me clothed in a most noble color, a becoming and modest crimson, and she was girt and adorned in the style that suited her extreme youth.  At that instant, I say truly, the spirit of life, which dwells in the most secret chamber of the heart, began to tremble with such violence, that it appeared horribly in the least pulses, and, trembling, said these words:  Ecce deus fortior me, qui veniens dominabitur mihi! [Behold a god, stronger than I, who, coming, shall rule me![C]]

[Footnote A:  It may be that Dante here refers to the meaning of the name Beatrice,—­She who renders happy.  She who blesses.]

[Footnote B:  According to the astronomy of the times, the sphere of the stars moved from west to east one degree in a hundred years.  The twelfth of a degree was, therefore, eight and a half years.  See the Convito, Tratt.  II. c. vi.]

[Footnote C:  Compare with this passage Canzone x, st. 5, 6.  Especially the lines,

  “E, se ’l libro non erra,
  Lo spirito maggior tremo si forte,
  Che parve ben, che morte
  Per lui in questo mondo giunta fosse.”

“And, if the book errs not, the chief spirit so greatly trembled, that it plainly appeared that death for him had arrived in this world.”

When Dante meets Beatrice in Purgatory, he says, referring to this time,—­and it is pleasant to note these connections between his earliest and his latest works,—­

  “Tosto che nella vista mi percosse
  L’ alta virtu, che gia m’ avca trafitto
  Prima ch’ io fuor di puerizia fosse.” 
               Canto xxx. l. 40-42.
]

“At that instant, the spirit of the soul, which dwells in the high chamber to which all the spirits of the senses bring their perceptions, began to marvel greatly, and, addressing the spirits of the sight, said these words:  Apparuit jam beatitudo vestra. [Now hath appeared your bliss.] At that instant the natural spirit, which dwells in that part where the nourishment is supplied, began to weep, and, weeping, said these words:  Heu miser! quia frequenter impeditus ero deinceps. [Woe is me wretched! because frequently henceforth shall I be hindered.]

“From this time forward I say that Love lorded over my soul, which had been thus quickly put at his disposal;[D] and he began to exercise over me such control and such lordship, through the power which my imagination gave to him, that I was obliged to perform completely all his pleasure.  He commanded me many times that I should seek to see this youthful angel, so that I in my boyhood often went seeking her, and saw her of such noble and praiseworthy deportment, that truly of her might be said that saying of the poet Homer:  ’She does not seem the daughter of a mortal, but of God.’  And it befell that her image, which stayed constantly with me, inspired boldness in Love to hold lordship over me; but it was of such noble virtue, that it never suffered that Love should rule without the faithful counsel of Reason in those matters in which such counsel could be useful.”