“Questa primavera sempiterna Che notturno Ariete non dispoglia.”[236]
For although Aries may be seen during some part of the night in the greater part of the year, it is most emphatically a noctural sign when it rises as the sun sets, and remains above the horizon until he rises; this happens when the sun is in the opposite sign of Libra, which he enters at the autumnal equinox.
A rather curious passage in the Paradiso is incomprehensible unless we think of the sun’s path in the zodiac, and realize that Dante is comparing the brightness of the spirit of St. John in an indirect way with the brightness of the sun.
“Poscia tra esse un lume si schiarì, Sì che, se il Cancro avesse un tal cristallo, L’inverno avrebbe un mese d’un sol dì.”[237]
If a light as dazzling as this spirit were to shine forth in Cancer, there would be perpetual day for a whole month in winter. For when the sun entered Capricornus, which he does in December, he would be exactly opposite, so that as one light set the other would rise, and there would be no darkness until the sun passed into another sign.
To many similar instances the diagram ([p. 276]) will be found to supply a key, and some we shall have occasion to notice presently in another connection.
3. THE STARS.
If our poet did not love moonlight, there is no doubt that starlight was very dear to him. Never are stars spoken of as cold, or placed in antithesis to the sun. Rather are they classed together, as in the pathetic letter, written when he heard of the possibility that the Florentines might receive him again if he would consent to return as a disgraced but pardoned criminal. If this is the only path to Florence, never will he re-enter the beloved city. “What then?” he cries. “Can he not see the mirrors of the sun and of the stars, wherever he may be? can he not meditate on precious truths under any sky?”[238]
He describes the Inferno as bereft of stars as well as of sun;[239] he hopes to escape those dark abysses to see the beautiful stars again,[240] and the terror of the sounds of weeping and crying is heightened indescribably by the simple words:—“risonavan per l’aer senza stelle.”[241] When he does at length come forth to see “le cose belle che porta il ciel”[242] how eagerly he gazes, not only at Venus, but at the new stars in the south! how his “greedy eyes”[243] seek the same region as soon as dusk begins to fall! and how radiantly the stars look down upon him on that last night on the rocky slopes of the Mountain, near the summit![244]
This is all allegorical, no doubt, but it is because of Dante’s feeling for the real “belle stelle”[245] that he uses them as symbols of truth and holiness, and concludes each Cantica of the Divine Comedy with their name:—