Canto XXXI, XXXII. Beatrice continues to accuse Dante, who confesses his guilt. Matilda draws him through the stream, the Lethe, to Beatrice. Here he sleeps, then wakes to see a second pageant, in which the history of the Church is portrayed, and particularly its troubled relations with secular power. This masque takes place by the tree of knowledge, which is withered and dry, until the Griffon ties the cross-bar of the chariot to it, whereupon it bursts into flower, an image of the glory of the Cross and all it accomplished.

Beatrice's words to Dante set out the heart of his doctrine about love as a means to knowledge of God. His love for Beatrice "bore/Thy love along with it to seek the Good/Past which there's nothing to be eager for", yet after her death he was distracted and fell away. Dante expresses contrition, a reminder that this is a gift of the sacrament of confession, and Dante, now in the earthly paradise, has a greater horror of his past misdeeds than he could have had before.


The pageant of the Church in the Holkham MS.

http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/medieval/jpegs/holkham/misc/48/1000/04800487.jpg