joins Dante and Virgil (_Purg._ xxi.). He explains how the pains of Purgatory are voluntarily endured, since, against the hypothetic or absolute will with which they desire the bliss of Paradise, the souls suffer these purifying pains with the conditional or actual will, the same inclination or impulse or desire (_talento_) which they formerly had to sin. Thus it is free will itself that imposes the purgatorial process, and that alone shows the soul when purification is complete. The delicious scene of the recognition of Virgil by Statius is full of that peculiarly tender Dantesque playfulness that informs the two Eclogues; Dante’s affectionate humour in dealing with those he loved is one of the most attractive aspects of his character, and one perhaps too often missed. SIXTH TERRACE.--The Angel of Justice has removed the fifth P from Dante’s forehead, opposing in his song the thirst of justice to that of gain. As they mount, Statius explains to Virgil how he was converted from prodigality by a line in the _Aeneid_, and led to Christianity by the fourth Eclogue (_Purg._ xxii.). The conversion of a pagan to Christianity through reading Virgil occurs in a story told by Vincent of Beauvais; Dante was probably influenced in applying this to Statius, representing him as a secret convert to the true faith, by his study of the _Thebaid_; for there, in the last book, Statius describes the Altar of Mercy at Athens in language which harmonises with the words of Christ in the Gospels and the address of his own contemporary, St. Paul, to the Athenians in the Acts. The poets pursue their way with greater confidence now that Statius is with them, and reach the sixth terrace, where unseen spirits cry out examples of temperance from the tree beneath which drunkenness and gluttony are purged. The spirits, terribly wasted, suffer intense torments of hunger and thirst in the presence of most tempting food and drink; but the sanctifying pain is a solace, desired even as Christ willed to die for man. With the soul of Forese Donati, Dante holds loving converse; the memory of their dissolute lives together is still grievous; the poet makes amends for his old slander of Forese’s wife Nella, by the tender lines now placed upon her husband’s lips (_Purg._ xxiii. 85-93). Forese darkly foretells the death of Corso Donati, which appears to be the latest event in Florentine history mentioned in the poem (xxiv. 82-90). Whatever the friendship of these two had been on earth, it was fair and lovely indeed on the Mount of Purgation.