Rev. Washington Gladden, D.D., of Columbus, Ohio, who is now serving his second term as University preacher, gave the first of the William Belden Noble lectures in Phillips Brooks House last evening on "Dante Alighieri, the Poet." Dr. Gladden spoke of the great Italian poet as one whose work was done quite outside the realm of organized Christianity, but whose life was filled with the spirit of God, and bore abundant witness to the light.

Dante's first great mission he said was the introduction of the common speech of the people into literature. Up to his time all European literature, with insignificant exceptions, was in Latin. But Dante chose the common tongue of Italy as the language of his sublime poems, and by that act the speech of the Italy speech was glorified forever. As the father of modern literature, then, Dante may rightfully be called the leader of the long line of writers who furnish the surest revelation of the races which have achieved the progress of the world during the last five hundred years.

It is under the influence of idealized love Dante views the whole spiritual world. The "Divina Commedia" offers unquestionably the best opportunity for studying his ideas and purposes. What Dante sees in his vision of Hell is the natural reaction of conduct upon character: the suffering which he portrays has not been arbitrarily inflicted, but is the logical result of sin. His mind, despite his liberal tendencies, was of the seventeenth century type. The grim symbolism of his Hell is as stern and terrible as human realism can contemplate.

The Purgatory of the "Divine Comedy," though less known, exhibits not less on- sight into life than the more awe-inspiring picture of Hell. There is, however, no bitterness, no helplessness in the disciplinary suffering of Purgatory, and in Dante's description of penance, we find no suggestion of the personal friendship of Christ