By a mystic stair he saw souls descend to earth; he saw many come down,
and few go up. Each one of these innocent spirits went accompanied by a
most radiant archangel who covered it with the shadow of his wings. The
archangels who returned alone came in silence, weeping; but the others
mounted singing like the larks on April mornings.
Then the rosy and azure mists which floated in the ether, like curtains
of transparent gauze, were rent, as Holy Saturday, the Day of Glory,
rends in our churches the veiling of the altars, and the Paradise of the
Righteous opened, dazzling in its beauty, to his gaze.