Chapter XVII

.

[741] _Conv._ ii. 13. The symbolism inherent in all human mental processes seems indicated by the argument of Aquinas (_ante_, p. 466) that the mind knows “the particular through sense and imagination; ... it must turn itself to images in order to behold the universal nature existing in the

## particular.” This is a necessity of our half material nature.

[742] _Convito_ ii. 1. Letter to Can Grande, par. 7.

[743] In the Can Grande letter, having stated this fourfold significance, Dante does _not_ proceed to exemplify it in the interpretation which follows of the opening lines of the _Paradiso_. Possibly those lines did not admit of the fourfold interpretation; yet, in general, Dante does not try to carry it out in practice, any more than other mediaeval writers commonly.

[744] _Convito_ ii. ch. 14 and 15.

[745] Doubtless the commentator habit is fixed in the nature of man; but it was pre-eminently mediaeval. We have seen enough elsewhere of the multiplication of Commentaries on the _Sentences_ of the Lombard and other scholastic works. Dante’s friend, Guido Cavalcanti, wrote a little poem beginning _Donna mi priego_, upon which we have eight Commentaries, the first from Egidio Colonna in 1316.

[746] Yet, however obvious the meaning, tying the pole of the Chariot to the Tree of Life was a great stroke (_Purg._ xxxii. 49).

[747] There is a piece of allegory in the _Paradiso_ which almost gets on one’s nerves, _i.e._ the ceaseless whirling of the blessed spirits, usually in wheel formations: _e.g._ _Par._ xii. 3; xxi. 81; xxiv. 10 _sqq._: cf. x. 145; xiii. 20.

[748] One notes that all the symbolizing personages of the poem--Virgil, Statius, Matilda, Lia, Beatrice--have literal reality, however subtle or far-reaching may be the allegorical intendment with which the poet has invested them.

[749] See _e.g._ _Par._ xxxi. 67.

[750] Cf. De Sanctis, _Storia della letteratura italiana_, i. p. 46 _sqq._

[751] Compare _Purg._ xxvii. 34 _sqq._; xxx.; xxxi.; _Par._ xviii. 13 _sqq._; xxiii.; xxx.; xxxi.; xxxii. 8.

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