Paradise – Manifestations of Light Dante's ascension throughout the Divine Comedy, namely that of his last book, Paradiso, is markedly marked by the variants of light and the how it affects poets. Essential to the purpose of the entire poem is the depiction of Heaven as a realm of light that exists in nine spheres, whose closeness to God varies directly with their merit, shown by the first three lines, "The glory of Him who moves every thing / Penetrates the universe, and shines / In one part more and in another less." (Dante, 293) In the nearest spheres and with a smaller radius, Dante notices the soft lights, but as he approaches the most central sphere, he attempts to describe the inexpressible glow of the vision of divinity, hence the recurrence of the theme of light. runs throughout the poem. The first appearance in the illumination sequence occurs in Canto I where he refers to Paradise as "all that hemisphere was bathed in light/The other darkness". (Dante, 294) Upon entering the sky for the first time, he notices that its luminescence irradiates everything around him, leaving him in total darkness. As he continues "Already I was satisfied / With great amazement; but now I am amazed / How I transcend the light of these bodies." (Dante, 297) But this would only be the beginning of the amazement. This central theme of light returns in Canto XXIII, where Dante contemplates the symbolism of Christ as light. "Shining myriads of lamps I then saw / a Sun that lit each and every one, like ours / lights the stars that crowd its high domain; / and through the rays, poured in living rains, / the radiant substance, blazing upon me , proved / my mortal vision beyond my mortal powers." (Bergin, 111) Thus, Dante realizes that he has been enlightened far beyond what reason can describe. The last example in the recurring sequence of lights occurs at the very end of the poem where he, "for a flash my mind was struck/And so came the fulfillment of my wish.