Dante #11: Purgatory Cantos 15-25

Good morning. Welcome back. So, any questions from yesterday? Any questions or comments? Yes. Hey. I had this weird dream last Okay.

And I found the tree, right? But between me and the tree, there's a huge lake or a gigantic water Like between me and the tree.

He sees a tree and he thinks this tree is his goal, but there's a river that blocks access to the tree. So instead he sees a reflection and this reflection talks to him. Okay, that's a very vivid dream, and this is something that actually Dante, it's a vision that Dante would have, and we'll see a vision very similar to this as we climb up Mount Purgatory. So, what is this dream about? Yes.

Just because of what Adam and Eve did. Okay. So plant is a very important metaphor. Plant and tree are very important metaphors in purgatory. Any other thoughts or interpretations? Okay. So, as you read the Divine Comedy, the interpretation will become a lot more clear. Okay. All right. So, I want to begin today's class by talking about... Yes.

So the question then is, okay, let's think of this. If you ascend through purgatory, what determines your place in heaven? Well, it would be the same criteria, right? Because purgatory is meant to purge you of your sins. But once you're purged of your sins, then what remains is your understanding of God, your faith in God, and your willingness to be in God. And Piccarda, she did lead a sinless life, but it was one about real faith, right? So it was kind of passive, and that showed a limited understanding of God, that showed limited faith, that showed limited willingness to be with God.

So she got to Yale, so she did everything required, checked all the boxes, but she's basically the worst student at Yale because she's not willing to take the hardest classes, you know, she's not really pushing herself to her limit. Okay. Does that make sense? Okay. All right. So let's talk about the schematics of the Divine Comedy. So we know from Paradise, because we had Paradise first, that ultimately the end goal of the universe is for us to co-create with God.

How? Through faith, hope, and love. And what we also discussed is that faith is really about imagination. Right? You have to imagine that God exists. You have to imagine that God is all loving, all generous, all merciful. You have to imagine that you have a special divine mission on earth. Okay, these are all things that you cannot prove. You just have to imagine them. You have to believe them. Okay, that's the idea of faith. Then hope is one of arrogance, which is to say, I matter. What I do on this earth matters, and I could be a nobody, right?

It doesn't matter. I still have responsibility to love those around me, to seek justice, to be generous with others. Okay. So, think of Rachel, who didn't really do much, but when presented with a choice, right, Leah had already married Jacob, she still chose to love Jacob and marry him and endure the pain of being with her sister for the rest of her life. Okay. So that's the idea of hope. And then love is one of action. Okay. If you truly love someone, then you will pray for this person for all eternity.

Okay. So that's the grand thesis that Dante is presenting. A truly good life that draws you closer to God is one of faith, hope, and love. And this counters the traditional understanding of what these terms meant historically as presented by Paul and Augustine, right? Faith is one of compliance. Don't question things, just believe things. Hope is one of humility. You are saved by the grace of God. There's nothing you can do to change your fate. Just be humble before God and then you will ascend to heaven.

And love is really one of obedience, to obey the church, to be a sheep and let the church be the shepherd. Okay. So again this framework subverts the traditional church teachings. When we went through Inferno, what we appreciated is that the nine circles of hell are designed in a way as to promote these ideas on earth and to punish those who subvert these ideas. Okay. So as you remember, the nine circles are lust, gluttony, and anger. Okay. So these five are outside the capital of hell, Dis. So they're not that serious.

Okay. And then within this there's fraud, and then treachery. Okay? And these [clears throat] are the nine. And again, it makes sense because these four disrupt others' capacity to practice faith, love, and hope. Okay? So right now we completely understand what's going on. When we get to purgatory, there are problems. Okay? Because there are seven terraces now. And these seven terraces are [snorts] pride, greed, is it wrath, lust, and then there's gluttony.

Okay. Actually, you know what? I think I screwed this up. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Okay. All right. So, what we also discussed is that there are certain punishments that just would replicate themselves in hell. Okay. So, for example, there's no circle of envy, but the punishment is to be blindfolded, to be blind. Basically, your eyes are shut and you have to hold on to other people in order to get around. Okay? And you have to depend on other people to get around.

And this is punishment for envying other people. Okay? Because before you saw yourself as separate from other people, now you're completely dependent on other people. Okay?

And in hell it would be the same thing. But what we said is the results would be different, because in purgatory they're trying to seek redemption. They're trying to push themselves out of their envy. They're actually working together, okay? And they're looking inward to be a better person. Whereas in hell, if this were the same situation, then they would not work together. They would push each other around and they would all imagine that each is better than the rest. And because you're blind, they can't see that they're actually the same.

They would go crazy. Okay? They would be very angry. So the question for us is how would this system further this system? Okay, do you understand? There's a totality, there's a unity, a coherence to this Dante cosmology. I'm trying to figure out the logic of this. I understand why you'd be punished for disrupting the system, but how would this actually help us get to this? Okay. All right. So, before I do that, I just wanted to basically summarize the punishments. Okay. So, for pride you have to learn humility, right?

So what happens is stones are put on top of you and you have to crawl. Okay. So you're always humbled. Okay. For sloth, you are forced to run around a lot. Okay. You're active. You're running around a lot. For greed, you're crawling. Okay. Why are you crawling? Because before on earth, you were so greedy, you wanted power, right? So you're always ascending. But as punishment, now you are crawling. With wrath, what happens is you're blinded by smoke. And the idea is that your anger blinds you, right?

And so you have to learn to see with your heart. Gluttony is you basically starve. [laughter] You're starving. Lust is that you're burned by a flame. Okay. So this is the structure of purgatory, and I want to figure out how would constructing a system like this purgatory help advance the larger goal of ensuring that everyone lives a life of faith, hope, and love? Any... Okay. So, first of all, is it easy to get into purgatory?

Yeah, it's pretty easy. Okay. There are lots of ways you get into purgatory. Okay. So, one is to repent at the last minute, right? You can live a life of total sin, but the very last minute you're like, I seek God. Okay? That's one way. Another way is if you do an act of charity, an act of goodness in your life once. Okay, that goes against the church, which is like, if you do an act of sin once, you're screwed. But here it's like, no, you do an act of good once and then you're saved.

Your family members could pray for you, right? There are lots of ways to get into purgatory. So one really interesting thing about purgatory: it's easy to get into, hard to advance.

Okay, does that make sense? Anyone can go to purgatory, but to graduate you have to work really hard and it could take you a million years. Okay, that's the first characteristic. The second is, what's another distinct characteristic about purgatory that's important for us to appreciate?

Okay. All right. Any more interesting characteristics about purgatory?

Okay? So you just are assigned to one terrace and then that's good enough. Okay. So it's basically no hierarchy. Okay. All right. So explain to me why purgatory is constructed the way it is. And again we need to remember there's a unity, a totality to the divine harmony. And so all three have to line up perfectly. So, we've been to paradise. We know what paradise is about. We've been to hell. We know what hell is about. Explain what purgatory is about.

Why would he do that? Up the layers of purgatory, you're closer to heaven, so the sin is not as severe as the ones at the bottom layers.

That's interesting. Okay, that's an interesting idea, huh? But I don't understand why. Oh, yeah, you're right, actually. Yeah, this does make sense. Yes. Right. Okay. So there is a hierarchy. Yeah, I'm wrong. Okay. Yeah, because you're close to heaven and then this is further from heaven. You're right. No, no, no, no. You're right. Okay. Yes, there is a hierarchy: the higher you go, the less serious the sin.

Okay, this is purgatory. Someone explain to me what is being taught about purgatory at this point in... Okay. Yes.

That's point one. Okay. What else about purgatory at this point in history? Do you guys remember? Yes, I remember a lot of fire in the imagery.

Okay. Infants. So another way of saying this is that this is a theological... You guys understand the idea where if I can't actually explain something using heaven and hell, purgatory. Okay. Well, I can't explain babies who die, right? Because they're innocent but they weren't baptized. So they can't belong in hell, but they don't belong in heaven either. So purgatory. Okay. Do you guys understand what's going on? Like if there's ever a special case, like I don't know what's going on, purgatory, right? So at this time in history, purgatory is not really developed.

Okay. And in reality, purgatory is only for very special cases. But what Dante does is he turns purgatory into another world equal to that of hell and heaven. Right? And at this time in history, most people aren't even thinking of purgatory because you can't be that rich to buy people a place in purgatory, right? You have to be rich. You have to provide indulgences in order to get your relative into purgatory. And so this doesn't apply to most people, right? So explain to me what the difference is To tie it all together, I think the fundamental message of Dante in the Divine Comedy is on the heaven side, right?

So I guess in my mind that ties it all together. Whereas in hell you're not learning, right? There's no growth mindset, right? So the real distinction is between hell, like the extremes of hell and heaven. Purgatory is just the Okay.

Okay? So it's hopeful. Whereas at this time in history, the Catholic Church teaches you not to have any hope. Okay? Don't have hope. Just believe in God. Yes. And it's also action based rather than having to pay money or Exactly.

So this is a radically different conception of purgatory. Explain why this has to be the case. Why does it have to be democratic, hopeful, and action-based, and why does it have to be merciful and just in order for this to be It's consistent with his cosmology that God is love.

Never ever must you believe that this is God's will, there's nothing I can do about it. Okay, Dante is trying to eliminate that possibility. So the cosmology is designed in such a way that you can reason everything out and appreciate that it's your choice, not God's choice. Okay? Does that make sense? That's the real purpose of this cosmology, to convince you it's always your choice. It's always your free will. Everything that happens is because of what you do.

Yes. Would this kind of be in contradiction to people like Anselm at the time, who were really interested in describing how God was outside of time and that somehow his will was already in the universe?

Okay? Does that make sense, guys? All right. All right. Let's go to canto 15 and I want to do as much as possible today. Okay. Because this is the last two days, okay? Believe it or not, we've been doing this for a long time, right?

All right. So this is canto 15. Okay. As many as the hours in which the sphere that's always playing like a child appears from daybreak to the end of the third hour, so many were the hours of light still left before the course of day had reached sunset. Vespers was there and where we are, midnight. When sunlight struck directly at our faces, for we had circled so much of the mountain that now we headed straight into the west. Then I could feel my vision overcome by radiance greater than I'd sensed before.

