# Divine Comedy (Longfellow 1867)/Volume 3/Canto 25

If e'er it happen that the Poem Sacred,  To which both heaven and earth have set their hand,  So that it many a year hath made me lean,
O'ercome the cruelty that bars me out  From the fair sheepfold, where a lamb I slumbered,  An enemy to the wolves that war upon it,
With other voice forthwith, with other fleece  Poet will I return, and at my font  Baptismal will I take the laurel crown;
Because into the Faith that maketh known  All souls to God there entered I, and then  Peter for her sake thus my brow encircled.
Thereafterward towards us moved a light  Out of that band whence issued the first-fruits  Which of his vicars Christ behind him left,
And then my Lady, full of ecstasy,  Said unto me: "Look, look! behold the Baron  For whom below Galicia is frequented."
In the same way as, when a dove alights  Near his companion, both of them pour forth,  Circling about and murmuring, their affection,
So one beheld I by the other grand  Prince glorified to be with welcome greeted,  Lauding the food that there above is eaten.
But when their gratulations were complete,  Silently 'coram me' each one stood still,  So incandescent it o'ercame my sight.
Smiling thereafterwards, said Beatrice:  "Illustrious life, by whom the benefactions  Of our Basilica have been described,
Make Hope resound within this altitude;  Thou knowest as oft thou dost personify it  As Jesus to the three gave greater clearness."--
"Lift up thy head, and make thyself assured;  For what comes hither from the mortal world  Must needs be ripened in our radiance."
This comfort came to me from the second fire;  Wherefore mine eyes I lifted to the hills,  Which bent them down before with too great weight.
"Since, through his grace, our Emperor wills that thou  Shouldst find thee face to face, before thy death,  In the most secret chamber, with his Counts,
So that, the truth beholden of this court,  Hope, which below there rightfully enamours,  Thereby thou strengthen in thyself and others,
Say what it is, and how is flowering with it  Thy mind, and say from whence it came to thee."  Thus did the second light again continue.
And the Compassionate, who piloted  The plumage of my wings in such high flight,  Did in reply anticipate me thus:
"No child whatever the Church Militant  Of greater hope possesses, as is written  In that Sun which irradiates all our band;
Therefore it is conceded him from Egypt  To come into Jerusalem to see,  Or ever yet his warfare be completed.
The two remaining points, that not for knowledge  Have been demanded, but that he report  How much this virtue unto thee is pleasing,
To him I leave; for hard he will not find them,  Nor of self-praise; and let him answer them;  And may the grace of God in this assist him!"
As a disciple, who his teacher follows,  Ready and willing, where he is expert,  That his proficiency may be displayed,
"Hope," said I, "is the certain expectation  Of future glory, which is the effect  Of grace divine and merit precedent.
From many stars this light comes unto me;  But he instilled it first into my heart  Who was chief singer unto the chief captain.
'Sperent in te,' in the high Theody  He sayeth, 'those who know thy name;' and who  Knoweth it not, if he my faith possess?
Thou didst instil me, then, with his instilling  In the Epistle, so that I am full,  And upon others rain again your rain."
While I was speaking, in the living bosom  Of that combustion quivered an effulgence,  Sudden and frequent, in the guise of lightning;
Then breathed: "The love wherewith I am inflamed  Towards the virtue still which followed me  Unto the palm and issue of the field,
Wills that I breathe to thee that thou delight  In her; and grateful to me is thy telling  Whatever things Hope promises to thee."
And I: "The ancient Scriptures and the new  The mark establish, and this shows it me,  Of all the souls whom God hath made his friends.
Isaiah saith, that each one garmented  In his own land shall be with twofold garments,  And his own land is this delightful life.
Thy brother, too, far more explicitly,  There where he treateth of the robes of white,  This revelation manifests to us."
And first, and near the ending of these words,  "Sperent in te" from over us was heard,  To which responsive answered all the carols.
Thereafterward a light among them brightened,  So that, if Cancer one such crystal had,  Winter would have a month of one sole day.
And as uprises, goes, and enters the dance  A winsome maiden, only to do honour  To the new bride, and not from any failing,
Even thus did I behold the brightened splendour  Approach the two, who in a wheel revolved  As was beseeming to their ardent love.
Into the song and music there it entered;  And fixed on them my Lady kept her look,  Even as a bride silent and motionless.
"This is the one who lay upon the breast  Of him our Pelican; and this is he  To the great office from the cross elected."
My Lady thus; but therefore none the more  Did move her sight from its attentive gaze  Before or afterward these words of hers.
Even as a man who gazes, and endeavours  To see the eclipsing of the sun a little,  And who, by seeing, sightless doth become,
So I became before that latest fire,  While it was said, "Why dost thou daze thyself  To see a thing which here hath no existence?
Earth in the earth my body is, and shall be  With all the others there, until our number  With the eternal proposition tallies.
With the two garments in the blessed cloister  Are the two lights alone that have ascended:  And this shalt thou take back into your world."
And at this utterance the flaming circle  Grew quiet, with the dulcet intermingling  Of sound that by the trinal breath was made,
As to escape from danger or fatigue  The oars that erst were in the water beaten  Are all suspended at a whistle's sound.
Ah, how much in my mind was I disturbed,  When I turned round to look on Beatrice,  That her I could not see, although I was
Close at her side and in the Happy World!