 Thomas can speak of the natural desire to know as a force like gravity, whose attraction intensifies as it approaches its object [SCG 3.25.13]. In contrast Dante’s insistence on types and stages of knowing may seem almost perverse, a matter of emphasizing the stages of the mind’s ascent rather than a single, unified desire that leads it forward from stage to stage. But what is at stake for Dante is the need to acknowledge human ends as having a definite value of their own, and this need will play an equally important role in Dante’s other major philosophical works.