And unaccounted things left me amazed, at which I raised my hands above my brow so that they might serve me as a shade. I lifted up my hands above my brow to limit some of that excessive splendor. As when a ray of light from water or mirror lapses in the opposed direction and rises at an angle equal to its angle of descent, and to each side the distance from the vertical is equal, as science and experiment have shown. So did it seem to me that I had been struck there by light reflected facing me, at which my eyes turned elsewhere rapidly.

"Kind father, what is that against which I have tried in vain," I said, "to screen my eyes? It seems to move toward us." And he replied, "Don't wonder if you're still dazzled by the family of heaven. A messenger has come and he invites us to ascend. Soon in the sight of such things, there will be no difficulty for you, but delight as much as nature fashioned you to feel." No sooner had we reached the blessed angel than with glad voice he told us, "Enter here. These are less steep than were the other stairs."

Explain this to me. I think people do this for themselves. When you talk to yourself, it's similar to that, where you need an outside other entity to try and talk to you. And it's like your inner voice is giving you instructions. So you need to give that inner voice a being and a body of some kind so that it stops you against pride or arrogance, that it's you doing it.

Unless he were a poet. Okay, keep on going. Line 37. We climbed already past that point. Behind us we heard "Beati misericordes" sung, and then "Rejoice, you who have overcome." I and my master journeyed on alone, we two together upward as we walked. I thought I'd gather profit from his words. And even as I turned toward him, I asked, "What did the spirit of Romagna mean when he said 'sharing cannot have a part'?" And his reply, "He knows the harm that lies in his worst vice. If he chastises it to ease its expiation, do not wonder.

For when your longing centers on things such that sharing them lessens the portion to each, then envy stirs the bellows of your sighs. But if the love within the highest sphere should turn your longings heavenward, the fear inhabiting your breast would disappear. For there the more there are who say 'ours,' so much the greater is the good possessed by each. So much more love burns in that cloister." "I'm more hungry now for satisfaction," I said, "than if I'd held my tongue before. I host a deeper doubt within my mind. How can a good that's shared by more possessors enable each to be more rich in it than if that good had been possessed by few?"

And he to me, "But if you still persist in letting your mind fix on earthly things, then even from true light you gather darkness. The good, ineffable and infinite, which is above, directs itself toward love as light directs itself to polished bodies. Where there is ardor, that good gives of itself, and where more love is there, that good confers a greater measure of eternal worth. And when there are more souls above who love, there's more to love well there, and they love more, a mirror like each soul reflects the other. And if my speech has not appeased your hunger, you will see Beatrice.

She will fulfill this and all other longings that you feel. Now only strive so that the other five wounds may be canceled quickly as the two already are, the wounds contrition heals."

Then there appeared to me another woman, upon her cheeks the tears that grief distills when it is born of much scorn for another. She said, "If you're ruler of that city to name which even goddesses once contended, where every science had its source of light, revenge yourself on the presumptuous arms that embraced our daughter, oh Pisistratus." And her lord seemed to me benign and mild, his aspect temperate as he replied, "What shall we do to one who injures us if one who loves us earns our condemnation?" Next, I saw people whom the fire of wrath had kindled, and they stoned a youth and kept on shouting loudly to each other, "Kill, kill, kill." I saw him now bowed down by death sink to the ground.

Although his eyes were bent, they were always on heaven, they were heaven's gates. Praying to his high lord despite the torture to pardon those who were his persecutors. His look was such that it unlocked compassion. And when my soul returned outside itself and met the things outside it that are real, I then could recognize my not false error.

He is beneath us. So we should punish him. And then Pisistratus, the king, says, why are we punishing someone who flatters us? Right? Isn't he flattering us that he wants our daughter in marriage? And if people who are nice to us we punish, then people who are mean to us, what do we do? Okay. All right. So it shows the ignorance of wrath, of anger. And the last example is also from the Bible, the story of St. Stephen, who is stoned to death for idolatry by the Jews in Jerusalem.

Okay, he was the first martyr of the Christian tradition. You will find this in the Acts of the Apostles, and rather than be angry, what Stephen does is pray for their forgiveness. Okay. All right. So these are three examples of how to deal with wrath. Okay.

And forgiveness. What are these things? How does he see these things?

Okay. So we will spend a lot of time discussing this idea. Okay. So, we're trying to figure out how the mind works today. Okay. And who studied psychology? Okay. You studied psychology, right? How do we have memories? Do tell us.

So all your memories are categorized by their emotional value. And then based on the order of your emotions, this then leads to your worldview, okay? And then that becomes part of your senses, which then determines what memories you remember, what memories you don't remember. Okay? So in other words, first of all, you only remember things that have emotional value. Okay. It's why in school you actually don't remember what you learn in the classroom, but you remember a lot of what you did with your friends. Okay.

Two types, where there is one linked to emotions and one only to knowledge, but it's harder to remember That's right, that's right.

Okay. All right. Yes.

Are we clear about this? Okay. This creates a lot of problems, right? Because obviously you're like, okay, if this is the case, where does the imagination come from? And how is it that people like Dante and Virgil and Shakespeare are able to create characters that are realistic and which are not part of their emotional experience? How does that work? Right? If everything is stored in your brain and you can only know what you experience, then how does Dante know Virgil? Does that make sense? Yes.

And if you read Shakespeare, you also have people like that. In Shakespeare, you have Hamlet. All the characters are distinct individuals. So if they are all just projections of Shakespeare, I don't know how that works.

You have to summon this person. Does that make sense? So, it's like he spent his entire life with Virgil as his best friend and they're just talking to each other all the time. So he understands this guy's peculiarities, right? Does that make sense? There are certain things, there are certain quirks that you cannot imagine, you cannot create. It just has to be that person. Yes, It just reminds me when I was reading about Machiavelli, there was at the time some guy called Valentino Borgia.

That is also a possibility. But then you raise the question of how does the Virgil that is created, right, how does the Virgil in the Divine Comedy match perfectly with the Virgil who wrote the Aeneid? Do you understand? Because when we talk to Virgil, you read the Aeneid and you're like, okay, this is the guy who wrote the Aeneid. Right? Because when you read the Aeneid, what you're reading is the persona of Virgil who wrote the Aeneid. Okay? Does that make sense? Because remember, in the Divine Comedy there are three Dantes, right?

There's Dante the pilgrim, the character. There's Dante the historical person, the real person. There's Dante the poet. And all three are different because Dante the pilgrim obviously is the protagonist. Dante the real person is a real person. But Dante the poet is a person who is trying to talk to us. You understand? Okay. So he's trying to create the Divine Comedy in a way that speaks to us, and I don't know how you do that unless you're a real person. Okay. Whereas in Virgil, yes, if you think about Virgil and you were to bring him outside and ask him about the Aeneid, he would know the Aeneid intimately, right?

He's like, "Yeah, obviously I wrote the Aeneid." So you're all providing good theories and hypotheses, but having thought very deeply about this, I think he just summoned Virgil. And this is the real Virgil, right? And this is absurd because Dante lived around the year 1300 and Virgil lived about, you know, during the time of Jesus, not the time of Jesus, but a generation before. Okay. So we're talking 1300 years of difference. How is this possible? Yes.

It feels like, when I'm writing, someone's taking possession of me and I'm just writing things. And then I'm writing about these characters and I'm like, I don't know these people. Okay. It's not like I'm creating these people. It's like these are being revealed to me. And then I finish writing and I look at these characters and I don't know these people. I've never met these people and they feel real to me. But not only that, I feel as though these characters not only are talking to me, but they're talking to themselves independently.

Okay. And then I'm exhausted after a day's work and I fall asleep and, okay, well, my mind is blank and I'm not going to have any more visions. Now, in the morning, I get up again and I have more visions. Okay? And then I keep on working and then at the end of my novel, what happens is I look back and it's like, how is it possible for me to world build? Okay. How is it possible for me to create all these people that are independent of each other, have different personalities, but they are true to themselves, and they're true to each other.

Okay? And I'm like, I don't know these people. I've never had this in my own life. And I can't explain the process. And that's why I think that what's happened here is that Dante has summoned Virgil, because these are two very different people. They're alike in some ways, but they're two different people.

All right. So now what I'm going to do is present another theory of how this works. Okay. And this is more in line with Dante's theory of how this works. So we know the doctrine of science. Okay. This is a standard theory of memory and identity. Right. I mean, this is what you're taught in school. Okay. Now I'm going to present to you a different theory. Okay. All right. So for Dante we have the divine spark. The divine spark is not a light in us.

It's our soul. And our soul is not a part of us. It is us. It's basically like our electrical field. Okay? It's an aura around us. Okay? That's the real soul. Okay? [snorts] And the soul doesn't exist in our dimension. It exists in different dimensions. All right? And we also know from Dante that there is a god and this god is the emanation of the universe, the source of the universe, and we're all connected to this god. Okay, so the entire cosmos is connected. Okay, so imagine the cosmos as this infinite mind.

Okay. And what happens is that when we have an... okay, the emotions aren't stored inside our brains. They're stored inside this universal consciousness, as what Carl Jung would say, as what Manly Hall would say. Okay. Right. First of all, Edward, do you want to explain to us the theory before I explain it myself?

I think it's just where you're going, that there's this idea that rather than the memories being stored in our physical beings, there is a collective consciousness, and through different methods that some people propose there is a way of channeling this, and I don't know the exact stories of it, but I know that, for example, even in the contemporary world, there are some sources about, for example, very young children that have knowledge of things that there is no way that they would have known happened.

So the first thing we asked him, of course, is what planet? And he mentioned the name. I can't remember it, but for him it was real. Okay. So it seems as though he came in with already memories of a past life and possibly many, many past lives. I'm not sure if you had a similar experience with your children, but you know.

Okay. Okay. So this is where the memories are stored. Okay. But not only that, but Evelyn's memories are stored here, right? So it's like the internet. And so what happens is that over time certain regions become alive themselves because there's so many memories being stored in this place, right? It becomes alive itself and that's where we get the idea of ghosts and spirits and demons. Okay? And so in other words, what happens is when we have memories, okay, not only do we store the memories in a certain place, but this place also communicates, connects with us. And so basically you're an independent person but also you're a collection of different memories from different eras, which means you're also a collection of different individuals from different times.

