There fared a mother driven forth // Out of an inn to roam; // In the place where she was homeless // All men are at home. // The crazy stable close at hand, // With shaking timber and shifting sand, // Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand // Than the square stones of Rome.

Where is it mothers learn their love? / In every Church a fountain springs / O'er which th' Eternal Dove / Hovers out softest wings. // What sparkles in that lucid flood / Is water, by gross mortals eyed / But seen by Faith, 'tis blood / Out of a dear Friend's side.

I gaze upon the strange nature and setting of the ladder. / Its stairs consist of virtues / and it leads to heaven in a strange manner, / as the ladder divides the length of such a long track upwards / into only thirty steps.

May is Mary’s month, and I / Muse at that and wonder why: / Her feasts follow reason, / Dated due to season—

The engendering Spirit / did not enter her without consent. / God waited. // She was free / to accept or to refuse, choice / integral to humanness.

Down with the rosemary and bays, / Down with the misletoe; / Instead of holly, now up-raise / The greener box, for show. // The holly hitherto did sway; / Let box now domineer, / Until the dancing Easter-day, / Or Easter's eve appear.

Beatrice begs James to conduct the examination of hope and she herself, in answer to the first question, testifies to Dante’s possession of hope. Dante then replies on the nature of hope, on the content of his hope, and on the sources of hope.

The faith that I love the best, says God, is hope. // Faith doesn’t surprise me. // [...] Charity, says God, that doesn't surprise me. // [...] But hope, says God, that is something that surprises me.

For every tiny town or place / God made the stars especially; // Babies look up with owlish face / And see them tangled in a tree: // You saw a moon from Sussex Downs, / A Sussex moon, untraveled still, // I saw a moon that was the town’s, / The largest lamp on Campden Hill.