OF SIX MEDIÆVAL WOMEN
the connecting link with Dante[1]—that between this world and it, she came to a spot—the Earthly Paradise—where she saw trees and fresh grass and no weeds. Some of the trees bore apples, but most of them sweetly scented leaves. Swift streams flowed through it, and warm winds were wafted from the north. The air was sweeter than words can tell. Here, she adds, there were no animals or birds, for God has reserved it for mankind alone, so that he may dwell there undisturbed. This seems to strike a strange note coming from the poetess Mechthild. How different is her sentiment from that of her brother-mystic, St. Francis, to whom the birds were his "little sisters," and who "loved above all other birds a certain little bird which is called the lark." But though, with apparent satisfaction, Mechthild saw no birds, she did see Enoch and Elias, and greeted the former by questioning him as to how he came there. Holy Writ has supplied the only answer, "He walked with God, and he was not, for God took him." Having spoken thus of the Earthly Paradise, Mechthild goes on to tell of the Heavenly, where she sees, "floating in rapture, as the air floats in the sunshine," the souls which, though not deserving of Purgatory, are not yet come into God's kingdom, and to whom rewards and crowns come not until they enter that kingdom. She
- ↑ The tendency of present-day Italian scholarship seems in favour of identifying Mechthild of Hackeborn, rather than Mechthild of Magdeburg, with Dante's Matelda.
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