Paradiso: Canto XXXI -- We Lose Beatrice!

From the moment he first set eyes on her, he could not let her go. Now that she's brought him to the throne of God, Beatrice leaves his side and resumes her throne, a throne near where he, too, will sit when he arrives in glory following his own death. For this reason, he cannot bemoan the fact that she's no longer by his side -- surrounded by the blessed and in tune with the bliss of Mary, Dante succumbs to the ultimate vision, divine revelation having led him to it and fulfilled its purpose. He remarks that it was "through [her] power and [her] excellence alone/ [that he] recognized the goodness and the grace/ inherent in the things [he had] been shown" (82-4). After his prayer to her, she smiles at him and looks back into the Fountainhead of all things, and that is the last we know of her. Dante's attention then turns from St. Bernard toward Mary, where it will remain until the power wells within him to experience the direct vision of God.



Now, while we may miss Beatrice at this point, we have to admit that she was a real shrew to have around. If courage is endurance of pain, as Aristotle suggests, then Dante's journey toward Beatrice, through Hell and up Purgatory, was an exercise in courage, for it was a painful as well as fulfilling journey, and when he finally reached her, she emasculated him through her tirade about his conduct toward her memory. Even so, Beatice is the reason we came on this trip and was the conduit through which we got to this point where we're now standing and staring at the Blessed Virgin, the second Eve. We got here because it was in our capacity to do so, and each of us, like St. Pedro de San José Betancur, has the courage within us to reach our fullest capacity in our orientation to God -- regardless of the path we take to reach him, through a greater or lesser charismatic emphasis on erudition or works or faith, hope, and love.

S.