Wherefore let us soar, if we can, to the heights of that Supreme Intelligence; for there Reason will see what in itself it cannot look upon; and that is in what way things whose occurrence is not certain may yet be seen in a sure and definite foreknowledge; and that this foreknowledge is not conjecture, but rather knowledge in its supreme simplicity, free of all limits and restrictions.' SONG V.
THE UPWARD LOOK.
In what divers shapes and fashions do the creatures great and small Over wide earth's teeming surface skim, or scud, or walk, or crawl! Some with elongated body sweep the ground, and, as they move, Trail perforce with writhing belly in the dust a sinuous groove; Some, on light wing upward soaring, swiftly do the winds divide, And through heaven's ample spaces in free motion smoothly glide; These earth's solid surface pressing, with firm paces onward rove, Ranging through the verdant meadows, crouching in the woodland grove.
Great and wondrous is their variance! Yet in all the head low-bent Dulls the soul and blunts the senses, though their forms be different.
Man alone, erect, aspiring, lifts his forehead to the skies, And in upright posture steadfast seems earth's baseness to despise.
If with earth not all besotted, to this parable give ear, Thou whose gaze is fixed on heaven, who thy face on high dost rear: Lift thy soul, too, heavenward; haply lest it stain its heavenly worth, And thine eyes alone look upward, while thy mind cleaves to the earth! VI.
'Since, then, as we lately proved, everything that is known is cognized not in accordance with its own nature, but in accordance with the nature of the faculty that comprehends it, let us now contemplate, as far as lawful, the character of the Divine essence, that we may be able to understand also the nature of its knowledge.
'God is eternal; in this judgment all rational beings agree.

Let us, then, consider what eternity is.

For this word carries with it a revelation alike of the Divine nature and of the Divine knowledge.

Now, eternity is the possession of endless life whole and perfect at a single moment.

What this is becomes more clear and manifest from a comparison with things temporal.