Canto I. Dante and Virgil emerge from the domain of hell into the dawn of the southern hemisphere. Here they meet Cato of Utica, who represents (as he did to medieval christian writers in general) the virtuous pagan: the paragon of virtue in so far as that is achievable without divine grace. Cato is enlightened by four stars which represent the four cardinal virtues: prudence, justice, temperance and courage. These virtues direct the person who is well-ordered in, respectively, his or her mind, will, appetites and irascible emotions. In christian understanding these virtues can be acquired only incompletely through effort and education. Since human society is ultimately for the sake of the kingdom of God, then, as Herbert McCabe writes “the cardinal virtues need to be perfected and enlivened by the theological virtues, especially charity”. This is why Cato can stand on the lowest terrace of purgatory and direct christian souls towards the first pass, but cannot himself climb it. He instructs Virgil to tidy Dante up: to wash his face and hold his cloak together with a reed (to replace a girdle lost in hell).

This seemingly obscure passage contains much for reflection. In Lent there is a temptation to assume that we are setting out on a programme of self-improvement, giving up chocolate for the sake of our souls as well as our teeth and waist-lines, and that we will achieve some spiritual improvement just as we might achieve a planned loss of weight. At the bottom of Dante’s Mount Purgatory we are reminded that we depend utterly on the gift of divine grace, and that Lenten exercises, by such grace, open us to that, and help us to weaken the attachments to secondary goods which prevent us from fully accepting God’s gifts. What we do in Lent should deepen our sense of dependence on God, and so our humility.