conflicting opinions, which flow forth ever multiplying from the living Spring in the eyes of this Lady, and then her light still continuing, they fall away, almost like little morning clouds before the Sun. And now the intellect, become her friend, remains free and full of certain Truth, even as the atmosphere is rendered pure and bright by the shining of the midday Sun. The third passage again is explained by the Literal exposition as far as to where it says, "Still therefore the Soul weeps." Here it is desirable to attend to a certain moral sense which may be observed in these words: that a man ought not for the sake of the greater friend to forget the service received from the lesser; but if one must follow the one and leave the other, the greater is to be followed, with honest lamentation for desertion of the other, whereby he gives occasion to the one whom he follows to bestow more love on him. Then there where it says, "Of my eyes," has no other meaning except that bitter was the hour when the first demonstration of this Lady entered into the eyes of my intellect, which was the cause of this most close attachment. And there where it says, "My peers," it means the Souls set free from miserable and vile pleasures, and from vulgar habits, endowed with understanding and memory. And then it says, "Her eyes bear death," and then it says, "I gazed on her and die," which appears contrary to that which is said above of Salvation by this Lady. And therefore it is to be known that one Spirit speaks here on one side and the other speaks there on the other; which two dispute contrariwise, according to that which is made evident above. Wherefore it is no wonder if here the one Spirit says Yes, and there the other Spirit says No. Then in the stanza where it says, "A sweet voice of tenderness," a thought is meant which was born of my deep contemplation; wherefore it is to be known that by Love, in this Allegory, is always meant that deep contemplation which is the earnest application of the enamoured mind to that object wherewith it is enamoured. Then when it says, "There shall shine High miracles before thee," it announces that through her the adornments of the miracles will be seen; and it speaks truly, that the adornment of the miracles is to see the cause of the same, which she demonstrates; as in the beginning of the book on Metaphysics the Philosopher seems to feel, saying that, through the contemplation of these adornments, men began to be enamoured with this Lady. And concerning this word, i.e., miracle, in the following treatise I shall speak more fully. What then follows of this Song is sufficiently explained by the other exposition.