Does that make sense? Okay. Why is this important? Because now it gives us insight into how art works. Right? Because what art really is, is a portal or a mechanism to enhance your connection to this universal consciousness, this internet. Okay? Does it make sense? Okay. So when that happens, then not only do you feel more, but remember these emotions come with their own memories, with their own visions. Then these visions become available to you. Okay? So that's what art and dreaming does. It connects you to this universal web.

But if the connection is really strong, then you don't need these agents to provoke you. You just see them yourself. And so that's what happened to Dante. So what's happened is he's now able to see these visions for himself without artwork. And the reason why he's able to see them, what has given him sight, is the fact that he's cleansing himself of his sins, right? Because you see, sins, what sins really do is they bulk you down to the material world and they make you forget the universal truth, right?

Which is the universal consciousness. So the more virtuous a life you live, the more visions you have because the greater your connection to the divine. All right, do you guys understand this? Any questions about this theory?

Act of feeling lighter. I feel like when you're lighter, your ideas come from a spiritual world. Whereas if you're really heavy, then it's just material, like, "Oh, I'm lacking money or I'm late." And so there's really a link between feeling lighter and having better ideas.

Okay. Yeah. But do you have a better imagery for your concept? Because it's really hard to write down what you did here. Do you have a better way to do a drawing about what's happening, with bubbles or stuff?

He's committed to change and because he's cleansing himself of more and more sins, the visions will become much more vibrant. Okay. Okay. Yeah. This is actually what I wanted. Okay. You guys see this? Okay. This is the best we can probably do. You are inside God. God is inside you. Do you guys see this? Yes. I was just going to say also bringing it more to contemporary thought, we're talking about how Dante can cleanse himself, get a better connection to the collective consciousness, but it's also quite similar to Hinduism and yoga, when they have the idea of kundalini, right, that if you abstain from all these desires, you do very deep meditation over years and years

There was Gay, his wife Nan Talese, who is one of the most famous publishers in America. She published Margaret Atwood and all these famous writers including Joan Didion, and she was telling us how Phil Knight, you guys know who Phil Knight is, right, a billionaire.

And he's like, you know, I want to be a writer. And he spent, you know, these decades going to these workshops, hiring writers, learning the craft, but then Nan is like, you know, he's not a very good writer, but he is just so joyful and enthusiastic and happy about writing. He says he wants to write because it brings him tremendous joy. And then Gay said, "Well, if you're really stupid, you could be very happy as a writer." Okay. All right. True story. If you just suck, you would find tremendous pleasure in writing.

But if you're really good, you would find only agony and suffering in writing because you recognize that when you write, you're not actually in control. Okay? You're being possessed. You're channeling. Okay? Right? Does it make sense to you guys? All right. All right. Let's continue.

I asked so that your feet might find more force, so must one urge the indolent, too slow to use their waking time when it returns. We made our way until the end of vespers, peering as far ahead as sight could stretch, at rays of light that although late were bright, but gradually smoke as black as night began to overtake us, and there was no place where we could have avoided it of pure air and sight.

So I moved through the bitter filthy air while listening to my guide, who kept repeating, "Take care not to be cut off from me." But I heard voices, and each seemed to pray unto the Lamb of God who takes away our sins for peace and mercy. "Agnus Dei" was sung repeatedly as their exordium. Words sung in such a way, in unison, that fullest concord seemed to be among them. "Master, are those whom I hear spirits?" I asked him. "You have grasped rightly," he replied. "And as they go, they loose the knot of anger." "Then who are you whose body pierces through our smoke, who speak of us exactly like a man who uses months to measure time?"

A voice said this. On hearing it, my master turned round to me and said, "Reply to him, then ask if this way leads us to the upward path." And I, "O creature, who cleanse yourself that you return fair unto him who made you, you shall hear wonders if you follow me." "I'll follow you as far as I'm allowed," he answered. "And if smoke won't let us see, hearing will serve instead to keep us linked." Then I began, "With those same swaddling bands that death unwinds I take my upward path. I've come here by way of hell's exactions.

Since God so gathered me into his grace that he would have me in a manner most unusual for modern times see his court, do not conceal from me who you once were before your death, and tell me if I go straight to the pass. Your words will be our escort." "I was a Lombard and I was called Marco. I knew the world's ways and I loved those goods for which the bows of all men now grow slack. The way you've taken leads directly upward." So he replied and then he added, "I pray you to pray for me when you're above." And I to him, "I pledge my faith to you to do what you have asked.

And yet a doubt will burst in me if it finds no way out. Before my doubt was simple, but your statement has doubled it and made me sure that I'm right to couple your word with another's. The world indeed has been stripped utterly of every virtue, as you said to me, it cloaks and is cloaked by perversity. Some place the cause in heaven, some below. But I beseech you to define the cause, that seeing it I may show it to others." A sigh, which sorrow formed into "Oh," was his beginning. Then he answered, "Brother, the world is blind, and you come from the world.

You living ones continue to assign to heaven every cause, as if it were the necessary source of every motion. If this were so, then your free will would be destroyed, and there would be no equity in joy for doing good and grief for evil.

Okay. Keep on going.

A ruler too was needed, one who would discern at least the tower of the true city. The laws exist, but who applies them now? No one, the shepherd who precedes his flock can chew the cud, but does not have cleft hooves. And thus the people who can see their guide snatch only at that good for which they feel some greed, would feed on that, and seek no further. Misrule, you see, has caused the world to be malevolent. The cause is clearly not celestial forces. They do not corrupt. For Rome, who made the world good, used to have two suns, and they made visible two paths, the world's path and the pathway that is God's.

Each has eclipsed the other. Now the sword has joined the shepherd's crook. The two together must of necessity result in evil, because so joined, one need not fear the other. And if you doubt me, watch the fruit and flower, for every plant is known by what it seeds. Within the territory watered by Adige and Po, one used to find valor and courtesy, that is before Frederick was met by strife. Now anyone ashamed of talking with the righteous or of meeting them can journey there secure. True, three old men are there in whom old times reprove the new, and they find God is slow in summoning them to a better life.

Currado da Palazzo, good Gherardo, and Guido da Castel, whom it is better to call, as do the French, the candid Lombard. You can conclude the church of Rome confounds two powers in itself, into the filth it falls, and fouls itself and its new burden." "Good Marco," I replied, "you reason well, and now I understand why Levi's sons were not allowed to share in legacies. But what Gherardo is this whom you mention as an example of the vanished people whose present would reproach the savage age?" "Either your speech deceives me or would tempt me," he answered then, "for you whose speech is Tuscan seem to know nothing of the good Gherardo.

There's no other name by which I know him unless I speak of him as Gaia's father. God be with you. I come with you no farther. You see the rays that penetrate the smoke already whitening. I must take leave. The angel has arrived before he sees me." So he turned back and would not hear me.

But eventually the ruler becomes corrupt himself. And then what happens is God sends a divine messenger like Jesus or Homer or Dante to remind us of who we are, to remind us that we are divine sparks that seek to return to God. And then from this person will arise a religion, a church. And at first that's good, but then what happens is that the church and empire combine together and then this causes a lot of corruption. But the main point is, yes, even though this is just a natural course of history, free will is the fundamental law of the universe and therefore we must take responsibility for our actions on earth.

We can't be like, well, God made us this way or whatever. No, no, God gave us all free choice. Whatever we do is because we choose to. So if we don't like things the way they are we have to go fix it. Okay. Yes. So the fundamental rule of the universe is free will, then how... But you said before there are good writers and bad writers, does that mean a kind of deterministic No, no, writers are...

It's me JK.

So Fred, did you want to say something?

Oh fantasy, that at times would snatch us so from outward things we notice nothing, although a thousand trumpets sound around us, who moves you when the senses do not spur you? A light that finds its form in heaven moves you, directly or led downward by God's will. Within my fantasy I saw impressed the savagery of one who then, transformed, became the bird that most delights in song. At this my mind withdrew to the within, to what imagining might bring. No thing that came from the without could enter in.

You killed yourself. Now you have lost me. I am she, mother, who mourns your fall before another's.'" Sleep is shattered when new light strikes suddenly against closed eyes, and once it's shattered, gleams before it dies completely. So my imagination fell away as soon as light more powerful than light we're accustomed to beat on my eyes. I looked about to see where I might be. But when a voice said, "Here one can ascend," then I abandoned every other intent. That voice made my will keen to see the one who had spoken, with the eagerness that cannot be still until it faces what it wants.

But even as the sun becomes so strong it defeats our vision, veiling its own form, so there my power of sight was overcome. "This spirit is divine, and though unasked he would conduct us to the upward path. He hides himself with that same light he sheds. He does with us as men do with themselves. For he who sees a need but waits to be asked is already set on cruel refusal. Now let our steps accept his invitation and let us try to climb before dark falls. Then until day returns we'll have to halt."

So said my guide, and toward a stairway he and I together turned, and just as soon as I was at the first step I sensed something much like the motion of a wing and wind that beat against my face, and "Beati pacifici," those free of evil anger. Above us now the final rays before the fall of night were raised to such a height that we could see the stars on every side. "Oh why, my strength, do you so melt away?" I said within myself, because I felt the force within my legs compelled to halt.

We'd reached a point at which the upward stairs no longer climbed, and we were halted there just like a ship when it has touched the shore. I listened for a while, hoping to hear whatever there might be in this new circle. Then I turned toward my master, asking him, "Tell me, my gentle father, what offense is purged within the circle we have reached? Although our feet must stop, your words need not." And he to me, "Precisely here the love of good that is too tepidly pursued is mended.

Here the lazy oar plies harder. And so that you may understand more clearly, now turn your mind to me and you will gather some useful fruit from our delaying here. My son, there's no creator and no creature whoever was without love, natural or mental. And you know that. The natural is always without error, but mental love may choose an evil object or err through too much or too little vigor. As long as it's directed toward the first good and tends toward secondary goods with measure, it cannot be the cause of evil pleasure. But when it twists toward evil, or tends to good with more or less care than it should, those whom he made have worked against their maker.

From this you see that of necessity love is the seed in you of every virtue and of all acts deserving punishment. Now since love never turns aside its eyes from the well-being of its subject, things are surely free of hatred of themselves. And since no being can be seen as self-existing and divorced from the first being, each creature is cut off from hating him. Thus, if I have distinguished properly, ill love must mean to wish one's neighbor ill. And this love's born in three ways in your clay.

