Commentary Par XXII 10-12

Carroll (DDP Carroll.Par.XXII.1-18) restates a passage in St. Bernard's De Consideratione (V.xiv) that may throw considerable light on this tercet: There are four kinds of divine judgments, each one defined by its breadth, or length, or depth, or height.  Consideration of God's judgments coincides with 'depth.'  Carroll continues: 'This kind of contemplation [now citing Bernard] "may violently shock the beholder with the fearful vision, but it puts vice to flight, firmly bases virtue, initiates in wisdom, preserves humility."  It is plainly the shock of this contemplation of the "depth" which here stuns the Pilgrim.  The cry is an echo from the Thrones of the Divine judgments who preside over this Heaven, and the very echo shakes Dante to the soul; and Beatrice asks how, if the "depth" so shook him, he could have borne the "height" -- the lofty ecstatic joy of contemplation represented by her smile.'