me two old men, dignified and grave,
St. Paul and St. Luke, who are followed by four others representing
other books of the New Testament viz., the Epistles of St. James, St.
Peter, St. John and St. Jude. The rear guard is an aged Solitary
symbolic of the Apocalypse.

"And when the chariot was opposite to me" writes Dante, "a clap of
thunder was heard; and those worthy folk seemed to have their further
march forbidden, and halted there with the first ensign" (XXIX, 153).

What is the meaning of this symbolic procession so common to Dante's
day, so alien to ours? We have already said that it is a dramatic
representation of the human race finding happiness, finding its Eden in
its membership in the Church. But it, also, is a symbolic lesson for the
individual. Dante, the type of humanity having done penance for his
sins, is about to be received through the sacrament of penance into the
soul of the Church i.e. into the full communion of grace. It is
fitting, therefore, that the Church should advance to meet him, the
repentant sinner, and should reveal itself to him before receiving him
into its bosom.

If objection be made that Dante already has been absolved from sin and
in Purgatory has made expiation for his offences, the answer is given by
Ozanam; "At the term of the expiatory course, as at its beginning, to
quit it as well as to enter upon it, we must render submission to a
religious authority and fulfill the conditions without which God does
not treat with us--confession for oblivion, fears for consolation and
shame for definitive rehabilitation." When the pageant comes to a halt
the participants group themselves about the Griffin and the Chariot, by
that act declaring that the goal and object of their desires are
centered in Christ and His Church. Then one of the company by divine
command calls aloud three times to a heavenly being, the spouse of the
Church, to appear and the cry is repeated by the whole company. From the
Chariot arise, as will arise the dead from their graves, a hundred
angels scattering flowers over and around the Chariot and also raising
their voices in the call for the Heavenly Bride. They first sing the
words of the Canticle of Palm Sunday. _Benedictus qui venis_ (Blessed
art thou who comest) and then the beautiful line from the Aeneid:
_Manibus o date lilia plenis_ (Oh! give lilies with full hands). Then
comes from the clouds through the midst of the flowers showering down
again within and