and they cause
  That the offences cannot be excused.

Will absolute consenteth not to evil;
  But in so far consenteth as it fears,
  If it refrain, to fall into more harm.

Hence when Piccarda uses this expression,
  She meaneth the will absolute, and I
  The other, so that both of us speak truth."

Such was the flowing of the holy river
  That issued from the fount whence springs all truth;
  This put to rest my wishes one and all.

"O love of the first lover, O divine,"
  Said I forthwith, "whose speech inundates me
  And warms me so, it more and more revives me,

My own affection is not so profound
  As to suffice in rendering grace for grace;
  Let Him, who sees and can, thereto respond.

Well I perceive that never sated is
  Our intellect unless the Truth illume it,
  Beyond which nothing true expands itself.

It rests therein, as wild beast in his lair,
  When it attains it; and it can attain it;
  If not, then each desire would frustrate be.

Therefore springs up, in fashion of a shoot,
  Doubt at the foot of truth; and this is nature,
  Which to the top from height to height impels us.

This doth invite me, this assurance give me
  With reverence, Lady, to inquire of you
  Another truth, which is obscure to me.

I wish to know if man can satisfy you
  For broken vows with other good deeds, so
  That in your balance they will not be light."

Beatrice gazed upon me with her eyes
  Full of the sparks of love, and so divine,
  That, overcome my power, I turned my back

And almost lost myself with eyes downcast.

Paradiso: Canto V

"If in the heat of love I flame upon thee
  Beyond the measure that on earth is seen,
  So that the valour of thine eyes I vanquish,

Marvel thou not thereat; for this proceeds
  From perfect sight, which as it apprehends
  To the good apprehended moves its feet.

Well I perceive how is already shining
  Into thine intellect the eternal light,
  That only seen enkindles always love;

And if some other thing your love seduce,
  'Tis nothing but a vestige of the same,
  Ill understood, which there is shining through.

Thou fain wouldst know if with another service
  For broken vow can such return be made
  As to secure the soul from further claim."

This Canto thus did Beatrice begin;
  And, as a man who breaks not off his speech,
  Continued thus her holy argument:

"The greatest gift that in his largess God
  Creating made, and unto his own goodness
  Nearest conformed, and that which he doth prize

Most highly, is the freedom of the will,
  Wherewith the creatures of intelligence
  Both all and only were and are endowed.

Now wilt thou see, if thence thou reasonest,
  The high worth of a vow, if it he made
  So that when thou consentest God consents:

For, closing between God and man the compact,
  A sacrifice is of this treasure made,
  Such as I say, and made by its own act.

What can be rendered then as compensation?
  Think'st thou to make good use of what thou'st offered,
  With gains ill gotten thou wouldst do good deed.

Now art thou certain of the greater point;
  But because Holy Church in this dispenses,
  Which seems against the truth which I have shown thee,

Behoves thee still to sit awhile at table,
  Because the solid food which thou hast taken
  Requireth further aid for thy digestion.

Open thy mind to that which I reveal,
  And fix it there within; for 'tis not knowledge,
  The having heard without retaining it.

In the essence of this sacrifice two things
  Convene together; and the one is that
  Of which 'tis made, the other is the agreement.

This last for evermore is cancelled not
  Unless complied with, and concerning this
  With such precision has above been spoken.

Therefore it was enjoined upon the Hebrews
  To offer still, though sometimes what was offered
  Might be commuted, as thou ought'st to know.

The other, which is known to thee as matter,
  May well indeed be such that one errs not
  If it for other matter be exchanged.

But let none shift the burden on his shoulder
  At his arbitrament, without the turning
  Both of the white and of the yellow key;

And every permutation deem as foolish,
  If in the substitute the thing relinquished,
  As the four is in six, be not contained.

Therefore whatever thing has so great weight
  In value that it drags down every balance,
  Cannot be satisfied with other spending.

Let mortals never take a vow in jest;
  Be faithful and not blind in doing that,
  As Jephthah was in his first offering,

Whom more beseemed to say, 'I have done wrong,
  Than to do worse by keeping; and as foolish
  Thou the great leader of the Greeks wilt find,

Whence wept Iphigenia her fair face,
  And made for her both wise and simple weep,
  Who heard such kind of worship spoken of.'

Christians, be ye more serious in your movements;
  Be ye not like a feather at each wind,
  And think not every water washes you.

Ye have the Old and the New Testament,
  And the Pastor of the Church who guideth you
  Let this suffice you unto your salvation.

If evil appetite cry aught else to you,
  Be ye as men, and not as silly sheep,
  So that the Jew among you may not mock you.

Be ye not as the lamb that doth abandon
  Its mother's milk, and frolicsome and simple
  Combats at its own pleasure with itself."

Thus Beatrice to me even as I write it;
  Then all desireful turned herself again
  To that part where the world is most alive.

Her silence and her change of countenance
  Silence imposed upon my eager mind,
  That had already in advance new questions;

And as an arrow that upon the mark
  Strikes ere the bowstring quiet hath become,
  So did we speed into the second realm.

My Lady there so joyful I beheld,
  As into the brightness of that heaven she entered,
  More luminous thereat the planet grew;

And if the star itself was changed and smiled,
  What became I, who by my nature am
  Exceeding mutable in every guise!

As, in a fish-pond which is pure and tranquil,
  The fishes draw to that which from without
  Comes in such fashion that their food they deem it;

So I beheld more than a thousand splendours
  Drawing towards us, and in each was heard:
  "Lo, this is she who