PRISONERS OF HOPE.
Prisoners of Hope an Exposition of Dante's Purgatorio. By the Rev. John S. Carroll, M.A. (Hodder and Stoughton. 10s. ed. net.)—This interesting book is of course on the same lines as Mr. Carroll's former volume, "Exiles of Eternity." In that Dante's "Hell," in this his " Purgatory," is carefully and minutely studied from a religious and ethical rather than a poetical and historical point of view. At first sight this treat- ment might seem to narrow the interest of so great a study, but it does not really do so. Neither does Mr. Carroll, in practice, approach his subject in the spirit of his opening words "Protestant readers, unable to accept a threefold division of the world to come, may be excused if they approach the Purgatorio with the feeling that its chief ethical interest and value must be confined to members of Dante's own Church." One can hardly help regretting such a suggestion, which casts a slur on the intellect of "Protestant readers," undeserved by the great majority of them, and also strikes a jarring note at the beginning of a book full of learning, interest, and beauty. As to the special view, the "Divine Comedy" is like a great forest of fairyland: many paths lead through it, and each traveller, probably each student, calls his path what Mr. Carroll calls his own, "the King's highway." Certainly the clearness of his leading gives him a right to claim that "wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein." His book should be very welcome to all who love Dante without being able to aspire to the heights trodden by "professed Dante scholars."
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