Dante Alighieri Quotes

“Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straightforward pathway had been lost.
Ah me! how hard a thing it is to say
What was this forest savage, rough, and stern,
Which in the very thought renews the fear.
So bitter is it, death is little more;
But of the good to treat, which there I found,
Speak will I of the other things I saw there.”

“I made response to him with bashful forehead.
‘Oh, of the other poets honor and light,
Avail me the long study and great love
That have impelled me to explore thy volume!
Thou art my master, and my author thou,
Thou art alone the one from whom I took
The beautiful style that has done honor to me.‘”

″‘…I think and judge it for the best
Thou follow me, and I will be thy guide,
And lead thee hence through the eternal place,
Where thou shalt here the desperate lamentations,
Shalt see the ancient spirits disconsolate,
Who cry out each one for the second death…‘”

“They turned to me with signs of salutation,
And on beholding this, my Master smiled;
And more of honor still, much more, they did me,
In that they made me one of their own band;
So that the sixth was I, ‘mid so much wit.”

“Then sorrowed I, and sorrow now again,
When I direct my mind to what I saw,
And more my genius curb than I am wont,
That it may run not unless virtue guide it…”

“My Leader on a sudden seized me up,
Even as a mother who by noise is wakened,
And close beside her sees the enkindled flames,
Who takes her son, and flies, and does not stop,
Having more care of him than of herself…”

″‘The anguish of the people
Who are below here in my face depicts
That pity which for terror thou has taken.‘”

“Then I uprose, showing myself provided
Better with breath than I did feel myself,
And said: ‘Go on, for I am strong and bold.‘”

“How frozen I became and powerless then,
Ask it not, reader, for I write it not,
Because all language would be insufficient.
I did not die, and I alive remained not.
Think for thyself now, hast though ought of wit,
What I became, being of both deprived.”

“THROUGH ME THE WAY INTO THE SUFFERING CITY,
THROUGH ME THE WAY TO THE ETERNAL PAIN,
THROUGH ME THE WAY THAT RUNS AMONG THE LOST.
JUSTICE URGED ON MY HIGH ARTIFICER;
MY MAKER WAS DIVINE AUTHORITY,
THE HIGHEST WISDOM, AND THE PRIMAL LOVE.
BEFORE ME NOTHING BUT ETERNAL THINGS
ABANDON EVERY HOPE, WHO ENTER HERE.
These words – their aspect was obscure – I read
inscribed above a gateway”

″‘Now I will have thee know, the other time
I here descended to the nether Hell,
This precipice had not yet fallen down.‘”

″‘Art thou, too, of the other fools?
Here pity lives when it is wholly dead;
Who is a greater reprobate than he
Who feels compassion at the doom divine?‘”

″‘Now fraud, that eats away at every conscience,
is practice by a man against another
who trust in him, or one who has no trust.
This latter way seems only to cut off
the bond of love that nature forges; thus,
nestled within the second circle are:
hypocrisy and flattery, sorcerers,
and falsifiers, simony, and theft,
and barrators and panders and like trash.
But in the former way of fraud, not only
the love that nature forges is forgotten,
but added love that builds a special trust;
thus, in the tightest circle, where there is
the universe’s center, seat of Dis,
all traitors are consumed eternally.‘”

″‘An ill way thou goest!‘”

“We came along from one bridge to another,
talking of things my Comedy is not
concerned to sing.”

“Without hope we live in desire.”

“Have you forgotten, then, the words with which
your Ethics treats of those three dispositions
that strike at Heaven’s will: incontinence
and malice and mad bestiality?”

“…when I faced that restless beast,
which, even as she stalked me, step by step
had thrust me back to where the sun is speechless.”

“Your art would follow nature,
just as a pupil imitates his master;
... your art is almost God’s grandchild.”

“Like someone who has imperfect vision, we see things, which are remote from us; so much light the Supreme Ruler still gives to us; when they draw nigh, or are, our intellect is altogether void; and except what others bring us, we know nothing of your human state.”

“There above How many now hold themselves mighty kings Who here like swine shall wallow in the mire, Leaving behind them horrible dispraise!”

“This miserable fate Suffer the wretched souls of those, who liv’d Without or praise or blame, with that ill band Of angels mix’d, who nor rebellious prov’d Nor yet were true to God, but for themselves Were only.”

“Thy soul is by vile fear assail’d, which oft So overcasts a man, that he recoils From noblest resolution, like a beast At some false semblance in the twilight gloom.”

“As in large troops And multitudinous, when winter reigns, The starlings on their wings are borne abroad; So bears the tyrannous gust those evil souls. On this side and on that, above, below, It drives them: hope of rest to solace them Is none, nor e’en of milder pang.”

“Let not thy fear Harm thee, for power in him, be sure, is none To hinder down this rock thy safe descent.”

“The book and writer both Were love’s purveyors.”

“IN the midway of this our mortal life, I found me in a gloomy wood, astray.”

“These of death No hope may entertain: and their blind life So meanly passes, that all other lots They envy. Fame of them the world hath none, Nor suffers; mercy and justice scorn them both. Speak not of them, but look, and pass them by.”

“Heaven’s justice goads them on, that fear Is turn’d into desire.”

“Av’rice, envy, pride, Three fatal sparks, have set the hearts of all On fire.”

“And art thou then that Virgil, that well-spring, From which such copious floods of eloquence Have issued?”

“No greater grief than to remember days Of joy, when mis’ry is at hand!”

“The carnal sinners are condemn’d, in whom Reason by lust is sway’d.”

“Oh, how long Me seems it, ere the promis’d help arrive!”

“I, if on this voyage then I venture, fear it will in folly end.”

“Though ne’er to true perfection may arrive This race accurs’d, yet nearer then than now They shall approach it.”

“THROUGH me you pass into the city of woe: Through me you pass into eternal pain: Through me among the people lost for aye. Justice the founder of my fabric mov’d: To rear me was the task of power divine, Supremest wisdom, and primeval love. Before me things create were none, save things Eternal, and eternal I endure. All hope abandon ye who enter here.”

“Eternal fire, That inward burns, shows them with ruddy flame Illum’d.”

“Not all the gold, that is beneath the moon, Or ever hath been, of these toil-worn souls Might purchase rest for one.”

“Assist him. So to me will comfort spring.”