THE PLAN OF THE “DIVINE COMEDY”
The “Commedia,”〖See Harvard Classics, xx, and General Index, under Dante, in vol. l.〗 with its three books and its hundred cantos, relates the whole progress of a soul from sin, through remorse, meditation, and discipline, to the state of purity that enables it to see God. Lost in wickedness, the poet suddenly comes to his senses and tries to escape from it, but in vain. Reason, moved by grace, thereupon leads him step by step to a full understanding of evil, in all its ugliness and folly; and he at last turns his back upon it. His next duty is to cleanse his soul by penance, until its innocence is gradually restored. Then Revelation descends to meet him, and lifts him heavenward, higher and higher, even to the presence of his Maker. All this is set forth allegorically in the form of a journey, under the guidance of Virgil and then of Beatrice, through the underground kingdom of Hell, up the lonely mountain of Purgatory to the Garden of Eden, and thence through the revolving spheres to Paradise.