There's he who through the abasement of another hopes for supremacy. He only longs to see his neighbor's excellence cast down. Then there's one who, when he's outdone, fears his own loss of fame, power, honor, favor. His sadness loves misfortune for his neighbor. And there's he who over injury received, resentful, for revenge grows greedy and angrily seeks out another's harm. This threefold love is expiated here below. Now I would have you understand the love that seeks the good distortedly. Each apprehends confusedly a good in which the mind may rest, and longs for it.

And thus all strive to reach that good. But if the love that urges you to know it or to reach that good is lax, this terrace, after a just repentance, punishes for that. There's a different good which does not make men glad. It is not happiness. It's not true essence, the fruit and root of every good. The love that profligately yields to that is wept on in three terraces above us. But I'll not say what threefold shape that love takes. May you seek those distinctions for yourself."

And they are the ones which confuse you. Okay. All right. Let's go on to 18. Okay. Canto 18. The subtle teacher had completed his discourse to me. Attentively he watched my eyes to see if I seemed satisfied. And I, still goaded by new thirst, was silent without, although within I said, "Perhaps I have displeased him with too many questions." But that true father, who had recognized the timid want I would not tell aloud, by speaking gave me courage to speak out, at which I said, "Master, my sight is so illumined by your light, I recognize all that your words declare or analyze.

Therefore I pray you, gentle father dear, to teach me what love is. You have reduced to love both each good and its opposite."

Then just as flames ascend because the form of fire was fashioned to fly upward toward the stuff of its own sphere where it lasts longest, so does the soul, once seized, move into longing, emotion of the spirit, never resting till the beloved thing has made it joyous. Now you can plainly see how deeply hidden truth is from those who would insist that every love is in itself praiseworthy, and they're led to error by the matter of love, because it may seem always good, but not each seal is fine although the wax is."

"Your speech and my own wit that followed it," I answered him, "have shown me what love is, but that has filled me with still greater doubt. For if love's offered to us from without and is the only foot with which the soul walks, the soul going straight or crooked has no merit." And he to me, "What reason can see here I can impart. Past that, for truth of faith, Beatrice alone you must await. Every substantial form, at once distinct from matter and conjoined to it, gathers the force that is distinctively its own, a force unknown to us until it acts.

It's never shown except in its effects, just as green boughs display the life in plants. And thus man does not know the source of his intelligence of primal notions and his tending toward desires' primal objects. Both are in you, just as in bees there is the honeymaking urge. Such primal will deserves no praise and it deserves no blame. Now that all other longings may conform to this first will, there's in you inborn the power that counsels, keeper of the threshold of your assent.

This is the principle on which your merit may be judged, for it garners and winnows good and evil loves. Those reasoners who reached the roots of things learned of its inborn freedom. The bequest that thus they left unto the world is ethics. Even if we allow necessity as source for every love that flames in you, the power to curb that love is still your own. This noble power is what Beatrice means by free will. Therefore, remember it if she should ever speak of it to you."

If you're a woman, you're obviously seeing the most handsome guy you've seen. Okay. All right. But just for the sake of argument, let's use beautiful woman. Okay. For the sake of some simplicity.

And what do you want to do now? Come on.

You understand? That's literally what he will do, right? For years and years, he will pursue you and you'll be like, "No." And he'll try harder and harder. Okay, that's Virgil's conception of love. Tell me how Dante is different.

Yes, Edward. Did you want to Try?

He would think that love is the perfect expression of his devotion, of his faith, of his individuality. Okay, does that make sense? Okay, so these are two, the center of the whole comedy, and that's the canto that focuses on free will. And now we get a lecture on love which doesn't seem symmetrical from Paradise or Inferno. And so it's like the free will kind of has led into this concept of love, the center of the whole comedy.

You want to possess the other person. Whereas for Dante, love is about giving. Okay? And this is very clear when we reach paradise. Okay? So this is where heaven and hell meet, right? This is the final battle between the two. And this is where they will ultimately separate and go their separate ways.

How does Virgil define free will here? What is free will? You see this beautiful woman, you talk to her, you buy her flowers, you buy her a diamond ring, you give her money, and all you want is to have sex with her. What is free will in Virgil's understanding of things?

That you're free to do whatever you want. So it doesn't really matter what she wants or what she wants to do, that you have the freedom to pursue her as much as you like and follow what you want as much as you.

Then that's what's good. You understand? That's what free will is. Free will is to deny yourself when you know the thing is wrong. Okay. How does this conflict with Virgil then? Oh, sorry. How does this conflict with Dante? Because Virgil says love is neutral. Love can be good or bad. Free will is to know the difference and to act accordingly. Right? What would Dante say?

Come on. We read Paradise. We know what Dante says. Yes. It's like follow your heart.

That's the difference. This is where they separate. Okay. All right. Okay. Is that clear, guys? Yes.

So Virgil knows the absolute truth of the universe but he's made certain choices that have clouded his understanding of things. Okay. So he is a poet. He knows the complete truth of the universe but he chose to write the Aeneid to serve empire and so that's going to cloud his understanding of the way things work. Right? Once you take an action you have to justify this action. Does that make sense? Right? Once you take this action you have to be like, this is a right action. You can't be like, "Oh, it was a mistake." So once you take this action you now have to go justify it by changing your worldview.

Okay? So even though he knows the absolute truth, he needs to make certain adjustments to this theory in order to make his actions make sense to him, right? So he knows that love is giving yourself. But then why did you write the poem, the Aeneid, and why did you let, I guess, let yourself censor it when you know better, right? And you're like, well, okay, and so what you do is rather than just say I'm wrong, you change your worldview. Does that make sense?

Okay. So Yeah.

And so if your consciousness is directed in this realm then you'll think about money, time, house, material objects, about yourself, etc. And depending on situations and moments in your life then your consciousness is more directed in the center where you think more of love, hope and family, etc. It's just a whole idea, and also I saw something of, who is it, Rupert Sheldrake?

I feel like angels are more meant to push us inward and demons outward in a way. And I think it's really movable. So depending on the moment in your life and during the day your consciousness just moves around there.

Okay, that's the first part. The second point is that Rupert Sheldrake is really interesting. So if you have a chance, please watch his interviews, his presentations online. But to prove a point I'll do an experiment. Okay. So first of all, can you face the screen? Okay. You're going to face the screen. Okay. And then I'm going to have Edward come and what... Yes. No. No. No. No. Stand behind him. Stand behind him. Okay. Okay. And stand behind him. All right. So, I want you to turn away from him.

Okay. All right. So, we're going to see... Okay. We'll do an experiment, okay? Where Edward's going to turn around and look at Francois. Okay. And Francois, could you please close your eyes? Okay. Okay. So, obviously, if Francois turns before Edward turns around, then Francois loses this game. Okay. Right. So, we're trying to figure out how long it will take for everyone to turn around. Okay. And when everyone turns around, I want us to count how long it takes for Francois to turn around. Okay? And remember, if Francois turns around first, he obviously loses, okay?

Does it make sense, guys? This is just an experiment, okay? It's not a test. But let's start. Okay. On three. And again, it's entirely Edward's choice. We're going to turn around. He could choose not to turn around if he wants to. I mean, we could be here for another two hours. Okay. But we're going to count how long it takes, silently, for Francois to turn around when Edward turns around. Okay. All right. So, let's start. 1, 2, 3, go.

Wow. You guys see that? That was pretty fast, man. Thank you. Thank you both. Okay. You see that? You guys saw that? So, Francois, how did you know? Can you... like, we waited a long time. I was getting impatient. I was like, "What's going on here, man?"

If you use standard neuroscience, it gets you nowhere, right? But if you believe that we actually exist in different dimensions and we have morphic fields. Okay. So basically we project and so this sort of stuff is possible, but also you think about it, telepathy, telekinesis is also possible to a certain degree. Okay. And this is something we'll discuss as we continue the Divine Comedy. Now where our souls are, our souls are essentially these morphic fields. Okay. And so when Edward is turning around and staring at Francois, Francois is turning around because there's a connection at the soul level.

Okay. And that's why the reaction is so fast. Weird, right? Okay. Well, there you go. All right. Let's continue the Divine Comedy. Have you guys not seen this before? Again, the point is there's so much interesting stuff out there, but we close our minds to it, right? We have these prejudices about how the world works, and so we shut our minds to these possibilities.

What's your impression of that? I knew that.

But readiness for sleep was suddenly taken from me by people who behind our backs already had turned in our direction. Just as of old Ismenus and Asopus at night along their banks saw crowds and clamor whenever the Thebans had to summon Bacchus, such was the arching crowd that curved around that circle, driven on, as I made out, by righteous will as well as by just love. Soon all that mighty throng drew near us, for they ran and ran, and two in front of them who wept were crying, "In her journey, Mary made haste to reach the mountain," and "In order to conquer Lerida, Caesar thrust against Marseilles, and then to Spain he rushed."

Following them, the others cried, "Quick, quick, lest time be lost through an insufficient love. Where urge for good is keen, grace finds new green. Oh people in whom eager fervor now may compensate for sloth and negligence he showed in doing good, he who's alive, and surely I don't lie to you, would climb above as soon as he has seen the sun shed light on us again. Then tell us where the passage lies at hand." My guide said this. One of the souls replied, "Come follow us and you will find the gap.

We're so fully anxious to advance, we cannot halt. And do forgive us should you take our penance for discourtesy. I was San Zeno's abbot in Verona under the rule of valiant Barbarossa, of whom Milan still speaks with so much sorrow. And there's one with one foot in the grave who soon will weep over that monastery, lamenting that he once had power there, because in place of its true shepherd he put one who was unsound of body and still more of mind, and born in sin, his son." I don't know if he had said more or was silent, he had already raced so far beyond us, but I heard this much and was pleased to hear it.

And he who was my help in every need said, "Turn around. See those two coming? They whose words mock sloth." And I heard those two say behind all of the rest, "The ones for whom the sea parted were dead before the Jordan saw those who had inherited its lands." And "Those who did not suffer trials until the end together with Anchises' son gave themselves up to life without renown." Then when those shades were so far off from us that seeing them became impossible, a new thought rose inside me, and from that thought till others many and diverse were born.

I was so drawn from random thought to thought that wandering in mind I shut my eyes, transforming thought on thought to So a new thought rose inside of me and it kept on going.

