Love is the seed of all you do. It's news to me, given the state of the world. But not to Virgil. And certainly not to Dante's COMEDY.

Virgil's explosive claim about love lies at the center of the poem: We do right and we go wrong because of the seed of love.

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Here are the segments of this episode of WALKING WITH DANTE:

[01:43] My English translation of the passage: PURGATORIO, Canto XVII, lines 91 - 105. If you'd like to read along or continue the discussion with me, please scroll down this page.

[03:57] Virgil's explosive claim: love is the seed of all human action.

[05:27] Virgil's scholastic divisions of love.

[08:38] A translation problem: "o naturale o d'anima."

[12:40] Virgil's understand of the two types of love.

[14:59] Virgil's odd repetition of his own argument.

[18:27] The basis of Dante's thought: the Bible, Aristotle, and Aquinas.

[27:27] Dante's source: William Perault's SUMMA DE VITIIS ET VIRTURTIBUS. (Ugh, my Latin pronunciation!)

[29:16] But what then of the fall in the Garden of Eden?

[30:59] Rereading the passage: PURGATORIO, Canto XVII, lines 91 - 105.

And here’s my English translation of Purgatorio, Canto XVII, Lines 91 – 105

[Virgil] began, “My son, neither creator nor creature

Ever existed without love,

Whether [it be] natural or from the spirit. This much you know.

“Natural [love] is ever without error,

But the other [kind] can go off-kilter with a bad target.

Or [it can do so] with too much exertion or too little.

“So long as it’s directed to the primary good

And then moderates itself when it comes to secondary things,

It can’t be the source of malicious delights.

“But when it torques toward evil, or when it runs after

Some good with either more fervor or less than is required,

It forces the one who is made to toil against the maker.

“Given all this, you can understand that love must be

The seed in you both for every virtue

And for every action that deserves punishment.”