One perfect hour.
And, though too soon you die,
In your dust glows
Something the passer-by
Knows was a Rose."

Monte Cassino is one of the most interesting inland points in Southern
Italy,--the monastery lying on the crest of a hill nearly two thousand
feet above the sea. Dante alludes to this in his Paradiso (XXII,
XXXVII), and in the prose translation made by that eminent Dantean
scholar, Professor Charles Eliot Norton, this assurance of Beatrice to
Dante is thus rendered:--

"That mountain on whose slope Cassino is, was of old frequented on
its summit by the deluded and ill-disposed people, and I am he who
first carried up thither the name of Him who brought to earth the
truth which so high exalts us; and such grace shone upon me that I
drew away the surrounding villages from the impious worship which
seduced the world. Those other fires were all contemplative men,
kindled by that heat which brings to birth holy flowers and fruits.
Here is Macarius, here is Romuald, here are my brothers, who within
the cloisters fixed their feet, and held a steadfast heart. And I
to him, 'The affection which thou displayest in speaking with me,
and the good semblance which I see and note in all your ardors,
have so expanded my confidence as the sun does the rose, when she
becomes open so much as she has power to be. Therefore I pray thee,
and do thou, father, assure me if I have power to receive so much
grace, that I may see thee with uncovered shape.' Whereon he,
'Brother, thy high desire shall be fulfilled in the last sphere,
where are fulfilled all others and my own. There perfect, mature,
and whole is every desire; in that alone is every part there where
it always was: for it is not in space, and hath not poles; and our
stairway reaches up to it, wherefore thus from thy sight it
conceals itself. Far up as there the patriarch Jacob saw it stretch
its topmost part when it appeared to him so laden with Angels. But
now no one lifts his feet from earth to ascend it; and my rule is
remaining as waste of paper. The walls, which used to be an abbey,
have become caves; and the cowls are sacks full of bad meal. But
heavy usury is not gathered in so greatly against the pleasure of
God, as that fruit which makes the heart of monks so foolish. For
whatsoever the Church guards is