Canto 19. In that hour when the heat of day, defeated by earth and sometimes Saturn, can no longer warm up the moon's cold, when geomancers can in the east see their Fortuna Major rising before the dawn along a path that will be darkened for it only briefly, a stammering woman came to me in dream. Her eyes skewed and crooked on her feet, her hands were crippled, her complexion sallow. I looked at her, and just as sun revives cold limbs that night made numb, so did my gaze loosen her tongue, and then in little time set her contorted limbs in perfect order, and with the coloring that love prefers, my eyes transformed the wanness of her features.

And when her speech had been set free, then she began to sing so that it would have been most difficult for me to turn aside. "I am," she sang, "I am the pleasing siren who in mid-sea leads mariners astray. There's so much delight in hearing me. I turned aside Ulysses, although he had longed to journey, from his course, and who grows used to me seldom departs, I satisfy him so." Her lips were not yet done when there beside me a woman showed herself, alert and saintly, to cast the siren into much confusion. "Oh, Virgil, Virgil, tell me, who is this?"

She asked most scornfully, and he came forward, his eyes intent upon that honest one. He seized the other, baring her in front, tearing her clothes and showing me her belly. The stench that came from there awakened me. I moved my eyes and my good master cried, "At least three times I've called you. Rise and come. Let's find the opening where you may enter."

And then a woman barges in and shouts, "Oh, Virgil, Virgil, tell me who is..." And then Virgil comes forward and then he seizes the siren and tears her clothes apart. What's going on here? Okay, let's try to figure out what this dream is about. Remember the last dream that Dante had was a vision from heaven where Saint Lucia as an eagle picks him up and delivers him to the gates of... What is going on here? And again, I don't know the answer. It's all interpretation, right? It's all speculation.

So can someone tell me what is going on here? What is this dream in our understanding of the Divine Comedy? Who is the siren? Do you mean... okay. Yeah, I know the siren is a woman, but I'm saying so far in our story, who should be the siren? Yeah, it's Virgil, right? Okay. So, if we see this, we think maybe it's Virgil, because Virgil is the one seducing Dante throughout, right, with his poetry. And throughout all this time, Dante has been a student, a child of Virgil's, right?

So, it seems as though it sounds like Virgil is the one seducing Dante and leading him astray, but then something weird happens. Beatrice comes in. I think it's Beatrice, you know, maybe it's Beatrice. She's like, "Virgil, Virgil, tell me who is this?" Where's Dante here? When Virgil comes forward, he's behind Dante. So, because he's baring her in front, it's almost like he's hiding himself. And I think that when he's showing Dante her belly, it's a message from Beatrice saying, you are, please don't get stuck in Virgil such that you would start to rot, that the siren is like a love that has been left to fester and that's why it smells.

Does that make sense, guys? Yes.

Yes. I think it's quite telling that Beatrice asked Virgil to identify the siren, because it's kind of the love that we were talking about that Virgil has that turns The ugly lady into a beautiful one.

I mean what I think, my interpretation is this, okay? If I'm Dante, I see this dream and I'm extremely uncomfortable. I'm extremely anxious. And the reason why is I feel as though Beatrice and Virgil might become one with each other. Does that make sense? Because it's Virgil who goes and does Beatrice's bidding. Okay. So it's one of, like, Virgil is my competitor now. You understand? That's the emotion now. Before it's like Virgil's my father. Now he's like, no, no, no, no. Virgil is my competitor. I need to watch out.

I mean, if I really want to keep Beatrice, I need to show I am more worthy than Virgil, that I am more willing to sacrifice myself for Beatrice.

Okay. Be wary of what he just said. Okay. Does it make sense, guys? Okay. All right. Let's keep on going. "I rose. The daylight had already filled the circles of the sacred mountain. We were journeying with new sun at our back. I followed him, bearing my brow like one whose thoughts have weighed him down, who bends as if he were the semiarch that forms a bridge. And then I heard, 'Draw near, the pass is here,' said in a manner so benign and gentle, as in our mortal land one cannot hear. He who addressed us so had open wings, white as the swans, and he directed us upward between two walls of the hard rock.

And then he moved his plumes and fanning us affirmed that those 'qui lugent' would be blessed, their souls would be possessed of consolation. 'What makes you keep your eyes upon the ground?' my guide began to say to me, when both of us had climbed a little past the angel. And I, 'What makes me move with such misgiving is a new vision. It has so beguiled me that I cannot relinquish thoughts of it.' Okay.

When I was in the clearing, the fifth level, my eyes discovered people there who wept, lying upon the ground, all turned face down. 'Adhaesit pavimento anima mea,' I heard them say with sighs so deep that it was hard to comprehend the words they spoke. 'Oh God's elect, whose sufferings both hope and justice make less difficult, direct us to the stairway meant for our ascent.' 'If you come here but do not need to be prostrate, and you would find the path most quickly, then keep your right hand always to the outside.' So did the poet ask, and so did reply come from a little way ahead.

And I, hearing that voice reply, learned what was hidden. I turned my eyes to find my master's eyes. At this, with a glad sign, he ratified what I had asked for with my eager eyes. When free to do as I had wanted to, I moved ahead and bent over that soul whose words before had made me notice him, saying, "Spirit, in whom weeping ripens that without which there's no return to God, suspend a while for me your greater care. Tell me, who were you and why are your backs turned up?

And would you have me beseech good for you there where I, alive, set out?" And he to me, "Why heaven turns our backs against itself, you are to know. But first, 'Scias quod ego fui successor Petri.' Between Sestri and Chiavari descends a handsome river, and its name is set upon the upper portion of my crest. For one month and a little more I learned how the great mantle weighs on him who'd keep it out of the mire. All other weight seemed feathers. Alas, how tardy my conversion was. But when I had been named the Roman shepherd, then I discovered the deceit of life.

I saw that there the heart was not at rest, nor could I in that life ascend more high, so that in me love for this life was kindled. Until that point I was a squalid soul, for God divided, avaricious. Now, as you see, I'm punished here for that. What avarice does is declared here in the purgation of converted souls, the mountain has no punishment more bitter. Just as we did not lift our eyes on high, but set our sight on earthly things instead, so justice here impels our eyes toward earth. As avarice quenched our love of any other good, and thus we lost our chance for righteous works, so justice here fetters our hands and feet and holds us captive.

And for as long as it may please our just Lord, here we'll be outstretched and motionless."

Line 127. I'd knelt, wishing to speak, but just as I began, and through my voice alone, he sensed that I had meant to do him reverence. "What reason makes you bend your body so?" he said, and I to him, "Your dignity made conscience sting me as I stood erect." "Brother, straighten your legs, rise up," he answered. "Don't be mistaken. I, with you and others, am but a fellow servant of one power. If you have ever understood the holy sound of the gospel that says 'neque nubent,' then you will see why I have spoken so.

Now go your way. I'd not have you stop longer. Your staying here disturbs my lamentations, the tears that help me ripen what you mentioned. Beyond, I have a niece whose name is Alagia. She in herself is good as long as our house by example brings her not to evil. And she alone is left to me beyond."

Your hungering is steep and never ending. Oh heavens, through whose revolutions many think things on earth are changed, when will he come, the one whose works will drive that wolf away? Our steps were short and slow as we moved on. I was attentive to the shades. I heard the sorrow in their tears and lamentations. Then I by chance heard one ahead of us crying in his lament, "Sweet Mary," as a woman crying in labor pains, and he continued, "In that hostel where you had set down your holy burden, there one could discover just how poor you were." Following this, I heard, "Oh good Fabricius, you chose as your possessions indigence with virtue rather than much wealth with vice."

These words have been so pleasing to me, I moved forward so that I might come to know the spirit from whom they had seemed to come. He kept on speaking, telling the largesse of Nicholas, the gifts he gave the maidens so that they might be honorably wed. "Oh soul who speaks of so much righteousness, do tell me who you were," I said, "and why just you alone renew these seemly praises. Your speaking to me will not go unrewarded when I return to finish the short span of that life which now hurries toward its end."

And he, "I'll tell you, not because I hope for solace from your world, but for such grace as shines in you before your death has arrived. I was the root of the obnoxious plant that overshadows all the Christian land so that the fine fruit can rarely rise from Okay, so his name is Hugh Capet and he is the founder of the current dynasty of the Holy Roman Empire.

Line 46. But if Douai and Lille and Bruges and Ghent had power, they would soon take vengeance on it. And this I beg of him who judges all. The name I bore beyond was Hugh Capet. Of me were born the Louises and Philips by whom France has been ruled most recently. I was the son of a Parisian butcher when all the line of ancient kings was done, and only one, a monk in gray, survived. I found the reins that ruled the kingdom tight within my hands. And I held so much new-gained power and possessed so many friends that to the widowed crown my own son's head was elevated.

And from him began the consecrated bones of all those kings, until the giant dowry of Provence removed all sense of shame within my house. My line was not worth much but did no wrong. There its rapine began with lies and force, and then it seized, that it might make amends, Ponthieu and Normandy and Gascony. Charles came to Italy and for amends made Conradin a victim, and then thrust Thomas back into heaven for amends. I see a time not too far off in which another Charles advances out of France to make himself and his descendants famous.

He does not carry weapons when he comes, only the lance that Judas tilted. This he couches so he twists the paunch of Florence. From this he'll gain not land, just shame and sin, which will be all the heavier for him as he would reckon lightly such disgrace. The other, who once left his ship as prisoner, I see him sell his daughter, bargaining, as pirates haggle over female slaves. Oh avarice, my house is now your captive. It traffics in the flesh of its own children. What more is left for you to do to us?

That past and future evil may seem less, I see the fleur-de-lis enter Anagni and in his vicar Christ made prisoner. I see him mocked a second time. I see the vinegar and gall renewed, and he slain between two living thieves. And I see the new Pilate, one so cruel that still it does not sate him, that without decree he carries his greedy sails into the temple. Oh my Lord, when will I be happy on seeing vengeance that, concealed, makes sweet your anger in your secrecy? What I have said about the only bride the Holy Ghost has known, and which made you turn to me for commentary, these words serve as answer to our prayers as long as it is day.

But when night falls, we recite examples that are contrary. Then we tell over how Pygmalion, out of his greedy lust for gold, became a thief and traitor and a parasite. The wretchedness of avaricious Midas, resulting from his ravenous request, the consequence that always makes men laugh. And each of us recalls the foolish Achan, how he had robbed the spoil, so that the anger of Joshua still seems to sting him here.

