At these words: "Venerable and holy patriarch," said I to him, "I am eager to know what you understand by that Serpent which was consumed." He, with face a smiling, answered me thus:...[19] "The Tree of Knowledge is planted opposite; its fruit is covered with a Rind which produces Ignorance in whomsoever hath tasted thereof; yet this Rind preserves underneath its thickness all the spiritual virtues of this learned food. God, when he had driven Adam from this fortunate country, rubbed his gums with this same Rind, that he might never find the way back again; for more than fifteen years thereafter he did dote, and did so completely forget all things, that neither he nor any of his descendants till Moses ever remembered even so much as the Creation; but what Power was left of this direful Rind at last passed away through the warmth and brightness of that great Prophet's genius. "I happily met with one among these apples, which through ripeness was despoiled of its skin; hardly had my mouth watered with it, when Universal Knowledge penetrated my being, I felt as it were an infinite number of Eyes fix themselves in my head, and I knew the means of speaking with the Lord. "When I have since reflected on these miraculous events, I have judged that I could in no wise have overcome, by any occult powers of a simple natural body, the vigilance of that Seraph whom God has ordained to guard this Paradise; but since he is pleased to use _second causes_, I imagined that he had inspired me to find this means of entering there; even as he thought good to take of the ribs of Adam to make him a wife, though he could form her of Earth, as well as he did Adam. "I remained long in this Garden, walking about alone; but in fine, since the angel that was Keeper of the Gate seemed to me to be in chief my Host here, I was taken with the desire to salute him. In an hour's journey I came to a place where a thousand Lightnings mingled together in one blinding light that served but to make Darkness visible. I was not yet fully recovered from this dazzlement, when I saw before me a beautiful Young man. 'I am,' said he, 'the Archangel whom you seek, I have but now read in God that he had inspired you with the means of coming here, and that he willed you should here expect his pleasure.' He talked with me of many things, and told me among the rest: