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the eleventh Canto of the Inferno (lines 22-90) two distinct statements are put upon the lips of Virgil in reference to the Ethical System of Hell.A considerable literature has gathered round the question of their relation to each other, but, though opinions still differ, I cannot help hoping that a fuller statement and coordination of the evidence than, so far as I know, has yet been furnished, may secure a unanimous verdict.I believe it can be shewn that an elaborate and uniform numerical scheme underlies the classification in all the three Cantiche.It consists in a three-fold division, yielding, by subdivision of its first and third members, seven main divisions of souls; to which two more, on a somewhat different plane, must be added, 7 + 2 = 9; while yet another mansion, distinct from the nine thus appropriated gives us 9 + 1, and so yields the mystic number 10.But in the matter of topography and classification the first Cantica is far more complicated than either of the other two, and for that reason it will be well to preface our examination of the Inferno by a brief account of the simpler schemes of the Purgatorio and the Paradiso.On the Mount of Purgatory there are seven terraces.They correspond to the seven Capital Vices, from the stains of which souls must be cleansed before they can ascend to the Earthly Paradise.But this seven-fold classification is explained by Virgil (in Purgatorio xvII) as rising out of a three-fold division that underlies it.Our affections, he says, are perfectly regulated when we love, or rejoice in, the right things in the right measure-God and goodness supremely, and all else in relation and in subordination to that highest love.When we go wrong, we either love what we ought not to love at all, or we love the supreme too little or that which is not supreme too much.Thus perverse love, inadequate love, and excessive love, include, amongst them, every kind of passion or affection that needs purgation on the Mount, and they underlie all the seven capital vices.
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