the Elect.

Beatrice leads the poet into the center of the Heavenly Rose.

"Into the yellow of the Rose Eternal
That spreads, and multiplies, and breathes an odor
Of praise unto the ever-vernal Sun,
As one who silent is and fain would speak,
Me Beatrice drew on, and said: 'Behold
Of the white stoles how vast the convent is!
Behold how vast the circuit of our city!
Behold our seats so filled to overflowing,
That here henceforward are few people wanting!'"
(XXX, 124.)

While Dante gazes on the supernatural spectacle Beatrice slips away to
take her place the third seat below the throne of the Blessed Virgin. As
his guide she has led him to the highest Heaven and has instructed him
in all that concerns God and His attributes. Her mission as Revelation
or Divine Science being finished, she withdraws and sends St. Bernard to
bring the poet into intimate union with the Godhead.

"The general form of Paradise already
My glance had comprehended as a whole,
In no part hitherto remaining fixed,
And round I turned me with rekindled wish
My lady to interrogate of things
Concerning which my mind was in suspense.
One thing I meant, another answered me;
I thought I should see Beatrice, and saw
An Old Man habited like the glorious people.
O'er flowing was he in his eyes and cheeks
With joy benign, in attitude of pity
As to a tender father is becoming.
And 'She, where is she?' instantly I said;
Whence he: 'To put an end to thy desire,
Me Beatrice hath sent from mine own place.
And if thou lookest up to the third round
Of the first rank, again shalt thou behold her
Upon the throne her merits have assigned her.'
Without reply I lifted up mine eyes,
And saw her, as she made herself a crown
Reflecting from herself the eternal rays.
Not from that region which the highest thunders
Is any mortal eye so far removed,
In whatsoever sea it deepest sinks,
As there from Beatrice my sight; but this
Was nothing unto me; because her image
Descended not to me by medium blurred."
(XXXI, 52.)

St. Bernard, the mystic, celebrating the Blessed Virgin's praises in a
marvelous outburst of song, unsurpassed for lyrical beauty, beseeches
her intercession that Dante may see God face to face.

"Now doth this man, who from the lowest depth
Of the universe as far as here has seen
One after one the spiritual lives,
Supplicate