Perhaps Dante would have argued that sazia expresses the satiety itself, so that the very superfluousness becomes a propriety.]

[Footnote 30: 

  “E come a buon cantor buon citarista
  Fa seguitar to guizzo de la corda
  In che piu di piacer lo canto acquista;

  Si, mentre che parlo, mi si ricorda,
  Ch’io vidi le due luci benedette,
  Pur come batter d’occhi si concorda,

  Con le parole muover le fiammette.” ]

[Footnote 31:  A corrector of clerical abuses, who, though a cardinal, and much employed in public affairs, preferred the simplicity of a private life.  He has left writings, the eloquence of which, according to Tiraboschi, is “worthy of a better age.”  Petrarch also makes honourable mention of him.  See Cary, ut sup. p. 169.  Dante lived a good while in the monastery of Catria, and is said to have finished his poem there.—­Lombardi in loc. vol.  III. p. 547.]

[Footnote 32:  The cardinal’s hat.]

[Footnote 33:  “Si che duo bestie van sott’ una pelle.”]

[Footnote 34: 

  “Dintorno a questa (voce) vennero e fermarsi,
  E fero un grido di si alto suono,
  Che non potrebbe qui assomigliarsi;

  Ne io lo ’ntesi, si mi vinse il tuono.”

  Around this voice they flocked, a mighty crowd,
  And raised a shout so huge, that earthly wonder
  Knoweth no likeness for a peal so loud;

  Nor could I hear the words, it spoke such thunder.

If a Longinus had written after Dante, he would have put this passage into his treatise on the Sublime.]

[Footnote 35:  Benedict, the founder of the order called after his name.  Macarius, an Egyptian monk and moralist.  Romoaldo, founder of the Camaldoli.]

[Footnote 36:  The reader of English poetry will be reminded of a passage in Cowley

  “Lo, I mount; and lo,
  How small the biggest parts of earth’s proud title shew! 
  Where shall I find the noble British land? 
  Lo, I at last a northern speck espy,
  Which in the sea does lie,
  And seems a grain o’ the sand. 
  For this will any sin, or bleed? 
  Of civil wars is this the meed? 
  And is it this, alas, which we,
  Oh, irony of words! do call Great Brittanie?”

And he afterwards, on reaching higher depths of silence, says very finely, and with a beautiful intimation of the all-inclusiveness of the Deity by the use of a singular instead of a plural verb,—­

  “Where am I now? angels and God is here.”

All which follows in Dante, up to the appearance of Saint Peter, is full of grandeur and loveliness.]

[Footnote 37: 

  “Come l’ augello intra l’amate fronde,
  Posato al nido de’ suoi dolci nati
  La notte che le cose ci nasconde,

  Che per veder gli aspetti desiati,
  E per trovar lo cibo onde gli pasca,
  In che i gravi labor gli sono aggrati,