"[142] When, therefore, Dante speaks of the love of this Lady as
the "adversary of _Reason_," he uses the word in its highest sense, not
as understanding (_Intellectus_), but as synonymous with _soul_. Already,
when the latter part of the _Vita Nuova_, nay, perhaps the whole of the
explanatory portion of it, was written the plan of the _Commedia_ was
complete, a poem the higher aim of which was to keep the soul alive both
in this world and for the next. As Dante tells us, the contradiction in
his mind was, though he did not become aware of it till afterwards, more
apparent than real. He sought consolation in study, and, failing to find
it in Learning (_scienza_), he was led to seek it in Wisdom (_sapienza_),
which is the love of God and the knowledge of him.[143] He had sought
happiness through the understanding; he was to find it through intuition.
The lady Philosophy (according as she is moral or intellectual) includes
both. Her gradual transfiguration is exemplified in passages already
quoted. The active life leads indirectly by a knowledge of its failures
and sins (_Inferno_), or directly by a righteous employment of it
(_Purgatorio_), to the same end. The use of the sciences is to induce in
us the ultimate perfection, that of speculating upon truth; the use of
the highest of them, theology, the contemplation of God.
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