or the third ring. The souls are hopeless to the core, having to deal with the idea of losing all. It is a place of devastation because of the total absence of God. Lucifer, i.e., Satan is the great Dementor, sucking the good, the pleasant, and everything worth living for out of the souls around him. Satan is the prince of darkness. He rejoices when a soul is won to his world. The cumulative effects of the previous two stages are visible in these decrepit decaying souls. Imagine a concentration camp at the height of its killing. Even this description is insufficient to the agony in this ring. It would be like describing the Taj Mahal by calling it a building in Asia. This place is indescribable; the horrors there defy language. No one could stand to fathom the truly horrendousness that lies there. While I agree that my personal viewpoint is not literary genius, I do, and will stand by it. For we all have a personal concept of hell, or Inferno, and this is mine. While Dante and I compare quite well at times, at others we see about as eye to eye as a liberal Catholic and a conservative Baptist. I feel as if we strive for the same goal: to define Hell in our own eyes. In the end, I hope and pray that I never discover if our perceptions are either right or wrong. Once in Heaven, I never again wish to ponder the alternative. ...
