the other gods, and therefore it is no use
to imagine that Saturn shows him the way except by following him. Now
must we find out, whether Love appears and makes himself known
externally, whether his home is the soul itself, his bed the heart
itself, and whether he consists of the same composition as our own
substance, the same impulse as our own powers. Finally everything
naturally desires the beautiful and the good, and therefore it is
useless to argue and discuss, because the affection informs and confirms
itself, and in one instant desire joins itself to the desirable, as the
sight to the visible.

XI.

CES. Let us see here, what is the meaning of that burning arrow, around
which is the legend: Cui nova plaga loco? Explain what part does this
seek to wound?

MAR. Read the sonnet which says:--

51.

That all the ears of corn that may be reaped
In burning Apuleia, or sunbrowned Lybia,
With all that they unto the winds entrust,
Or that the rays from the great planet sent,
Should number those sad pains of my glad soul,
Which she from those two burning stars receives
With mournful joy in sweetest agony,
Forbid me Sense and Reason to believe.
What would'st thou more, sweet foe?
What wish is that which moves thee still to hurt,
Since this my heart of but one wound is made?
So that there lies no part that now may be
By thee or others printed, stabbed, or pierced,
Turn thee aside, turn otherwhere thy bow,
For thou dost waste thy powers, oh beauteous god!
In slaying him who lies already dead.

The meaning of all this is metaphorical, like the rest, and may be
understood in the same sense as that. Here the number of darts which
have wounded and do wound the heart, signify the innumerable individuals
and species of things, in which shine the splendour of Divine Beauty,
according to their degrees, and whence the affection for the good, well
proposed and well apprehended warms us. The which through the causes of
potentiality and actuality, of possibility and of effect, crucify and
console, give the sense of sweetness and also make the bitter to be
felt. But where the entire affection is all turned towards God, that is
towards the Idea of Ideas, from the light of intelligible things, the
mind becomes exalted to the super-essential unity, and, all love, all
one, it feels itself no longer solicited by various objects, which
distract it, but is one sole wo