Paradiso

Canto I

• “…I saw things that he who from that height descends, forgets or can not speak; for nearing its desired end, our intellect sinks into an abyss so deep that memory fails to follow it.”
• “Therefore, these natures move to different ports across the mighty sea of being, each given the impulse that will bear it on. This impulse carries fire to the moon; this is the motive force in mortal creatures; this binds the earth together, makes it one.”

Canto II

• “Because of the glad nature of its source, the power mingled with a sphere shines forth, as gladness, through the living pupil, shines. From this, and not from matter rare or dense, derive the differences from light to light; this is the forming principle, producing, conforming with its worth, the dark, the bright.”

  • Beatrice’s rebuttal to the moon’s dark/light spots being due to differences in density. A light lies beyond the material topology—and what unfolded the material in the first place? Some organizing principle…

Canto IV

• “…our doubting blossoms like a shoot out from the root of truth; this natural urge spurs us toward the peak, from height to height.”

Canto V

• “…thus you may draw, as consequence, the high worth of a vow, when what is pledged with your consent encounters God’s consent; for when a pact is drawn between a man and God, then through free will, a man gives up what I have called his treasure, his free will.”

  • In a vow freely consented to, we sacrifice that freedom. And is that act of submission the most free act we can engage with…a divine freedom rather than mortal, fleshy freedom? Therein lies its value…

Canto XI

• “One prince was all seraphic in his ardor; the other, for his wisdom, had possessed the splendour of cherubic light on earth. I shall devote my tale to one, because in praising either one praises both: the labors of the two were toward one goal.”

Canto XVI

• “The blind bull falls more quickly, more headlong, than does the blind lamb.”

Canto XVII

• “Contingency, while not extending past the book in which your world of matter has been writ, is yet in the Eternal Vision all depicted (but this does not imply necessity, just as a ship that sails downstream is not determined by the eye that watches it.”
• “For if, at the first taste, your words molest, they will, when they have been digested, end as living nourishment.”