The symbolism of the spheres assigned in Paradise to the different saints is partly drawn from astrological ideas, for in Venus Dante meets the lovers, in Mars the warriors, in Jupiter the just rulers. But those who were not eternally faithful to their vows are in the moon because she has the lowest sphere,[725] the contemplative saints are in the highest planet, the theologians who enlightened the faithful are in the sun, and the ambitious are in the little planet which ever keeps closest to the sun. The heaven of “many and diverse stars” shows the poet a host of saints, and the Primum Mobile, which controls the movement of the other spheres, reveals to him the Angels who direct them.
It seems, then, that Dante was not interested in technical astrology, and had never made a study of it; and I think we may adduce this additional evidence that he had not learned astronomy in a university, or under Cecco d’Ascoli. It is only necessary to look at the list of books prescribed at Bologna[726] to feel sure that Dante had not taken a regular course there. The list, it is true, belongs to a somewhat later time, but there is no reason to suppose that astrology became of more importance in the late fourteenth century than at its beginning.
Nevertheless, however little Dante may have cared for the details of astrology, we shall never understand all that the skies meant to him unless we realize that a general belief in their influence on man was deeply rooted in his mind. For him it was a tremendous fact, and one which pervades his writings, that stars and spheres are the instruments of God’s providence, and are ordained by the First Mover to mould the destinies of Earth.[727] It is their movements which manifest His Will;[728] they are the hammers,[729] earth the metal, they are the seals,[730] and earth the wax.
Three times the stars are invoked to bring justice and righteousness on earth.[731] Through the spheres the elements were evolved out of the first chaotic matter, and everything on earth took form; all life and motion is generated by them.[732] Man’s soul is a direct creation by God, but the moving heavens play an important part in the formation of his material body, his mental faculties, and his disposition.[733] Were it not for the action of the spheres, children would be precisely like their parents, their whole nature being governed by the law of heredity alone: it is the different influences of the skies that give them different natures.[734] This, says Beatrice, is perhaps what Plato meant when he said that souls came from different stars and returned thither: if his meaning was that the influences of the stars is so great that to them is due the praise or blame which we distribute to men, there is some truth in the saying.[735]
Some truth only—“alcun vero”; for the stars are not independent powers, for good or evil, which men are unable to resist. This view is expressly combated in Purg. xvi. 58-84. Dante has asked the spirit of the courtly Venetian Marco Lombardo why the world is so full of wickedness now, for some say it is the effect of the heavens, and others seek an earthly cause. Marco groans at the blindness of men, who accuse heaven for the results of their own misdeeds: it is true that the heavens influence our lower natures, our instincts, and desires; but the soul is free, and can control them. This is in accordance with the teaching of St. Augustine and Aquinas. In one passage of the De Monarchia, Dante goes even further than this, and asserts that the influences of the spheres are only good, and that evil results from imperfections in the material on which these perfect instruments work.[736]
Conceptions such as these give us a new idea of mediæval astrology. They may be mistaken, but at least they are grand, and not unworthy of a philosopher and a Christian.
5. THE MOTIVE POWER.
Dante’s ideas regarding the laws and origin of motion in the universe were derived from Aristotelian metaphysics and Church doctrines. He believed that there were three kinds of motion proper to three kinds of bodies: i.e. heavy bodies tended towards the centre of the universe, which is also the centre of the earth; light bodies tended upwards to the region of fire just below the moon; and bodies of ethereal substance—the stars, planets, and spheres—moved eternally in circles round the centre. Thus Beatrice, when speaking of the instinct implanted in all created things, which bears them through the great ocean of being each to his destined haven, says:—
“Questi ne porta il foco inver la luna, * * * * * Questi la terra in sè stringe ed aduna.”[737]
And Virgil:—