[Amanaduial the archer]

Tuor - I personally think that may just be Gandalph trying to comfort Frodo, and maybe himself - for it is, in a way, as Beserk first said, Gandalph who is putting Frodo through this.

However, Gandalph couldn't take it himself, as has been said - an idea I would add to this is that Gandalph knew too much about the Ring, and about it's maker. He knew all too well how the ring could corrupt, and of the people it had destroyed - but he also knew of it's 'pluses': the amount of power and influence which it could bring. Frodo was innocent of all that - the outside world had 'forgotten about the Shire' and the Shire was cut off from it. Everyone in Middle Earth would know something about the Ring, Sauron, and the Dark armies that were gathering under it's power - apart from the hobbits.

Even of the hobbits, not everyone would have been perfect, of course: but Frodo had been adopted by the oddball among oddballs, essentially - Bilbo Baggins, master storyteller, the first ringbearer, an adventurer...and generally considered rather odd. His mind was more open, and something within him wanted to go adventuring - he wanted to go with Bilbo, remember. And this, along with his innocence of the true power of the ring - he would pretty much believe whatever Gandalph and the others told him, he didn't exactly have a choice - made him perfect as a ringbearer who would not try to interfere.

But there is also a saying: "No one keeps a secret as well as a child". Now, while this may seem impossible to anyone here who has a younger sibling, it is in a way true - if a child has something they want to keep, or have been told again and again under dire circumstances not to let it go, nothing in the world will make them let go of it. Frodo was like this with the ring - maybe his innocence made him more than a little child like in this respect. He would not have given up the ring for anything - except maybe his friends. This was perhaps the one aspect that wise Gandalph did not take into account: the hobbits, unspoilt of all the people of Middle Earth, have preserved the simple, basic, 'fine' qualities - they enjoy simple pleasures, and friendship, love, and loyalty are some of the most important things in the world to them. This makes Frodo strong in some aspects, of course, but in others, it weakens him: if one of his friend's lives was directly threatened, Sam's for example, and the ring was the price to pay, I believe Frodo would give the ring.

A sidethought: did Gandalph blackmail Frodo into taking the ring, in a way? All his dire warnings and a very one-sided view of the ring's powers, even though he knew otherwise...

Of course, he was keeping Frodo's mind on the straight path, so that doubt would not alter his course, but if he had found out some of the missing information later...I think Gandalph may have taken a risk, to plunge the innocent little hobbit into a world he did not understand, without the full information he may have needed - imagine if Frodo had found out later on the pluses of the ring from someone biased the other way who had nonetheless showed him kindness. Would he have continued to trust Gandalph, when all the Wizard had really led him to was misfortune?