_Paracelsus_, at the age of 20, thinks _knowledge_ the _summum bonum_, and, at the advice of his two friends, Festus and Michal, retires to a seat of learning in quest thereof. Eight years later, being dissatisfied, he falls in with Aprile, an Italian poet, and resolves to seek the _summum bonum_ in love. Again he fails, and finally determines “to know and to enjoy.”--R. Browning, _Paracelsus_. =Par´adine= (3 _syl._), son of Astolpho, and brother of Dargonet, both rivals for the love of Laura. In the combat provoked by Prince Oswald against Gondibert, which was decided by four combatants on each side, Hugo “the Little” slew both the brothers.--Sir. Wm. Davenant, _Gondibert_, i. (died 1668). =Paradisa´ica= (“_the fruit of paradise_”). So the banana is called. The Mohammedans aver that the “forbidden fruit” was the banana or Indian fig, and cite in confirmation of this opinion that our first parents used fig leaves for their covering after their fall. =Paradise=, in thirty-three cantos, by Dantê (1311). Paradise is separated from Purgatory by the river Lethê; and Dantê was conducted through nine of the spheres by Beatrice, who left him in the sphere of “unbodied light,” under the charge of St. Bernard (canto xxxi.). The entire region is divided into ten spheres, each of which is appropriated to its proper order. The first seven spheres are the seven planets, viz. (1) the Moon, for angels, (2) Mercury, for archangels, (3) Venus, for virtues, (4) the Sun, for powers, (5) Mars, for principalities, (6) Jupiter, for dominions, (7) Saturn, for thrones. The eighth sphere is that of the fixed stars for the cherubim; the ninth is the _primum mobĭlê_ for the seraphim; and the tenth is the empyre´an for the Virgin Mary and the triune deity. Beatrice, with Rachel, Sarah, Judith, Rebecca and Ruth, St. Augustin, St. Francis, St. Benedict, and others, were enthroned in Venus, the sphere of the virtues. The empyrean, he says, is a sphere of “unbodied light,” “bright effluence of bright essence, uncreate.” This is what the Jews called “the heaven of the heavens.” _Paradise_ was placed in the legendary maps of the Middle Ages, in Ceylon; but Mahomet placed it “in the seventh heaven.” The Arabs have a tradition that when our first parents were cast out of the garden, Adam fell in the isle of Ceylon, and Eve in Joddah (the port of Mecca).--_Al Korân_, ii.