But in th’ aspect of that felicitie,
Which they have written in their inward ey;
On which they feed, and in their fastened mynd
All happie joy and full contentment fynd.”
(ll. 270–290.)
According to Spenser, then, heavenly love is the love felt in the soul when the sight of wisdom in her beauty dawns upon the inner vision. It is a love gained through speculation; and though the object is conceived of as yonder in heaven, it is still the beauty which is seen here in the mind. (l. 17.) Instead of the poetical device of the Mount of Heavenly Contemplation used in the “Faerie Queene” to signify the refinement of the spiritual vision necessary to the sight of this heavenly wisdom, Spenser has been able to explain in detail the way along which the soul must travel to gain its goal. It is the dialectic of the “Symposium” (211), the progress through ever ascending gradations of beauty up to the first absolute beauty changed only in the externals as required by the Christian conception of the heavenly hierarchy. But throughout the long series of upward stages through which his mind passes, one may feel the quickening of his spirit at the thought of the highest beauty, in which lies the unity of the poem. In the contemplation of this heavenly beauty the poem begins and ends.
“Rapt with the rage of mine own ravisht thought,
Through contemplation of those goodly sights,
And glorious images in heaven wrought,
Whose wondrous beauty breathing sweet delights,