Then we accuse Sapphira and her husband. We praise the kicks Heliodorus suffered, and Polymnestor, who killed Polydorus, resounds an infamy around all this mountain. And finally, what we cry here is "Crassus, tell us, because you know, how does gold taste?" At times one speaks aloud, another low, according to the sentiment that goads us now to be more swift and now more slow. Thus I was not alone in speaking of the good we sing by day. But here nearby no other spirit raised his voice as high. We had already taken leave of him and were already struggling to advance along that road as far as we were able.

When I could feel the mountain tremble like a falling thing, at which a chill seized me as cold grips one who goes to meet his death. Delos surely had not been buffeted so hard before Latona planted there the nest in which to bear the two eyes of the sky. Then such a shout rose up on every side that, drawing near to me, my master said, "Don't be afraid as long as I'm your guide." "Gloria in excelsis Deo," they all cried. So did I understand from those nearby whose shouted words were able to be heard.

Just like the shepherds who first heard that song, we stood but did not move, in expectation, until the trembling stopped and the song was done. Then we took up again our holy path, watching the shades who lay along the ground, who had resumed their customary tears. My ignorance has never struggled so, has never made me long so much to know, if memory does not mislead me now, as it seemed then, long within my thoughts, nor did I dare to ask. We were so rushed, nor by myself could I discern the cause, so timid, pensive, I pursued my way.

Okay. To signify that a soul has been released and will now ascend to heaven. Okay. And in the next canto we will meet the soul. And I want you to pay careful attention to how the soul interacts with Virgil, because his name is Statius. Okay. Statius.

So the symmetry. Okay. So remember before, Dante and Virgil met Sordello. Okay. This is Virgil. So Sordello is a troubadour, which is to say he is a love poet of the courtly love tradition, and he was living around the time of Dante, okay, maybe the 13th century. Okay, so do you remember when Virgil met with Sordello, what it was like? Yeah, they were from the same place, and so Sordello bowed before Virgil, right? And how did Virgil feel about all this? He was ecstatic, right? He was ecstatic. Okay.

And now what's going to happen is this. Virgil is going to meet Statius. And Statius is a Latin poet. Okay, a Latin epic poet very similar to Virgil. Okay. And Statius worships Virgil. And how does Virgil feel about this?

What would you guess? Yeah, he'd be very happy as well, right? Well, if Sordello worshipped Virgil, you would think another poet worshipping Virgil, Virgil would have the same reaction, but it's the opposite reaction. Okay. He is not happy about this. Okay. So let's read canto 21. Okay.

"If God's not deemed you worthy of ascent, who's guided you so far along his stairs?" "If you observe the signs the angel traced upon this man," my teacher said, "you'll see plainly he's meant to reign with all the righteous. But since she who spins night and day had not yet spun this bool that Clotho sets upon the distaff and adjusts for everyone, his soul, the sister of your soul and mine in its ascent, could not alone have climbed here, for it does not see the way we see. Therefore, I was brought forth from hell's broad jaws to guide him in his going.

I shall lead him just as far as where my teaching can reach. But tell me, if you can, why just before the mountain shook and shouted all of it, for so it seemed, down to its sea-bathed shore." His question threaded so the needle's eye of my desire that just the hope alone of knowing left my thirst more satisfied. The other shade began, "The sanctity of these slopes does not suffer anything that's without order or uncustomary. This place is free from every perturbation. What heaven from itself and in itself receives may serve as cause here, nothing else.

Therefore no rain nor hail, no snow, no dew, no hoarfrost falls here any higher than the stairs of entry with their three brief steps. Neither thick clouds nor thin appear, nor flash of lightning. Thaumas' daughter, who so often shifts places in our world, is absent here. Dry vapor cannot climb up any higher than to the top of the three steps of which I spoke, where Peter's vicar plants his feet. Below that point there may be smaller or ample tremors, but here above, I know not why, no wind concealed in earth has ever caused a tremor. For it only trembles here when some soul feels itself cleansed, so that it rises or stirs to climb on high, and that shout follows. The will alone is proof of purity and, fully free, surprises the soul into a change of dwelling place effectively.

The soul had the will to climb before, but that will was opposed by longing to do penance, as once to sin, instilled by divine justice. And I, who have lain in this suffering 500 years and more, just now have felt my free will for a better threshold.

What do these three lines mean?

You don't want to have any sin in you. Okay? It's like going to the prom and dressing up really, really nicely. Okay? You want to be your best, and that's why you do penance. That's why you suffer. Okay? Keep on going.

70. "Thus you heard the earthquake and the high spirits throughout the mountain as they praise the Lord. And may he send them speedily upward." So did he speak to us. And just as joy is greater when we quench a greater thirst, the joy he brought cannot be told in words. And my wise guide, "I now can see the net impeding you, how one slips through, and why it quakes here and what makes you all rejoice. And now may it please you to tell me who you were in your words.

May I find why you've lain here for so many Okay, stop.

Okay. Keep on going.

No, it's 70. Do you understand? 70. 70 is the year when the Romans burned down the second temple. Okay. Titus is the emperor and he burned down the second temple. All right. And the Christians believe this is vengeance for the crucifixion of Jesus. All right. Keep on going.

I speak of the Aeneid, which was mother to me and was my nurse in poetry. My work without it would not weigh an ounce. And to have lived on earth when Virgil lived, for that I would extend by one more year the time I owe before my exile's end."

And Virgil is next to him, right? So, how is Virgil feeling right now? He's ecstatic, right? He'd be like, "Oh, wow. I'm Virgil. Yeah, I'm better than God. Yeah. Wow. I'm the holy fire. Yeah. I nursed you. Yeah, that's me, man." Okay, you understand? All right. And now we're going to read this and appreciate there's no way Dante could have created Virgil. He had to summon Virgil. Okay, because it's too real. Okay, keep on reading.

Line 112. And said, "So may your trying labor end successfully. Do tell me why just now your face showed me the flashing of a smile." Now I am held by one side and the other one keeps me still. The other conjures me to speak. And so I sigh, and my master knows why and tells me, "Do not be afraid to speak, but speak and answer what he has asked you to tell him with such earnestness." At this I answered, "Ancient spirit, you perhaps are wondering at the smile I smiled, but I would have you feel still more surprised.

He who is guide who leads my eyes on high, that same Virgil, from whom you derived the power to sing of men and of the gods. Do not suppose my smile had any source beyond the speech you spoke. Be sure it was those words you said of him that were the cause." Now he had bent to kiss my teacher's feet. But Virgil told him, "Brother, there's no need. You're a shade. A shade is what you see." And rising, he: "Now you can understand how much love burns in me for you.

When I forget our insubstantiality, treating the shades as one treats solid Okay.

But here, Virgil's like, "Could you please stop? Just stop, man. Just stop." Right? Why is Virgil behaving like this? And again, it's impossible to create a Virgil. You have to summon this guy. I think because he realizes, it's really hitting in his head, that his poetry is kind of undermining the true message of the universe. And so he's like, if my work has made someone at the very height of purgatory act this way, it just kind of makes him feel embarrassed. And he's like, this really isn't what I should have done.

I should not have inspired someone to behave this way. And it's kind of making him self-conscious about what he wanted before.

He is a Roman epic poet. He is a pagan who did not convert. Same as if you're Virgil, you're like, what's going on here? Right? Okay. So, let's think about this. Okay.

We talked about how when Virgil met Cato, Virgil just engaged in cognitive dissonance, right? He just forgot that Cato is a pagan. Okay. But here he is able to recognize the fact that yes, Statius is a pagan and I'm a pagan and he's better than I am. How is he able to do this?

Okay. Okay. We're running out of time, but I'll throw an idea out there for you guys. Okay. You cannot fool yourself ever. Okay. You think you can fool yourself, but you cannot fool yourself ever. Why? Because you exist in infinite dimensions. And in some parts you still know the truth. In most parts, you may not know the truth. Does that make sense? Okay, remember this. Remember this. There's no way you can ever fool yourself. Maybe you can fool everyone in the world, but you cannot fool yourself.

Okay, so Virgil, in his heart, he does know that it is not true that pagans cannot go to heaven. It is not true at all. He knows that. But he does not want to admit it to Dante because he's more concerned about his face than he is about the truth. Okay. Does that make sense? Yes.

And I'm very happy because she remembers me. And obviously the course had a huge impact on her. And I ask her, "So Ivy, what are you doing now?" And she says, "Oh, I'm teaching Dante at Harvard or Yale." Okay. What do I do now?

Sorry, I have an appointment. See you later, Ivy. Okay. [laughter] Why would I do that? Like, sorry. I have an appointment right now. I'll talk to you later. Why would I do that?

Thus now these stairs seem short. But tell me, and as a friend, forgive me if excessive candor lets my reins relax, and as a friend exchange your words with me, how is it that you found within your breast a place for avarice when you possess the wisdom you had nurtured with such care?" These words at first brought something of a smile to Statius, then he answered, "Every word you speak to me is a dear sign of love. Indeed, because true causes are concealed, we often face deceptive reasoning, and things provoke perplexity in us.

Your question makes me sure that you're convinced, perhaps because my circle was the fifth, that in the life I once lived, avarice had been my sin. Note then that I was far from avarice. It was my lack of measure that thousands of months have punished. And if I had not corrected my assessment by understanding what your verses meant, when you, as if outraged by human nature, exclaimed, 'Why cannot you, holy hunger for gold, restrain the appetite of mortals?', I'd now while rolling weights be in sorry joust. Then I became aware that hands might open too wide like wings in spending, and of this, as of my other sins, I did repent.

How many are to rise again with heads cropped close whom ignorance prevents from reaching repentance in life and at the end of life. And know that when a sin is countered by another fault directly opposite to it, then here both sins see their green wither. Thus I join those who pay for avarice in my purgation, though what brought me here was prodigality, its opposite. Now when you sang the savage wars of those twin sorrows of Jocasta, the singer of the bucolic poems, it does not seem from those notes struck by you and Clio there that you had yet turned faithful to the faith without which righteousness works do not suffice. If that is so, then what sun or what candles drew you from darkness, so that in their wake you set yourself behind the fisherman?"

