Commentary Purg III 40-45

Perhaps there is no passage in the poem that more clearly delineates the tragedy of Virgil, now studied by its protagonist himself.  His own fourth Eclogue, which spoke of a virgin who would give birth to a son, but did not mean Mary and did not mean Jesus, is symptomatic of how near he came and thus how great was his failure, a result here addressed in an unspoken gesture -- his lowering his head -- that swells with unshed tears.  In the last canto, the newly arrived pilgrims looked up with hope ('la nova gente alzò la fronte' [the new people raised their faces]).  The words describing Virgil's silence echo key words from that passage in a contrastive spirit (as noted by Holl.1990.1, p. 36): 'e qui chinò la fronte, / e più non disse, e rimase turbato' [and here he lowered his brow, said nothing more, and seemed disturbed].  As Benvenuto (DDP Benvenuto.Purg.III.43-45) would have it, it is as though Virgil were saying: 'And woe is me, I was among their number.'

      The words in rhyme position in these two tercets underline their message: 

                              Maria quetato

                  quia      Plato  

      via          turbato 

One way leads up through faith to Christian truth, mediated by the mortal woman who gave birth to God in the flesh, the other down from this potential happiness, through rational attempts to know the rationally unknowable, to everlasting unhappiness.  Mary and Plato are here the very emblems of the choices that we humans face.