"Why do you kick back against that Will/whose ends can never be cut short and which has many/times increased your suffering?/What is the good of butting against fate?" (Canto 9, verses 94-94, pg 145). I found these lines to be representative of the entire set of canti, and also as to why Dante the pilgrim ventured into Hell. The part of these lines that really struck me was when the man "who was walking across the Styx with dry feet" comes out of the smoke and asks the pilgrim Dante, "What is the good of butting against fate?" To me, it seemed like this was the line that should alleviate all of Dante's fears. He was worried throughout the first set of canti that he would end up like Paolo and Francesca because of the love and the desire that he felt for Beatrice.
I interpreted the line to mean that Dante the pilgrim was not to end up in Hell, that it was not his destiny to be put to such a fate. Clearly, we know that Dante does not end up remaining in Hell because he continues on to Purgatorio and Paradiso, and is narrating the story to us after it occurs. But for someone who was not familiar with this, this might be a clue to them that Dante is not meant to be down here. Also, to bring back up the theme of love and Paolo and Francesca, Dante's fate will clearly be different than theirs. First, he and Beatrice did not commit the same 'sin' as did Paolo and Francesca, and also, Beatrice has already made it to Heaven. If Dante were to be confined in Hell because of his love for Beatrice, I would imagine both would be there together.
"But certainly, if I remember well/.../on every side of this deep, foul valley trembled so/that I thought the universe must be feeling love, by/which, some believe,/the world has often turned back into chaos:/and at that point this ancient cliff, here and/elsewhere, was broken down" (Canto 12, verses 37-45, pg 187). I read the text notes on these lines after I wrote it down as a verse of interest, but I don't entirely agree with what the notes have to say about the lines. The notes explain that this refers to the traditional explanation of the sun darkening on Christ's death, with both Heaven and Hell acknowledging "that he was the Creator who had died". The notes also mention that Albertus Magnus wrote that "so many signs appeared" upon Christ's death because "the entire universe exclaimed that it could not endure that death". The notes mention, as a last thought, that the Greeks believed the universe alternated between strife, which drives things apart, and love, which brings things back into the original chaos.
However, I don't entirely agree with what the notes are saying about these lines. I understand Dante the author wrote the Divina Commedia as a religious work, but I interpreted these lines about love and chaos in a much less religious sense. The line in this group that really led my interpretation was when Virgil says "I thought the universe must be feeling love, by/which, some believe,/the world has often been turned back into chaos". I thought this meant that not all types of love are "good", and can cause harm - as a warning to Dante the pilgrim. In a religious context, love for God is good, but lust and physical desire are not good. The mention of the Minotaur in the beginning of the canto also made me think about the idea of how love can cause chaos. The Minotaur was created when King Minos' wife fell in love with a bull, and acted on that love. Because of these things, I imagined these lines were a warning to Dante about his love for Beatrice. In Canto 5, Dante falls into a swoon because he is worried that his love will cause him to end up with the same fate as Paolo and Francesca. This line, appearing later, just seemed to me to reinforce the idea of what can happen when you let your desires and emotions get the best of you.
In Canto 13, there was a line I found very interesting. I didn't entirely find any symbolic meaning in it, but it stood out to me and I wrote it down. In Canto 13, Date the pilgrim and Virgil come across the men who have been turned into trees. One of them speaks, and tells the travellers, "Like the others, we will come for our remains,but/not so that any may put them on again, for it is not/just to have what one has taken from oneself" (verses 103-105). The entire theme of the Inferno is justice, mainly divine, but still justice nonetheless. I thought the idea of not getting back what you have taken was a clever punishment. The other souls in the other layers of Hell all have their bodies, regardless of their punishments. However, in the second subcircle of the seventh layer, these souls are confined to the bodies of trees. They do not get their earthly bodies back, which makes their punishment cruel, yes, but I think much more of a punishment than being confined to walk in circles all day. I didn't really think much about the different punishments until I read this line and thought about it, and after thinking about it, I decided this was by far the most cruel but most just punishment.
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