"
(Par. XXX, 85, Grandgent's trans.)
Another figure of beautiful imagery makes us appreciate Dante's
understanding of infantile emotion. He is eager to tell us how bright
souls flame upward towards the Virgin Mother and here is the simile:
"And as a babe which stretches either arm
To reach its mother, after it is fed
Showing a heart with sweet affection warm,
Thus every flaming brightness reared its head
And higher, higher straining, by its act
The love it bore to Mary plainly said."
(Par. XXIII, 121 Grandgent's trans.)
Perhaps the most appealing example of Dante's kindly love for children
springs from the fact that instead of following the teaching of St.
Thomas Aquinas, who holds that in heaven the risen bodies of baby
children will appear in the aspect of the prime of life, our poet
discloses them with the charm of babyhood carrolling, as it were, the
nursery songs of Heaven. Of those blessed infants he speaks:
"Their youth, those little faces plainly tell,
Their childish treble voices tell it, too,
If thou but use thine eyes and listen well."
(Par. XXXII, 46. Grandgent's trans.)
Seeing so many examples of Dante's love for motherhood and children, one
naturally wonders why he makes no mention of his own wife and children.
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