(II. i. 5, 6.)
The feeling of order is conveyed through the movements of Guyon’s charger. The Palmer
“ever with slow pace the knight did lead,
Who taught his trampling steed with equall steps to tread.”
(II. i. 7.)
Medina, when she welcomes Guyon to her castle, meets him
“Faire marching forth in honorable wize.”
(II. ii. 14.)
The clearest explanation, however, of Spenser’s conception of temperance as the condition of the soul’s excellence in the body is given in his reflection at the opening of the eleventh book of the second canto, which records the repulse of the bodily senses from the dwelling-place of Alma, or the soul. No war is so fierce as that of the passions with the soul.
“But in a body, which doth freely yeeld