Purgatorio: Canto 25 Summary & Analysis

This difficult passage draws on Aristotelian philosophy to explain the relationship between the body and the soul. Statius first explains (according to the scientific understanding of the time) the development of the fetus in the womb, which, put simply, comes about through a coagulation of semen and menstrual blood. The fetus proceeds through various developmental phases, but how it develops an intellect—the thing that distinguishes it from, say, vegetables or animals—is not precisely understood. However, the key point is that God breathes a soul into the fetus, which makes it an individual person. This soul can never be separated from the person, which explains Dante’s ability to recognize individuals in Purgatory even though they are not presently united to their bodies. The soul is the ground of the individual. That, in short, is why the spiritual bodies in Purgatory, though intangible, recognizably reflect the true state of the individuals’ souls.