Commentary Par XXII 106-111

Dante apostrophizes us (for the distribution of the addresses to the reader throughout the poem, see C.Inf.VIII.94-96 and C.Par.X.22-27) for the final time in the poem (as Tommaseo noted [DDP Tommaseo.Par.XXII.106-108]).  It comes as a surprise of some magnitude when one reads Scartazzini on this passage (DDP Scartazzini.Par.XXII.106) and finds that stubbornly thorough assembler of data coming up several addresses to the reader short in his quick survey.  He undercounts occurrences of the phenomenon by two in Inferno and by two again here in the third cantica.  Are we to think it a coincidence that this last occurrence falls just before the first of the final triad of invocations, now to higher powers directly (God's creative powers in the stars and then the Deity Itself in Par. XXX and XXXIII)?  It is as though the poet is underlining the distance between human and divine experience by leaving us behind.  After Dante looks down through the planets, the next sight he will see is the Church Triumphant, which we will see again in the penultimate canto of the poem.  For all of the next canto, for the last third of the thirtieth, and for all the final three we are seeing 'face-to-face.'

As the space travelers near their eventual goal, the time taken for the ascent from sphere to sphere decreases, since the 'gravitational pull' of the Empyrean naturally increases as one nears it. (Note revised 24 August 2013; see C.Par.IX.10-12.)