Augustine: "It is my opinion
that the nature of hell-fire and the location of Hell are known to no
man unless the Holy Ghost made it known to him by a special revelation."
Dante makes his Hell big enough to hold the majority of mankind. He
thinks that the elect will be comparatively few--just numerous enough to
fill those places in heaven forfeited by the rebel angels who formed
according to his conjecture, about a tenth of the angelical host. That
their places in Heaven are already nearly filled leaving little room for
future generations Dante makes known in the words of Beatrice:
"Behold our City's circuit, oh how vast
Behold our benches now so full that few
Are they who are henceforth lacking here."
(Par. XXX, 130.)
His theory of restrictive salvation, it may be noted, is not in accord
with the teaching of the Church which holds that to every man God gives
grace sufficient for salvation. That is true even as affecting the
heathen and those living in place or in time far removed from the Cross.
St. Thomas Aquinas expresses this doctrine of the Church when he writes:
"If anyone who is born in a barbaric nation does what lieth in him, God
will reveal what is necessary for salvation, either by internal
inspiration or by a teacher.
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