{"product_id":"paradise-isbn-9780812977264","title":"Paradise","description":"“If there is any justice in the world of books, [Esolen’s] will be the standard Dante . . . for some time to come.”–Robert Royal, \u003ci\u003eCrisis\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn this, the concluding volume of \u003ci\u003eThe Divine Comedy\u003c\/i\u003e, Dante ascends from the devastation of the Inferno and the trials of Purgatory. Led by his beloved Beatrice, he enters Paradise, to profess his faith, hope, and love before the Heavenly court. Completed shortly before his death, \u003ci\u003eParadise\u003c\/i\u003e is the volume that perhaps best expresses Dante’s spiritual philosophy about resurrection, redemption, and the nature of divinity. It also affords modern-day readers a clear window into late medieval perceptions about faith. A bilingual text, classic illustrations by Gustave Doré, an appendix that reproduces Dante’s key sources, and other features make this the definitive edition of Dante’s ultimate masterwork.Anthony Esolen is a professor of English at Providence College. He is the author of Peppers, a book of poetry, and his translations include Lucretius’s De rerum natura and Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata, along with Dante’s Inferno and Purgatory, published by the Modern Library.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDante Alighieri was born in Florence in 1256. He entered public life in 1295, later becoming one of the six governing magistrates of Florence. He repeatedly opposed the machinations of Pope Boniface VIII, who was attempting to place all of Tuscany under Papal rule, and in 1301 was banished from Florence. Dante would never again enter his native city, spending his remaining years with a series of patrons in various Italian courts. He completed The Divine Comedy shortly before his death in 1321. Gustave Doré (1832-83) was one of the most popular and prolific French illustrators of the mid 19th century.Canto One\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDante and Beatrice are at the threshold of Heaven. She explains to him \u003cbr\u003ethat it is the nature of the human soul to rise.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe glory of the One who moves all things\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003epenetrates the universe with light,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emore radiant in one part and elsewhere less:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI have been in that heaven He makes most bright,4\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand seen things neither mind can hold nor tongue\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eutter, when one descends from such great height,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor as we near the One for whom we long,7\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eour intellects so plunge into the deep,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ememory cannot follow where we go.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNevertheless what small part I can keep10\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof that holy kingdom treasured in my heart\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewill now become the matter of my song.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eO good Apollo, for this last work of art,13\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emake me as fit a vessel of your power\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eas you demand when you bestow the crown\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOf the beloved laurel. Till this hour16\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eone peak of twin Parnassus has sufficed,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebut if I am to enter the lists now\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI shall need both. Then surge into my breast19\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand breathe your song, as when you drew the vain\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMarsyas from the sheath of his own limbs.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFather, virtue divine, should you but deign22\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethat I make manifest a shadow of\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe blessed kingdom sealed upon my brain,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt the foot of that tree whose wood you love25\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eyou’ll see me stand and crown my brows with green,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003emade worthy by the subject, and by you.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePoets and Caesars now so rarely glean28\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethose leaves to celebrate a victory\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e(man’s fault and shame, for our desires are mean),\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe Peneian branches must give birth to joy31\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewhen any man should thirst for their high fame,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ein the glad heart of the Delphic deity.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA little spark gives birth to a great flame.34\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBetter voices perhaps will follow mine,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003epraying to hear what Cyrrha shall proclaim!\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBy various spills of light the sun will shine37\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003edawning upon the world of men that die,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebut at the three-cross intersection of\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFour rings it rises in the company40\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof a more favorable time of year,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ehappier stars, to stamp this worldly clay\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith its most perfect seal. One hemisphere43\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003elay brightening in that stream and one grew dim,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eas it made morning there and evening here,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen I saw Beatrice turn upon her left46\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eand look to Heaven to gaze into the sun:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eno eagle ever held a gaze so firm.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs a reflecting ray will follow upon49\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe first and in a glance, an instant, rise\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ejust like a pilgrim longing to turn home,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo she instilled her gazing–through my eyes–52\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003einto my powers of fancy, and I too\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003estared at the sun more than our sight can bear.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith our weak powers on earth one may not do55\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewhat there one may–thanks to the special place\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ecreated as the proper home for man.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNot long could I sustain the brilliant rays58\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebefore they seemed to flash like sparks that play\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eround steel still white-hot from the forge’s blaze,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd suddenly it seemed that day and day61\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewere fused, as if the One who wields the might\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eadorned the heavens with a second sun.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eInto the everlasting wheels of light64\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBeatrice gazed with silent constancy;\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eon her I gazed, far from that central sight.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHer countenance had the same effect in me67\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eas did the plant that Glaucus tasted when\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eit made him share the godhood of the sea.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo signify man’s soaring beyond man70\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewords will not do: let my comparison\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esuffice for them for whom the grace of God\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eReserves the experience. If I bore alone73\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethat part of me which you created last,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eO Love that steers the heavens, you surely know,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor your light lifted me. And when the vast76\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewheel you have made eternal by desire\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eheld me intent to hear the harmony\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYou tune in all its parts, the sunlight-fire79\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003elit so much of the sky, no flooding stream\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eor rain could ever fill so broad a lake.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe newness of the sound, the swelling gleam82\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003elighted desire in me to learn their cause–\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ekeener than any appetite I’d known.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd she, who saw within me what I was,85\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto still the troubled waters of my soul,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eopened her lips before I could inquire,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd thus began: “You’re making your mind dull88\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewith false imagining–you don’t perceive\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewhat you would see, if you could shake it off.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYou are not on the earth, as you believe.91\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLightning that flees its proper realm is not\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eso swift as your returning to your own.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI admit I was shorn of my first doubt94\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eby the brief words she flashed me with a smile,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebut in another net my feet were caught:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“My first amazement is at peace–but still97\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI am amazed that I should rise so high,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebeyond the lightness of the air and fire.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe turned her eyes to me then with a sigh100\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof pity, as a mother in distress\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewhose child is ill and talks deliriously,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo she made matters plain: “All things possess103\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eorder amongst themselves: this order is\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethe form that makes the world resemble God.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThence the high beings read the signs, the trace106\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eof that eternal Power who is the end\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efor which the form is set in time and place.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAll natures in this order lean and tend109\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eeach in distinctive manner to its Source,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003esome to approach more near and others less–\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhence from their various ports all creatures move112\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eon the great sea of being, with each one\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eferried by instinct given from above.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis is what makes the fire rise toward the moon;115\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethis, the prime mover of the mortal heart;\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethis makes the heavy earth condense in one;\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNor does this bow with target-cleaving art118\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003estrike only things that lack intelligence,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebut beings made with intellect and love.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe glorious world-ordaining providence121\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eforever stills the highest heaven with light,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebeyond the spinning of the swiftest sphere,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd to that place as to our destined site124\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewe’re speeded by the power of that cord\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eshooting each arrow in its happy flight.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOften it’s true a form may not accord127\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ewith the intent of him who works the art\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ebecause the matter’s deaf and won’t respond:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo, from this course, a creature may depart130\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eif it should have the power, despite the push,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eto swerve away and veer off from its start,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd as you’ll see a fall of lightning flash133\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003efrom the high clouds, so cheating pleasures skew\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethat first urge, and they plunge it to the earth.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNo more amazement should it bring to you136\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ethat you ascend, than if a mountain stream\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eshould tumble rushing to the plains below.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut it would be a cause of just surprise139\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eif, free of every bar, you should remain\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003elike a still flame on earth, and not arise.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen to the heavens she turned her gaze again.142A new translation by Anthony Esolen; 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