At 08.39 12/03/98 +0000, you wrote:
>Dear Jessalynn
>the penance thing is, I think, a GREAT idea (which is, of course, no more
>than one expects from you ;-) )
>cheers
>john arnold
>
>On Wed, 11 Mar 1998, Jessalynn Bird wrote:
>
>> An angel draws seven P's into Dante's forehead with the point of a
>> sword at the base of mountain in Purgatory [canto IX]. Here the
>> physical mnemonic sign/blow is used to remind Dante of the sins he
>> must wash away in purgatory. Like many medieval writers, he compares
>> the act of memory as impressing a seal upon wax (James of Vitry
>> thought children could learn better b/c they hadn't 'hardened' up
>> yet).
>>
>Dante is playing wonderful games with the inscription with the sword,
rather than with the pen, then the healing of those cuts with an angel
feather, a penna, a pen, instead of erasing them from the parchment with a
knife. I have actually seen a monk at the dispensary at Casamaris Abbey
apply a lotion to a patient's sore by means of a gentle feather, using
medieval medical methods.
____
Julia Bolton Holloway, [log in to unmask]
Hermit of the Holy Family
via del Partigiano 16, Montebeni, 50014 FIESOLE, ITALY
http://members.aol.com/juliansite/Juliansite.htm
Io Caterina, serva e schiave de' servi di Gesu Cristo, scrivo nel precioso
sangue suo . . . Catherine of Siena
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