Commentary Par XIV 130-139

Dante realizes that his reader may object to his apparent slight of Beatrice.  These final ten verses of this extraordinary canto function as a commentary on the previous tercet ([Par XIV 127-129]), detailing Dante's increased love of God.  Here is Tozer's explanation (DDP Tozer.Par.XIV.133-139) of this convoluted, witty passage: 'Dante here justifies himself for having said that the melody which he had just heard delighted him more than anything he had hitherto met with in Paradise, by doing which he had assigned the second place to the joy of seeing Beatrice's eyes.  In order to justify himself (Per escusarmi), he accuses himself of not having looked at Beatrice's eyes since his arrival in the Heaven of Mars (l. 135); and his excuse for this (Escusar puommi) is that he was attracted by the delights of that Heaven, which surpassed those of the previous Heavens, according to the system of Paradise, in which the beauty and joy increase in ascending from sphere to sphere (ll. 133, 134).  Consequently, what he had said about the delight of the melody of this Heaven surpassing all previous delights was true, inasmuch as it is reconcilable with the superior attractions of Beatrice's eyes, for their beauty had increased since the Heaven of Mars had been reached, but Dante was not aware of this because he had not seen them (ll. 138, 139).'  Tozer and most other commentators take the verb dischiudere, which usually (in the Commedia as well as in Italian generally) means something like its English cognate, 'to disclose,' to signify, as they argue it also does once earlier ([Par VII 102]), 'to exclude.' (But for disagreement with this generally accepted variant meaning in both cases, see Cardellino [Card.2006.1]).  Our understanding of most of the literal sense of these verses coincides with that of Benvenuto da Imola (DDP Benvenuto.Par.XIV.133-139).  That the word 'here' (qui) refers to the poem is nearly guaranteed by its distinction from the 'there' (lì) of line 135.  (See the similar situation addressed by C.Inf.XXIX.54-57).

For an English paraphrase of this difficult passage, see DDP Tozer.Par.XIV.133-139.

For the argument that the final thirteen lines of the canto comprise a sort of 'pseudo-sonnet,' revisiting in corrective ways the sonnet on the Garisenda tower (Rime.LI.1-5), in which Dante curses his eyes for looking at a tower in Bologna, thereby missing the passing form of his lady, see Picone (Pico.2002.4), pp. 215-17.