In The Tempest, how does Ariel's quote, "Hell is empty, and all the devils are here," relate to his discovery?
In William Shakespeare's The Tempest, Prospero orders his servant-spirit, Ariel, to create the tempest at sea that causes the shipwreck which opens the play. On the ship are the men who usurped Prospero's dukedom of Milan, including Prospero's brother, Antonio, and Alonso, the King of Naples, as well as others not involved with the usurpation, among whom is Alonso's son, Ferdinand.
Prospero asks Ariel to describe the shipwreck to him, and Ariel reports that he made the ship to look as if it was on fire and about to break apart. Ariel says that everyone on the ship except the sailors became desperate and abandoned ship, and that the first person who "plunged in the foaming brine and quit the vessel" (1.2.247) is Ferdinand, who cries out, "Hell is empty, / And all the devils are here" (1.2.250–251).
Ferdinand is frightened by what he sees as the evil...
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spirits, or "devils," who seem to have overrun every part of the ship, as Ariel describes it:
I boarded the King's ship; now on the beak,
Now in the waist the deck, in every cabin,
I flamed amazement. Sometime I'd divide,
And burn in many places; on the topmast,
The yards and bowsprit, would I flame distinctly,
Then meet and join. (1.2.230–235)
Ferdinand also might be describing Antonio and Alonso as if seen through Prospero's eyes, as the "devils" who usurped Prospero's dukedom and set him adrift at sea with his daughter, Miranda, and who are "all the devils" now here on Prospero's island.
Ariel's magical powers, particularly his powers over nature and his powers of enchantment through his musical skills, are demonstrated throughout the play. It's entirely possible that Ariel caused Prospero and Miranda to be cast away on the island in much the same way, but on a much smaller scale, that Ariel caused the shipwreck that brought Antonio, Alonso, Ferdinand, and all the other passengers on Alonso's ship onto the island.
When Prospero and Miranda first arrived on the island, Ariel was confined in a "cloven pine" (1.2.328), imprisoned there for the past twelve years by the sorceress Sycorax (1.2.329–330). By the time Prospero and Miranda arrive on the island, Sycorax had died, and there was only Ariel and a "devil" living there, in the person of Caliban, Sycorax's son.
What Prospero calls Ariel's "groans," which Prospero heard and which "did make wolves howl, and penetrate the breasts / of ever-angry bears (1.2.339–341), might not have been "groans" at all, but simply another example of Ariel's powers over nature and his powers of enchantment which drew Prospero to discover Ariel in the tree in which he was imprisoned. Ariel worked his magic on Prospero to bring him to the island and to release him from the tree in the same way that he worked his magic on the sailors and passengers on Alonso's ship to cause them to abandon ship and seek refuge on the island.
In The Tempest, who says "Hell is empty / And all the devils are here"?
In act 1, scene 2 of The Tempest, Ariel is telling Prospero all about the shipwreck that has recently taken place off the coast of the island. The shipwreck was caused by a mighty storm—the tempest of the title—and was whipped up by Ariel, the spirit who is loyal and faithful to his lord and master Prospero.
Aboard the ship were a lot of very important people, such as Prospero's treacherous brother Antonio, who usurped him as Duke of Milan. Another passenger was Ferdinand, son of Alonso, King of Naples, who was also aboard.
Ariel tells Prospero that when Ferdinand jumped from the fiery ship—which had been set on fire by Ariel—he shouted,
Hell is empty
And all the devils are here. (I, ii, 215–216)
Ferdinand was obviously terrified at what had happened, and rightly so. He can be forgiven for thinking that there are diabolical forces at work, that all the devils from hell have left their fiery kingdom to cause the shipwreck and set the ship on fire.
On hearing the news of the shipwreck, Prospero is very pleased indeed; everything has gone according to plan. But he still wants to make sure that everyone aboard is safe. Ariel duly reassures him that nobody has been hurt in the slightest.
However, Ferdinand is still pretty shaken up by his ordeal, and he sits in a faraway nook on the island, folding his arms and sighing.