And he to him, "You were the first to send me to drink within Parnassus' caves, and you the first who after God enlightened me. You did as he who goes by night and carries the lamp behind him. He's of no help to his own self, but teaches those who follow, when you declared, 'The ages are renewed, justice and man's first time on earth return, from heaven a new progeny descends.' Through you I was a poet and through you a Christian. But that you may see more plainly, I'll set my hand to color what I sketch.

Because in Virgil's understanding, only Christians [snorts] are allowed access to heaven. And what Virgil, sorry, what Statius says is, "Well, I converted secretly." Yeah, I converted secretly. And who convinced him to convert to Poet, poets.

Using the structure of empire that has kind of made it kind of spread so Maybe I don't.

But we have free will so we can do whatever we want. And then Virgil became seduced by power. So he turned this vessel into a weapon for empire. Okay. But basically before, the vessel was meant to be like a glass where everyone can just feel the light, but now it's this bronze vessel, a weapon. Okay. But the holy fire is so strong that there are things that leak out, and if you are a perceptive enough reader you're able to still feel that light, and that light will draw you to Christianity.

Does that make sense? Okay. But the poet has committed evil and sin by trapping the holy fire. And so the poet is convinced that this vessel, this weapon he's created, is actually for good reasons. And so this cognitive dissonance blinds the poet from seeing the holy light. Does that make sense, guys? Okay. That's right. Statius can be converted by the Aeneid, but Virgil cannot be converted by the Aeneid. Okay, Fred, did you want to add something or

But out of fear, I was a secret Christian, and for a long time showed myself as pagan. For this half-heartedness, for more than four centuries, I circled the fourth circle. And now, may you who lifted up the lid that hid from me the good of which I speak, while time has left us as we climb, tell me, where's our ancient Terence and Caecilius and Plautus and Varro, if you know? Tell me if they're damned and in what quarter." "All these, Persius and I and many others," my guide replied, "are with that Greek to whom the Muses gave their gifts in greatest measure. Our place is the blind prison, its first circle, and there we often talk about the mountain where those who were our nurses always dwell. Is with us Euripides, Antiphon, Simonides, and Agathon, as well as many other Greeks who once wore laurel upon their brow. And there of your own people, once, the Antigone, Deiphyle is seen, sad still, Argia, as she was. There one can see the woman who showed Langia, and there too Tiresias' daughter, there's Thetis, and with her sisters, there Deidamia." Both poets now were silent once again, intent on their surroundings, they were free of stairs and walls, with day's first four handmaidens already left behind, and with the fifth guiding the chariot pole and lifting it so that its horn of flame rose ever higher.

My master said, "I think it's time that we turn our right shoulders toward the terrace edge, circling the mountain in the way we're used to." In this way, habit served us as a banner. And when we chose that path, our fear was less because that worthy soul gave his assent. The two were in the lead. I walked alone behind them, listening to their colloquy, which taught me much concerning poetry. But their delightful conversation soon was interrupted by a tree that blocked our path.

Its fruits were fine. Their scent was sweet, and even as a fir tree tapers upward from branch to branch, that tree there tapered downward, so, as I think, to ward off any climber. Upon our left, where wall enclosed our path, clear bright running water fell from the high rock and spread itself upon the leaves above. When the two poets had approached the tree, a voice emerging from within the leaves cried out, "This food shall be denied to you." Then it cried, "Mary's care was for the marriage feast being seemly and complete, not for her mouth, which now would intercede for you.

And when they drank of old, the Roman women were satisfied with water, and young Daniel, through his disdain of food, acquired wisdom. The first age was as beautiful as gold. When hungry men found the taste of acorns good, when thirsty they found that every little stream was nectar. When he was in the wilderness, the Baptist had fed on nothing more than honey and locusts. For this he was made great, as glorious as in the gospel is made plain to you."

Paradise 20, everyone. And in Paradise 20, there is going to be an eagle. Okay. And in this eagle are the great kings of time. Okay. Including David. And one of them, one of these people, is Ripheus. Okay.

And Ripheus is a Trojan. What's the problem, guys? Why is this a problem? Yeah. So, there's no way this could have happened, right? Because this is not just before the time of Jesus. It's also before the time of the Hebrews, man. So this is really confusing now for us. Okay. So, can we read Paradise 20, please? Can we go, please? 20, and we'll skip to 37. Okay.

Who in the world below would hold that he who was the fifth among the lights that formed the circle was the Trojan Ripheus? Now he has learned much that the world cannot discern of God's own grace, although his sight cannot divine its deepest sight." As if it were a lark at large in air, a lark that sings at first and falls then still, content with final sweetness that fulfills such things.

How is this possible? Okay. Yeah. Yes.

Okay. Like, to make it to heaven. Face it, guy. Don't you know?

Virgil writes, "Ripheus, uniquely the most just of all the Trojans, the most faithful preserver of equity, but the gods decided otherwise."

Okay? So again, the Divine Comedy is a rejection of Virgil, but it's also born of Virgil. Okay? It's like the father-son relationship. Okay. Let's go back to purgatory.

One, I think. Are we done with this No, we're done.

Even as pensive pilgrims do, who when they've overtaken folk unknown to them along the way, will turn but will not stop, so overtaking us, they had come from behind, but were more swift. A crowd of souls, devout and silent, looked at us in wonder. Each shade had dark and hollow eyes. Their faces were pale and so emaciated that their taut skin took its shape from bones beneath. I don't believe that even Erysichthon had been so dried down to his very hide by hunger when his fast made him fear most. Thinking, I told myself, "I see the people who lost Jerusalem when Mary plunged her beak into her son." The orbits of their eyes seemed like a ring that's lost its gems. And he who in the face of man would read "omo" would here have recognized the M. Who, if he knew not how, would have believed that longing born from odor of a fruit, odor of water, could reduce a soul.

So I was already wondering what had so famished them, for I had not learned the reason for their leanness and sad scurf. When there a shade, his eyes deep in his head, turned toward me, staring steadily, and then he cried aloud, "What grace has granted me this?" I never would have recognized him by his face, and yet his voice made plain to me what his appearance had obliterated. The spark rekindled in me everything I knew about those altered features. Thus I realized it was Forese's face. "Don't reproach me for the dried-out scabs that stain my skin," he begged.

"Nor for the lack of flesh on me, but do tell me the truth about yourself. Do tell me who those two souls there are, those who are escorting you. May you not keep yourself from speaking to me."

"Now gives me no less cause for sad lament, seeing you so deformed. But tell me, for God's sake, what has unleashed you so? Don't make me speak while I'm amazed." He who's distracted answers clumsily. And he to me, "From the eternal counsel, the water and the tree you left behind receive the power that makes me waste away. All of these souls who grieving sing because their appetite was gluttonous, in thirst and hunger here resanctify themselves. The fragrance of the fruit and of the water that sprays through that green tree kindles in us craving for food and drink. And not once only as we go around the space our pains renewed.

I speak of pain, but I should speak of solace. For we're guided to those trees by that same longing that had guided Christ when he had come to free us through the blood he shed, and in his joyousness called out 'Eli.'" And I to him, "From that day when you exchanged the world for better life until now less than five years have revolved. And if you waited for the moment when the power to sin was gone before you found the hour of the good grief that succors us and weds us once again to God, how have you come so quickly here?

I thought to find you down below where time must pay for time." And he to me, "It is my Nella who with her abundant tears has guided me to drink the sweet wormwood of torments. She with sighs and prayers devout has set me free of that slope where one waits and has freed me from circles underneath the circle. She, my gentle widow whom I loved most dearly, was all the more beloved and praised by God as she's more alone in her good works.

For even the Barbagia of Sardinia is far more modest in its women than that Barbagia where I left her. Oh sweet brother, what would you have me say? A future time already is visible to me, a time not too far off from now, when from the pulpit it shall be forbidden to those immodest ones, Florentine women, to go displaying bosoms with bare paps. What barbarian or Saracen women ever needed ordinances, spiritual or civil, to make them go covered? But if those shameless ones had certain knowledge of what the swift heavens are readying for them, then they would have mouths open now to howl.

For if our foresight here does not deceive me, they'll be sad before the cheeks of those whom lullabies can now appease grow beards. Brother, do not hide things any longer. You see that I am not alone, for all these people stare at where you veil the sun." At this I said to him, "If you should call to mind what you have been with me, and I with you, remembering now will still be heavy. He who precedes me turned me from that life some days ago when she who is the sister of him I pointed to, the sun, was showing her roundness to you.

It is he who led me through the deep night of the truly dead with this true flesh that follows after him. His help has drawn me up from there, climbing and circling around this mountain which makes straight you whom the world made crooked. And he says that he will bear me company until I reach the place where Beatrice is. There I must remain without him. It is Virgil who speaks to me in this way, and I point it to him.

This other is the shade for whom just now your kingdom caused its every slope to tremble as it freed him from itself."

Because their parents were really virtuous and prayed for them every single day. Okay. Let's keep on going to canto 24, please. "Our talking did not slow our pace, our pace not slowing our talking, but conversing, we moved quickly like a boat a fair wind drives. And recognizing that I was alive, the shades, who seemed to be things twice dead, drew amazement from the hollows of their eyes. And I, continuing my telling, added, 'Perhaps he's more slow in his ascent than he would be had he not met the other. But tell me, if you can, where is Piccarda?

And tell me if among those staring at me, I can see any person I should note.' 'My sister, and I know not whether she was greater in her goodness or her beauty, on high Olympus is in triumph. She rejoices in her crown already.' He began, then added, 'It is not forbidden to name each shade here. Abstinence has eaten away our faces.' And he pointed, 'This is Bonagiunta, Bonagiunta da Lucca. The one beyond him, even more emaciated than the rest, had clasped the holy church. He was from Tours, his fast purges the eels of Bolsena and Vernaccia's wine.' And he named many others one by one, and at their naming they all seemed content, so that for this no face was overcast.

I saw their teeth were biting emptiness, both Ubaldin della Pila and Boniface, who shepherded so many with his staff. I saw Messer Marchese, who once had more ease for drinking, less dryness, and yet could never satisfy his thirst. But just as he who looks and then esteems one more than another, so did I praise him of Lucca, for he seemed to know me better. He murmured something like 'Gentucca' was what I heard from the place where he could feel the wound of justice that denudes them so.

