Commentary Par X 86-96

It is interesting that this portion of the first utterance of St. Thomas, the great opponent of poetry for its seductive figurative quality, beautiful but simply untrue, contains several metaphors: the 'stair' (the ascent of the heavens toward God) that Dante is on; the 'wine' (knowledge) that Thomas will share with Dante; the 'plants' (souls) that surround Beatrice and him; the 'lambs' (friars) who were Thomas and his fellow Dominicans on earth; the 'path' (the way to God) that led to his salvation; the 'fattening' (knowledge of God's truth) found in the nourishment of the Word.  One can only imagine Thomas's objection had he been able to read those words, put by Dante into his mouth.  The last metaphor will have its second moment in the next canto ([Par XI 25]), and then its last and triumphant appearance in the final verse of that canto ([Par XI 139]).