St. Bernard, absorbed in contemplation of the Virgin.
Eve. St. Augustine, Serm. 18 De Sanctis, says : "Illa percussit, ista sanavit."
Rachel is an emblem of Divine Contemplation. Inf. II. 101, Beatrice says:--
"And came unto the place
Where I was sitting with the ancient Rachel."
Ruth the Moabitess, ancestress of King David.
"Have mercy upon me," are the first words of Psalm Ii., "a Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came unto him."
The saints of the Old Testament.
The saints of the New Testament.
John the Baptist, seated at the point of the mystic Rose, opposite to the Virgin Mary. He died two years before Christ's resurrection, and during these two years was in the Limbo of the Fathers.
The row of seats which divides the Rose horizontal]y, and crosses the two vertical lines of division, made by the seat of the Virgin Mary and those of the other Hebrew women on one side, and on the other the seats of John the Baptist and of the other saints of the New Testament beneath him.
That is to say, by the faith of their parents, by circumcision, and by baptism, as explained line 76 et seq.
Festinata gente, dying in infancy, and thus hurried into the life eternal
Shakespeare, King Lear, Iii. 7 : "Advise the Duke, where you are going to a most festinate preparation."
Jacob and Esau. Genesis xxv. 22: "And the children struggled together within her." And Romans ix. II : "For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God, according to election, might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth."
Buti comments thus : "As it pleased God to give black hair to one, and to the other red, so it pleased him to give more grace to one than to the other." And the Ottimo says: "One was red, the other black; which colours denote the temperaments of men, and accordingly the inclination of their minds."
The keenness of vision with which they are originally endowed.
From Adam to Abraham.
From Abraham to Christ. Genesis xvii. 10: "This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you, and thy seed after thee: Every man-child among you shall be circumcised."
The face of the Virgin Mary. Didron, in his Christ Iconog., I. 242,
devotes a chapter to the "History of the Portraits of God the Son." Besides the Veronica and the Santo Volto, attributed to Nicodemus, he mentions others which tradition traces back to Pilate and St. Luke, and a statue erected to Christ by the woman who was cured of the bloody flux. In the following extract several others are referred to:--
"Abgarus, king of Edessa, having learnt, says Damascenus, the wonderful things related of our Saviour, became inflamed with Divine love; he sent ambassadors to the Son of God, inviting him to come and visit him, and should the Saviour refuse to grant his request, he charged his ambassadors to employ some artist to make a portrait of our Lord. Jesus, from whom nothing is hidden, and to whom nothing is impossible, being aware of the intention of Abgarus, took a piece of linen, applied it to his face, and depicted thereon his own image. This very portrait, continues Damascenus, is in existence at the present day, and in perfect preservation.
"At the same epoch, a minute verbal description of the appearance of Christ was in circulation. The following description, which is of great importance, was sent to the Roman Senate by Publius Lentulus, Proconsul of Judea, before Herod. Lentulus had seen the Saviour, and had made him sit to him, as it were, that he might give a written description of his features and physiognomy. His portrait, apocryphal though it be, is at least one of the first upon record; it dates from the earliest period of the Church, and has been mentioned by the most ancient fathers. Lentulus writes to the Senate as follows: 'At this time appeared a man who is still living and endowed with mighty power ; his name is Jesus Christ. His disciples call him the Son of God; others regard him as a powerful prophet. He raises the dead to life, and heals the sick of every description of infirmity and disease. This man is of lofty stature, and well-proportioned; his countenance severe and virtuous, so that he inspires beholders with feelings both of fear and love. The hair of his head is of the colour of wine, and from the top of the head to the ears straight and without radiance, but it descends from the ears to the shoulders in shining curls. From
the shoulders the hair flows down the back, divided into two portions, after the manner of the Nazarenes ; his forehead is clear and without wrinkle, his face free from blemish, and slightly tinged with red, his physiognomy noble and gracious. The nose and mouth faultless. His beard is abundant, the same colour as the hair, and forked. His eyes blue and very brilliant. In reproving or censuring he is awe-inspiring; in exhorting and teaching, his speech is gentle and caressing. His countenance is marvellous in seriousness and grace. He has never once been seen to laugh ; but many have seen him weep He is slender in person, his hands are straight and long, his arms beautiful. Grave and solemn in his discourse, his language is simple and quiet. He is in appearance the most beautiful of the children of men.'
"The Emperor Constantine caused pictures of the Son of God to be painted from this ancient description.
"In the eighth century, at the period in which Saint John Damascenus wrote, the lineaments of this remarkable figure continued to be the same as they are to this day.
"The hair and the beard, the colour which is somewhat undetermined in the letter of Lentulus, for wine may be pale, golden, red; or violet colour, is distinctly noted by Damascenus, who also adds the tint of the complexion ; moreover, the opinion of Damascenus, like that of Lentulus, is decidedly in favour of the beauty of Christ, and the former severely censures the Manicheans, who entertained a contrary opinion. Thus, then, Christ, in taking upon him the form of Adam, assumed features exactly resembling those of the Virgin Mary . . . . . . . .In the West, a century later than the time of Damascenus, Christ was always thus depicted. S. Anschaire, Archbishop of Hamburg and Bremen, who beheld Christ [in a vision], described him as 'tall, clad in the manner of the Jews, and beautiful in face, the splendour of Divinity darted like a flame from the eyes of the Redeemer, but his voice was full of sweetness."
The Angel Gabriel. Luke i. 28: "And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee : blessed art thou among women."
The countenance of each saint became brighter.
The word in the original is abbelliva, which Dante here uses in the sense of the Provencal, abellis, of Purg. XXVI. 140. He uses the word in the same sense in Convito, II.7 : "In all speech the speaker is chiefly bent on persuasion, that is, on pleasing the audience, all' abbellire dell' audienza, which is the source of all other persuasions."
" The star of morning delighting in the sun, is from Canto VIII. 12, where Dante speaks of Venus as
"The star
That wooes, the sun, now following, now in front."
The Virgin Mary, the Queen of this empire.
Adam.
St. Peter.
St. John, who lived till the evil days and persecutions of the Church, the bride of Christ, won by the crucifixion.
Moses.
Exodus xxxii. 9: "And the Lord said unto Moses, I have seen this people, and, behold, it is a stiff-necked people."
133. Anna, mother of the Virgin Mary.
Santa Lucia, virgin and martyr. Dante, Inf. II. 100, makes her, as the emblem of illuminating grace, intercede with Beatrice for his salvation.
Trusting only to thine own efforts.