rk forest of the world.
Virgil is the type of the right reason, that reason whose guidance, if
followed, leads man to the attainment of the moral virtues, by the
practice of which sin may be avoided, but which by themselves are not
enough for salvation. These were the virtues of the virtuous heathen,
unenlightened by divine revelation. Through the world, of whose evil
Hell is the type and fulfillment, reason is the sufficient guide and
guard along the perilous paths which man must traverse, exposed to the
assaults of sin, subject to temptation, and compelled to face the very
Devil himself. And when at last, worn and wearied by long-continued
effort, and repentant of his frequent errors, he has overcome
temptation, and entered on a course of purification through suffering
and penitence, whereby he may obtain forgiveness and struggle upward to
the height of moral virtue, reason still suffices to lead him on the
difficult ascent, until he reaches the security and the joy of having
overcome the world. But now reason no longer is sufficient. Another
guide is needed to lead the soul through heavenly paths to the
attainment of the divine virtues of faith, hope, and charity, by which
the soul is made fit for Paradise. And here Beatrice, the type of
theology, or knowledge of the things of God, takes the place of Virgil,
and conducts the purified and redeemed soul on its return to its divine
source, to the consummation of its desires and its bliss in the vision
of God himself.

Such is the general scheme of the poem, in which the order of the
universe is displayed and the life of man depicted, in scenes of immense
dramatic variety and of unsurpassed imaginative reality. It embraces the
whole field of human experience. Nature, art, the past, the present,
learning, philosophy, all contribute to it. The mastery of the poet over
all material which can serve him is complete; the force of his
controlling imagination corresponds with the depth and intensity of his
moral purpose. And herein lies the exceptional character of the poem, as
at once a work of art of supreme beauty and a work of didactic morals of
supreme significance. Art indeed cannot, if it would, divorce itself
from morals. Into every work of art, whether the artist intend it or
not, enters a moral element. But in art, beauty does not submit to be
subordinated to any other end, and it is the marvel in Dante that while
his main intent is didactic, he attains it by a means o