And then, like one who unchooses his own choice
And thinking again undoes what he has started,
So I became: a nullifying unease
Overcame my soul on that dark slope and voided
The undertaking I had so quickly embraced.
"If I understand," the generous shade retorted,
"Cowardice grips your spirit-- which can twist
A man away from the noblest enterprise
As a trick of vision startles a shying beast.
Canto II, Verse 31-39 Dante's Inferno, translation by Robert Pinsky
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