Literature is an art. It requires the imagination of the reader and in return the literature will communicate the message at whatever level desired. It is not uncommon for many literary works to operate on multiple levels; there are facts and truths that are immediately apparent and, conversely, symbolism or allegories that may be present upon deeper investigation and exploration. In works concerning religion or spiritual matters, it is often very common to find symbolism, and this is especially true of Dante's "Divine Comedy", a work so full of symbolism that there is only enough time to focus on the first two cantos from the first book Inferno. In contextualizing this work so that we can appreciate its symbolism, we must remember that it was written a long time ago. It was written in a time when religious beliefs were different from the way they are practiced and interpreted today. "Looking at Dante's poems we must understand that he portrayed his beliefs exactly as he saw them. Not through the physical conditions and geography of the territory, but through the condition of the soul in the afterlife" (Scartazzini 21). Searching for symbolism all Inside the individual cantos, we must also remember the symbolism of the book as a whole. The entire work is divided into three separate sections: Hell, followed by Purgatory and ending with the Order This work is symbolic in terms of structure. There is only one canto as an introduction, and then each of the three books is made up of thirty-three cantos. This gives us a total of 100 cantos tempo, from the Christian Church as a number representing perfection (Dante). The way it is calculated is that 100 is 1003 squared, and 10 is also the number squared of 3 plus 1. This is significant as it is the holy trinity of 3. plus the 1 which is seen as representing unity of God in the trinity (Dante). Therefore, it is obvious that the structure is intentionally symbolic, so we can assume that there are intentional symbols in the work that we can find when we start looking at the poem in its sections. The first canto is the one in which Dante is in the woods, walking towards a hill and meets Virgil; it is precisely in this initial phase that the symbolism begins. At the beginning...... middle of the sheet......08Works citedDante, A (Norton trans) Divine Comedy [online] accessible at h ttp://promo.net/cgi-promo on (25 November 2000 ).Knight, G. Wilson, "Prophets of the Renaissance: Dante, Goethe, Shakespeare", in The Christian Renaissance, Methuen & Co. Ltd., pp. 95-121. (1962). Ralphs, Sheila, 'Dante's journey to the centre: some patterns in his allegory', Manchester University Press; (1972) Scartazzin,i GA, (Thekla trans) "On the congruence of sins and punishments in Dante's Inferno", The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, vol. XXII, nos. 1 and 2, , pp. 21-83; (1888 January and April)