Quotes from Dante Alighieri

In that part of the book of my memory before which little can be read, there is a heading, which says: 'Incipit vita nova: Here begins the new life'.

He listens well who takes notes.

Thou shall know by experience how salt the savor is of others' bread, and how sad a path it is to climb and descend another's stairs.

Justice divine has weighed: the doom is clear. All hope renounce, ye lost, who enter here.

As, pricked out with less and greater lights, between the poles of the universe, the Milky Way so gleameth white as to set very sages questioning.

I did not die, and yet I lost life's breath

The man who lies asleep will never waken fame, and his desire and all his life drift past him like a dream, and the traces of his memory fade from time like smoke in air, or ripples on a stream.

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

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

This sorrow weighs upon the melancholy souls of those who lived without infamy or praise.

The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis.

There is no greater sorrow than to recall happiness in times of misery.

The only fit reply to a fit request is silence and the fact.

In that book which is my memory, On the first page of the chapter that is the day when I first met you, Appear the words, 'Here begins a new life'.

Midway in our life's journey, I went astray from the straight road and woke to find myself alone in a dark wood.

I wept not, so to stone within I grew.

The secret of getting things done is to act!

No one thinks of how much blood it costs.

Everywhere is here and every when is now.

... 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.)

In the midway of this our mortal life, I found me in a gloomy wood, astray, Gone from the path direct.

When I had journeyed half of our life's way, I found myself within a shadowed forest, for I had lost the path that does not stray.

Midway upon the journey of our life

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