Top 274 Quotes & Sayings by Dante Alighieri - Page 3

Love with delight discourses in my mindUpon my lady's admirable gifts...Beyond the range of human intellect.

Open your mind to what I shall disclose, and hold it fast within you; he who hears, but does not hold what he has heard, learns nothing. Beatrice - Canto V 40-42

I saw a point that shone with light so keen, the eye that sees it cannot bear its blazing; the star that is for us the smallest one would seem a moon if placed beside this point.

At grief so deep the tongue must wag in vain; the language of our sense and memory lacks the vocabulary of such pain.

As one who sees in dreams and wakes to find the emotional impression of his vision still powerful while its parts fade from his mind - Just such am I, having lost nearly all the vision itself, while in my heart I feel the sweetness of it yet distill and fall.

At the midpoint on the journey of life, I found myself in a dark forest, for the clear path was lost.

Sta come torre ferma, che non crolla Giammai la cima per soffiar de' venti. Be steadfast as a tower that doth not bend its stately summit to the tempest's shock.

Pure essence, and pure matter, and the two joined into one were shot forth without flaw, like three bright arrows from a three-string bow.

I wept not — so to stone I grew within.

O foolish anxiety of wretched man, how inconclusive are the arguments which make thee beat thy wings below!

O power of fantasy that steals our minds from things outside, to leave us unaware, although a thousand trumpets may blow loud--what stirs you if the senses show you nothing? Light stirs you, formed in Heaven, by itself, or by His will Who sends it down to us.

... Nessun maggior dolore Che ricordarsi del tempo felice Nella miseria. (There is no greater pain than to remember a happy time when one is in misery.)

He who know most grieves most for wasted time.

And here Dante describes an evidently spherical world... "The lamp of the world [the sun] rises to mortals through different passages; but through that which joins four circles with three crosses [the position of the rising sun at the vernal equinox] it issues with a better course and conjoined with better stars, and tempers and stamps the wax of the world more after its own fashion. Although such an outlet had made morning there and evening here, and all the hemisphere there was bright, and the other dark..."

Curb your talent lest it speed where virtue does not guide.

How come I never meet any nice girls?

Three sparks - pride, envy, and avarice - have been kindled in all hearts.

We are but a day in this world, and in that day the fashion is changed a thousand times: all seek liberty, yet all deprive themselves of it.

From there we came outside and saw the stars

Astrology, the noblest of sciences.

And when he had put his hand on mine with a cheerful look, wherefrom I took courage, he brought me within to the secret things. Here sighs, laments, and deep wailings were resounding through the starless air; wherefore at first I wept thereat. Strange tongues, horrible utterances, words of woe, accents of anger, voices high and faint, and sounds of hands with them, were making a tumult which whirls always in that air forever dark, like the sand when the whirlwind breathes.

So that the Universe felt love, by which, as somebelieve, the world has many times been turned to chaos. And at that moment this ancient rock, here and elsewhere, fell broken into pieces.

The human race is in the best condition when it has the greatest degree of liberty.

Abandon hope, all ye who enter here. [Omnes relinquite spes, o vos intrantes]

One ought to be afraid of nothing other then things possessed of power to do us harm, but things innoucuous need not be feared.

If thou follow thy star, thou canst not fail of glorious heaven.

Hope not ever to see heaven. I come to lead you to the other shore; into the eternal darkness; into fire and ice.

He who awaits the call, but sees the need, Already sets his spirit to refuse it.

You shall leave everything you love.

They find seven cornices on which penitent and redeemed sinners are cleansed by the grace of God. On the first cornice, that of Pride, the proud are learning humility: Our Father, dwelling in the Heavens, nowise As circumscribed, but as the things above, Thy first effects, are dearer in Thine eyes, Hallowed Thy name be and the Power thereof, By every creature, as right meet it is We praise the tender effluence of Thy love. Let come to us, let come Thy kingdom's peace.

To get back up to the shining world from there My guide and I went into that hidden tunnel, And Following its path, we took no care To rest, but climbed: he first, then I-so far, through a round aperture I saw appear Some of the beautiful things that Heaven bears, Where we came forth, and once more saw the stars.

The infernal storm, eternal in its rage, sweeps and drives the spirits with its blast; it whirls them, lashing them with punishment. When they are swept back past their place of judgment then come the shrieks, laments, and anguished cries; there they blaspheme God's almighty power.

Nothing which is harmonized by the bond of the Muse can be changed from its own to another language without destroying its sweetness

Through me you go into a city of weeping; through me you go into eternal pain; through me you go amongst the lost people

O you proud Christians, wretched souls and small,/ Who by the dim lights of your twisted minds/ Believe you prosper even as you fall,/ Can you not see that we are worms, each one/ Born to become the angelic butterfly/ That flies defenseless to the Judgement Throne?

No sadness is greater than in misery to rehearse memories of joy.

There is a place in Hell called the Malebolge.

Oh blind! Oh ignorant, self-seeking cupidity which spurs us so in the short mortal life and steeps us so through all eternity!

There is no greater pain than to remember, in our present grief, past happiness.

The glory of Him who moves everything penetrates through the universe, and is resplendent in one part more and in another less.

Thus you may understand that love alone is the true seed of every merit in you, and of all acts for which you must atone.

O you, who in some pretty boat, Eager to listen, have been following Behind my ship, that singing sails along Turn back to look again upon your own shores; Tempt not the deep, lest unawares, In losing me, you yourselves might be lost. The sea I sail has never yet been passed; Minerva breathes, and pilots me Apollo, And Muses nine point out to me the Bears. You other few who have neck uplifted Betimes to the bread of angels upon Which one lives and does not grow sated, Well may you launch your vessel Upon the deep sea.

Deed done is well begun.

In His will, our peace.

That which had pleased me once, troubled by spirit.

Many have justice in their hearts, but slowly it is let fly, for it comes not without council to the bow.

I was so full of sleep at the time that I left the true way.

O faithful conscience, delicately pure, how doth a little failing wound thee sore!

I saw within Its depth how It conceives All things in a single volume bound by Love of which the universe is the scattered leaves.

Conscience, that boon companion who sets a man free under the strong breastplate of innocence, that bids him on and fear not.

To run over better waters the little vessel of my genius now hoists her sails, as she leaves behind her a sea so cruel.

Still desiring, we live without hope.

There, pride, avarice, and envy are the tongues men know and heed, a Babel of depsair

The loser, when a game of dice is done, remains behind reviewing every roll sadly, and sadly wiser, and alone.

That infinite and indescribable good which is there above races as swiftly to love as a ray of light to a bright body.It gives of itself according to the ardor it finds, so that as charity spreads farther the eternal good increases upon it,and the more souls there are who love, up there, the more there are to love well, and the more love they reflect to each other, as in a mirror.

Here we find the moat of thieves. And just as a lizard, with a quick, slick slither, Flicks across the highway from hedge to hedge, Fleeter than a flash, in the battering dog-day weather, A fiery little monster, livid, in a rage, Black as any peppercorn, came and made a dart At the guts of the others, and leaping to engage One of the pair, it pierced him at the part Through which we first draw food; then loosed its grip And fell before him, outstretched and apart.

If you're asking for a date, forget it. 'Cause I make it a point not to go out with women who shoot me in the head!

The man who lies asleep will never waken fame.

Not one drop of blood is left inside my veins that does not throb: I recognize signs of the ancient flame.

As fall the light autumnal leaves, one still the other following, till the bough strews all its honors on the earth below.