended me

(King of Naples, Sicily, Hungary,

Count of Provence) you would not be exiled.       36

 My father’s second son is Naples’ King

              and has not learned the art of ruling men,

              for brother Robert does not even know               39

taxing the poor too much must breed revolt.

              One of our blood who did not heed that fact

              incited massacre in Palermo –                             42

mobs filling streets and yelling kill kill kill!

              Unlike our dad, Robert alas is mean,

              grabs wealth through knights who share his greed for gold.    45

He won’t get rid of them, although the cost

              of keeping them wrecks all good government.”

              “Sir Charles,” said I, “The Heaven-sent joy you bring   48

is also yours who, now so near to God,

              knows from Whom purest loving wisdom flows.

              You’ve made me glad, so now please make me wise.    51

How can good seed grow into rotten fruit?

              Why is bad son bred from a decent dad?”

              “If you can grasp the truth of my reply,”              54

said he, “you will understand many things

upon which you have so far turned your back:

what moves and satisfies this Paradise                   57

you now ascend, gives planets influence

over those born below. Each embryo

receives a starry ray, like shaft from bow,              60

that shapes its character.

               No soul is quite alike, yet can combine

               in Godly ways with other souls on Earth,           63

just as the planets circulate above.

               Were this not so the universe would be

               a chaos too confused to form a star                     66

or any form of life, but all we see

               amounts to one tremendous work of art.

               Even its smallest part has unity                           69

  

through balanced interchange of energy.

              Is that quite clear?” I said, “Yes, I agree.

              Nature has made the world just what we see.”   72

“Can men live well without societies?”

              asked he. I said, “One perhaps sometimes may,

              but not for long. None could begin to live         75

without a family.” He answered, “Right.

              A family is a society,

              but think as citizen. Cities require                      78

all kinds of skill: nurses for babies and

farmers for food, builders, tradesmen, doctors

for the ill, engineers like Daedalus                      81

law givers like Solon, artists like Phidias,

            priests like Melchizedek and commanders

            like Xerxes. Cities can exist because                  84      

star influence insists that lads are not

exact copies of their dads. That is why

pagans believed gods fathered their heroes.       87

Bastard Romulus was called son of Mars.

            Brothers (as well I know) can differ too

            even when twins, as Esau and Jacob show.       90

I love you, so will tell you something more.

            When by bad luck people are doing work

            unsuited to their nature, things go wrong           93

and a good land has chosen the wrong way

when fighters preach in time of peace, and then

in time of war the loud-mouthed clergymen

                       

are exalted to general command.”                                97