'Oh soul,' I said, 'who seemed so eager to converse with me, do speak so that I hear you, for speech may satisfy both you and me.' He answered, 'Although men condemn my city, there is a woman born, she wears no veil as yet, because of whom you will find it pleasing. You're to journey with this prophecy, as if there is something in my murmuring you doubt. Events themselves will bear me out. But tell me if the man whom I see here is he who brought the new rhymes forth, beginning, "Ladies who have intelligence of love."' I answered, 'I'm one who, when love breathes in me, takes note.

What he within dictates, I in that way without would speak and shape.' 'Oh brother, now I see,' he said, 'the knot that kept the Notary, Guittone, and me short of the sweet new manner that I hear. I clearly see how your pens follow closely behind him who dictates, and certainly that did not happen with our pens, and he who sets himself to searching profoundly can find no other difference between the two styles.' He fell still contentedly, even as birds that winter on the Nile at times will make a flock in air, then speed their flight and form a file.

So all the people who were there moved much more swiftly, turning away their faces, hurrying their pace because of leanness and desire. And just as he who's tired of running lets his comrades go ahead and slows his steps until he stills the panting of his chest, so did Forese let the holy flock pass by and move behind with me, saying, "How long before I shall see you again?" "I do not know," I said, "how long I will live.

And yet, however quick is my return, my longing for these shores would have me here sooner. Because the place where I was set to live is day by day deprived of good and seems along the way to wretched ruin." "Do not be vexed," he said, "for I can see the guiltiest of all dragged by a beast's tail to the valley where no sin is purged. At every step, the beast moves faster, always gaining momentum till it smashes him and leaves his body squalid and in death. Those wheels..." And here he looked up at the sky.

"Do not have long to turn before you see plainly what I can't tell you more openly. Now you remain behind, for time is costly here in this kingdom. I should lose too much by moving with you thus at equal pace." Just as a horseman sometimes gallops out, leaving behind his troop of riders, so that he may gain the honor of the first clash, so with longer strides did he leave us. And I remained along my path with those two who were such great marshals of the world. And when he'd gone so far ahead of us that my eyes strained to follow him, just as my mind was straining after what he'd said, the branches of another tree, heavy with fruit and alive with green, appeared to me nearby, just past a curve where I had turned.

Beneath the tree I saw shades lifting hands, crying I know not what up toward the branches, like little eager empty-handed children who beg, but he of whom they beg does not reply, but to provoke their longing holds high and does not hide the thing they want. Then they departed as if disabused, and we immediately reached that great tree which turns aside so many prayers and tears.

"Continue on, but don't draw close to it. There is a tree above from which Eve ate, and from that tree above this plant was raised." Among the boughs, a voice I know not whose spoke so. Thus drawing close, Virgil, Statius, and I pushed on along the side that rises. It said, "Remember those with double chests, the miserable ones born of the clouds, who battled Theseus when they gorged themselves, and those whom Gideon refused as comrades, those Hebrews who had drunk too avidly when he came down the hills to Midian." So keeping close to one of that road's margins, we moved ahead, hearing of gluttony's sins, which had since been repaid by sorry penalties.

Then with more space along the lonely path, a thousand steps and more had brought us forward, each of us meditating without a word. "What are you thinking of, you three who walk alone?" A sudden voice called out, at which I started like a scared young animal. I raised my head to see who it might be. No glass or metal ever seen within a furnace was so glowing or so red as one I saw who said, "If you'd ascend, then you must turn at this point. For whoever would journey unto peace must pass this way."

But his appearance had deprived me of my sight. So that, as one who uses hearing as guide, I turned and followed my two teachers. And like the breeze of May that, heralding the dawn, the dawning of the day, when steeped in flowers and in grass, stirs fragrantly, so did I feel the wind that blew against the center of my brow, and clearly sent the movement of his wings, the air's ambrosia. And then I heard, "Blessed are those who embrace illumination so that in their breast the love of taste does not awake too much desire, whose hungering is always in just measure."

Is your dream similar to what's going... So why do you think you had the dream?

So maybe it's a way for me to seek redemption or something like that.

Not surprised, honestly, but I feel it's like it's destined. It's destined to be like this. Has anyone had a dream that was basically of the future?

So, this happens to you a lot. Okay. Give us an example. Nothing special, but sometimes it's just like when I enter a building, a hall, or I just had a lunch with a stranger and it just clicks. I was like, oh, I knew what would happen five minutes later or an hour later. Yeah. Okay, Fred, do

But my dear father, though our steps were hurrying, did not stop talking, for he said, "The iron of the arrow's touched the long bow. Let the shaft of speech fly off." Then I had confidence enough to open my mouth and ask him, "How can one grow lean when there's never need for Okay, so this is a great question.

Okay? The correspondence between the body, the soul and the spirit. So that one thing happens to one, then the other, then the other thing happens to the other. Okay. So if your soul is starving then your body is starving. If your body is starving so is your soul starving.

What's the problem with this? The body's gone, right? So this is really confusing. So he doesn't really answer and he recognizes he doesn't really answer. So he says, "Let Statius answer." Okay. All right. Statius, you try now. All right.

From there it drips into the natural receptacle upon another's blood. The two bloods make one ready to be passive and one active because of the perfect place, the heart prepared them. The active, having reached the passive, starts to work. First it coagulates and then quickens the matter it has made more dense, having become a soul much like a plant, though with this difference: a plant's complete whereas a fetus still is journeying. The active virtue labors so the fetus may move and feel like a sea sponge, and then it starts to organize the powers seated.

At this point, son, the power that had come from the begetter's heart unfolds and spreads, that nature may see every limb. But how the animal becomes a speaking being you've not yet seen. This point so hard it led one wiser than you are to err in separating from the possible intellect the soul, since he could see no organ for the mind. So did he teach. Open your heart to truth. We now have reached and know that once the brain's articulation within the fetus has attained perfection, then the first mover turns toward it with joy on seeing so much art of nature and breathes into it new spirit vigorous, which draws all that is active in the fetus into its substance and becomes one soul that lives and feels and has self-awareness.

That what I say may leave you less perplexed, consider the sun's heat that, when combined with sap that flows from vines, is then made wine. And when Lachesis lacks more thread, the soul divides from the flesh, potentially it bears with it the human and divine. But with the human powers mute, the rest, intelligence and memory and will, are more acute in action than they were. With no delay the soul falls of itself astonishingly on one of two shores.

There it learns early what way it will journey. There, once the soul is circumscribed by space, the power that gives form radiates as and as much as once it formed the living limbs. And even as the saturated air, since it reflects the rays the sun has sent, takes rainbow colors as its ornament, so there where the soul stopped, the nearby air takes on the form that so impressed on it a shape that is potentially a real body. And then just as a flame will follow after the fire whenever fire moves, so that new form becomes the spirit's follower.

Since from that airy body it takes on its semblance, that soul is called shade. That shape forms organs for each sense, even for sight. This airy body lets us speak and laugh. With it we form the tears and sighs that you perhaps have heard around this mountain. Just as we are held fast by longings and by other sentiments, our shade takes form. This is the cause of your Okay.

Okay, the baby is so developed that God can now smile upon it. And when God smiles upon it, what happens is that this universal unconscious that we've discussed creates a soul for the baby. Okay, does that make sense? As the baby develops limbs and the full shape of the body, the soul itself starts to take shape as well. Okay. And we think that the soul, oh, it's a spark in us or it's part of the brain. No, it's actually the body... Okay. And these are what are called morphic fields.

So, think of it as though your body is now emitting energy fields. Okay? And that's how Francois was able to easily notice when Edward turned around. Okay? Does that make sense? Because there are fields around you that feel the world spiritually around you and connect you to the universal consciousness. Okay. So what happens is that these fields are now resembling your body. Okay. So each part of your body has its own field. Your organs have their own fields. Even when your body decomposes, these fields are still around that mimic your old body.

And as such, you can still feel the way that your old body used to feel. Not as much, but there's still some elements to it. That's how people are able to feel pain both in hell and in purgatory. Does that make sense, guys?

All right. Yes.

All right. So that's what he's saying here. Any questions about this? Yes.

And so, the soul, to demonstrate its longing yet its restraint, it becomes much more... Okay? Does that make sense? So it's a metaphorical fruit that... But it's not real hunger then because Okay, well, they say would it be real hunger, right?

So you still hunger and you can still starve, but in a spiritual way. Does it make sense? So what's happening here is not at a physical level, but at a spiritual level.

Did they have food in the other circles? And what Dante is saying here, there's no food. There's no need for food. Yes. Yes.

And our bodies have senses, which is to say we have these different desires like for food, okay. And so we become really confused. We don't know what brings us happiness. Is it lots of sex? Is it a Mercedes? Is it wine? Right? We just become really, really confused. And so that's why we do stupid things. But once we shed our bodies, then the souls only desire the divine light. Okay? Does that make sense? The problem with gluttony is the memory of these things, our desire for these things are still there and we want to pay penance for this.

So our souls engage in a process of, which is a denial of the divine light, in order to compensate for our gluttony on earth. So it's a conscious choice on our part to starve ourselves in order to pay penance for our gluttony on earth. And how this system works is the tree helps us remember our bodies through sense, right? It gives us the scent of food and we desire it, but we're souls. We can't actually eat food and so we have this emaciation going on.

Does it make sense, you guys? Okay. All right. Let's keep on, 109. "By now we've reached the final turning, we would meet and took the pathway right, at which we were preoccupied with other cares. There from the wall the mountain hurls its flames, but from the terrace side there whirls a wind that pushes back the fire and limits it. Thus on the open side, proceeding one by one, we went. I feared the fire on the left and on the right the precipice. My guide said, 'On this terrace, it is best to curb your eyes, the least distraction left and right.

Left or right can mean a step you will regret.'" Then from the heart of that great conflagration, I heard "Summae Deus clementiae" sung and was not less keen to turn my eyes. And I saw spirits walking in the flames, so that I looked at them and at my steps, sharing the time and had to look at each. After they'd reached that hymn's end, "Virum non cognosco" were the words they cried aloud. Then they began the hymn in a low voice again. And done again they cried, "Diana kept the woods and banished Helice after she'd felt the force of Venus's poison."

Then they returned to singing and they praised aloud those wives and husbands who were chaste as virtue and as matrimony mandate. This is, I think, the way these spirits act as long as they are burned by fire. This is the cure and this the nourishment with which one has to heal the final wound of all.

Yes. One last question, Fred.