VISIO QUINTA, cap. V
The Square of Touch and the Tempered Zone
The fifth part appears in a square form signifying touch, and its varied climates mirror how the five senses, though dissimilar, support one another through temptation toward virtue.
Now the fifth part of the earlier sections, which sits in the middle of all of them, appears in a square form, so that it may be equally contained and permeated by the rest, also signifying that touch holds the perfection of works and not the lightness of vices. And in one place it is permeated with heat, in another with cold, and in yet another with a tempering of air, because the sun's heat, burning it up here on account of its nearness, and the cold, constricting it there on account of the sun's distance, render it uninhabitable for humans. But the tempering of heat and cold grants that this region is habitable, just as fingers, different from one another yet containing the hand with their strength, strengthen it, and so the five senses of a person, although they are dissimilar to one another, passing through fire and water as through temptation, offer themselves to each other as mutual supports of help toward the virtues.
Habitable Souls and the Uninhabitable Faithless
The faithful who ruminate on God's law make themselves habitable through good works, while the faithless who resist God's words deny the Holy Spirit a dwelling place.
But these same places also show the faithful to be habitable, who, always ruminating on the divine law and raising themselves wholly to the heavenly life, render themselves habitable through good works; the faithless, however, designate those places as uninhabitable, who, trying to resist and oppose the words of God, and laboring to deny faith and to tear through and break apart the truth and solidity of that same faith, make themselves uninhabitable through these perversities, because they do not grant the Holy Spirit a dwelling place within themselves.
Purgation and Monstrous Horrors at the Boundaries
The four parts contain punishments of varying severity for purging penitent souls, and at their middle boundaries there are not punishments but monstrous horrors.
Likewise, concerning the qualities of those four parts, and in which places punishments are set for purging the penitent souls of human beings — in one place light, in another heavy, in another most severe, varying according to the degrees of the faults of those who are being examined — and why, at the boundaries in the middle of those same parts, there are held not punishments but certain monstrous horrors.
Read the original Latin
Quinta vero pars priorum partium, quae in medio omnium istarum est, in quadrata forma apparet, quatenus a caeteris aequaliter contineatur et perfundatur, designans etiam quod tactus perfectionem operum et non levitatem vitiorum habeat. Atque alibi ardore, alibi frigore, alibi autem temperamento aeris perfusa est, quia ardor solis eam hic propter vicinitatem suam perurens, frigus vero propter remotionem ipsius eam illic constringens, inhabitabilem hominibus reddit. Temperies autem caloris et frigoris illam isthic habitabilem concedit, quemadmodum et digiti a se differentes, manum tamen fortitudine sua continentes roborant, et ut quinque sensus hominis quamvis sibi dissimiles sint, velut per ignem et aquam tentationem transeuntes, adminicula adjutorii sibi invicem ad virtutes exhibent. Sed et haec eadem loca habitabilia fideles homines demonstrant, qui divinam legem semper ruminantes, et se totos ad supernam vitam erigentes, in bonis operibus se habitabiles reddunt; inhabitabilia autem infideles designant, qui verbis Dei resistere et repugnare conantes, et fidem abnegare, veritatemque et soliditatem ejusdem fidei lacerare et praerumpere laborantes, his perversitatibus se inhabitabiles faciunt, quia Spiritui sancto habitaculum in semetipsis non concedunt.
Item de qualitatibus ipsarum quatuor partium, et quibus in locis poenae purgandis poenitentium animabus hominum collocatae sint, alibi leves, alibi graves, alibi acerrimae, secundum modos culparum eorum qui examinantur differentes; et quare in mediis earumdem partium finibus non poenae, sed monstruosi quidam horrores habeantur.
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