When overcome by the splendor of the heaven Saturn it is as a child he turns to Beatrice for assurance: "Oppressed with stupor, I unto my guide Turned like a little child who always runs For refuge there where he confideth most, And she, even as a mother who straightway Gives comfort to her pale and breathless boy With voice whose wont is to reassure him, Said to me: 'Knowest thou not thou art in heaven?'" (Par. XXII, I) Again, it is the gentle heart of a fond father who speaks in the following lines: "Awaking late, no little innocent So sudden plunges towards its mother's breast With face intent upon its nourishment As I did bend." (Par. XXX, 85, Grandgent's trans.) Another figure of beautiful imagery makes us appreciate Dante's understanding of infantile emotion. He is eager to tell us how bright souls flame upward towards the Virgin Mother and here is the simile: "And as a babe which stretches either arm To reach its mother, after it is fed Showing a heart with sweet affection warm, Thus every flaming brightness reared its head And higher, higher straining, by its act The love it bore to Mary plainly said." (Par. XXIII, 121 Grandgent's trans.) Perhaps the most appealing example of Dante's kindly love for children springs from the fact that instead of following the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas, who holds that in heaven the risen bodies of baby children will appear in the aspect of the prime of life, our poet discloses them with the charm of babyhood carrolling, as it were, the nursery songs of Heaven. Of those blessed infants he speaks: "Their youth, those little faces plainly tell, Their childish treble voices tell it, too, If thou but use thine eyes and listen well." (Par. XXXII, 46. Grandgent's trans.) Seeing so many examples of Dante's love for motherhood and children, one naturally wonders why he makes no mention of his own wife and children. But we have only to remember that a nice sense of delicacy may have restrained him from speaking of the sacredness of his family life. In this matter he exhibited the wisdom of the gentleman-Saint, Francis de Sales, who used to say, "Without necessity never speak of yourself well or ill." It was indeed a principle of propriety with our poet that talking about one's self in public is to be avoided as unbecoming unless there is need of self vindication or edification of others. Only once in the Divine Comedy does he mention his own name and at once he apologizes for the intrusion. It is true that the poem is autobiographical but it is that in so far as it concerns matters of universal interest from which the poet may draw the moral that what God has done for him He will do for all men if they will but let Him. That being so it was not necessary for him to exploit his family affairs.