, the
shadows fled away on every side, and my sleep with them; whereupon I
rose, seeing my great Masters already risen. "That pleasant apple which
through so many branches the care of mortals goes seeking, to-day shall
put in peace thy hungerings." Virgil used words such as these toward me,
and never were there gifts which could be equal in pleasure to these.
Such wish upon wish came to me to be above, that at every step
thereafter I felt the feathers growing for my flight.

When beneath us all the stairway had been run, and we were on the
topmost step, Virgil fixed his eyes on me, and said, "The temporal fire
and the eternal thou hast seen, son, and art come to a place where of
myself no further onward I discern. I have brought thee here with
understanding and with art: thine own pleasure now take thou for guide;
forth art thou from the steep ways, forth art thou from the narrow. See
there the sun, which on thy front doth shine; see the young grass, the
flowers, the shrubs, which here the earth of itself alone produces.
Until rejoicing come the beautiful eyes which weeping made me come to
thee, thou canst sit down and thou canst go among them. Expect no more
or word or sign from me. Free, upright, and sane is thine own free will,
and it would be wrong not to act according to its pleasure; wherefore
thee over thyself I crown and mitre."

CANTOS XXX AND XXXI

THE MEETING WITH HIS LADY IN THE EARTHLY PARADISE

[Beatrice appears.--Departure of Virgil.--Reproof of Dante by
Beatrice.--Confession of Dante.--Passage of Lethe.--Unveiling of
Beatrice.]

When the septentrion of the first heaven,[20] which never setting knew,
nor rising, nor veil of other cloud than sin,--and which was making
every one there acquainted with his duty, as the lower[21] makes whoever
turns the helm to come to port,--stopped still, the truthful people who
had come first between the griffon and it, turned to the chariot as to
their peace, and one of them, as if sent from heaven, singing, cried
thrice, "Veni, sponsa, de Libano" [Come with me from Lebanon, my
spouse], and all the others after.

As the blessed at the last trump will arise swiftly, each from his tomb,
singing Hallelujah with recovered voice, so upon the divine chariot, _ad
vocem tanti senis_ [at the voice of so great an elder], rose up a
hundred ministers and messengers of life eternal. All were saying,
"Benedictus, qui venis" [Blessed thou that comest], and,