Divine Comedy Paradiso Canto XXXIII
O Light Supreme who doth Thyself withdraw so far above man’s mortal understanding, lend me again some glimpse of what I saw;
make Thou my tongue so eloquent it may of all Thy glory speak a single clue to those who follow me in the world’s day;
for by returning to my memory somewhat, and somewhat sounding in these verses, Thou shalt show man more of Thy victory.
So dazzling was the splendor of that Ray, that I must certainly have lost my senses had I, but for an instant, turned away.
And so it was, as I recall, I could the better bear to look, until at last my vision made one with the Eternal Good.
Oh grace abounding that had made me fit to fix my eyes on the eternal light until my vision was consumed in it!
I saw within Its depth how It conceives all things in a single volume bound by Love, of which the universe is the scattered leaves;
substance, accident, and their relation so fused that all I say could do no more than yield a glimpse of that bright revelation.
I think I saw the universal form that binds these things, for as I speak these words I feel my joy swell and my spirits warm.
Twenty-five centuries since Neptune saw the Argo’s keel have not moved all mankind, recalling that adventure, to such awe
as I felt in an instant. My tranced being stared fixed and motionless upon that vision, ever more fervent to see in the act of seeing.
Experiencing that Radiance, the spirit is so indrawn it is impossible even to think of ever turning from It.
For the good which is the will’s ultimate object is all subsumed in It; and, being removed, all is defective which in It is perfect.
Now in my recollection of the rest I have less power to speak than any infant wetting its tongue yet at its mother’s breast;
and not because that Living Radiance bore more than one semblance, for It is unchanging and is forever as it was before;
rather, as I grew worthier to see, the more I looked, the more unchanging semblance appeared to change with every change in me.
Within the depthless deep and clear existence of that abyss of light three circles shone—three in color, one in circumference:
the second from the first, rainbow from rainbow; the third, an exhalation of pure fire equally breathed forth by the other two.
But oh how much my words miss my conception, which is itself so far from what I saw that to call it feeble would be rank deception!
O Light Eternal fixed in Itself alone, by Itself alone understood, which from Itself loves and glows, self-knowing and self-known;
that second aureole which shone forth in Thee, conceived as a reflection of the first—or which appeared so to my scrutiny—
seemed in Itself of Its own coloration to be painted with man’s image. I fixed my eyes on that alone in rapturous contemplation.
Like a geometer wholly dedicated to squaring the circle, but who cannot find, think as he may, the principle indicated—
so did I study the supernal face. I yearned to know just how our image merges into that circle, and how it there finds place;
but mine were not the wings for such a flight. Yet, as I wished, the truth I wished for came cleaving my mind in a great flash of light.
Here my powers rest from their high fantasy, but already I could feel my being turned—instinct and intellect balanced equally
as in a wheel whose motion nothing jars—by the Love that moves the Sun and the other stars.