CHAPTER XI. On The Everlasting Pains of Hell
Eternal Wisdom.--O my chosen one! now
look from the very bottom of thy heart at this lamentable misery. Where are now
all those who heretofore sat down amidst this temporal scene with tranquility
and pleasure, with tenderness and comfort of body? What avails them all the
joys of this world which are as soon vanished on the wings of swift time as
though they had never been? How quickly over is that carnal love for which pain
must be eternally endured! O ye senseless fools! Where is now what ye so gaily
uttered: "Hail, ye children of merriment, let us give holiday to sorrow, let us
cherish the fullness of joy!" What avail now all the pleasures ye ever
obtained? Well may ye cry aloud with sorrowful voice; Woe upon us that ever we
were born into the world! How has swift time deceived us! How has death stolen
upon us! Is there any one still upon the earth who could be more deceived than
we have been deceived? Or is there any one willing to take counsel from the
calamity of others? If any one were to bear all the sufferings of all mankind
for a thousand years it would only be as a moment against this! How very happy
is that man who has never sought after pleasures displeasing to God, who for
His sake has renounced all temporal delights! We foolish ones, we deemed such
men forsaken and forgotten of God: but see how He has embraced them in eternity
with such marks of honour before all the heavenly host. What harm can all their
sufferings and disgraces now do them, which have turned out so much to their
joy? Meanwhile, all that we so entirely loved, how is it vanished? Ah, misery
on misery! and it must last for ever. Oh, for ever and ever, what are thou? Oh,
end without end! Oh, dying above all dying, to be dying every hour, and yet
never to die. Oh, father and mother, and all that we ever held dear, God bless
you for ever and ever, for we shall never see you and love you again: we must
ever be separated from you. Oh, separation, oh, everlasting separation, how
grievous thou art! Oh, wringing, oh, shrieking and howling for ever, and yet
never to be heard! Nothing but sorrow and distress must our wretched eyes
behold, our ears be filled with nothing--but alas! nothing save only Woe is me!
Oh, all hearts, let our lamentable For ever and ever! move your compassion, let
our miserable For ever! pierce to your core. Oh, ye mountains and valleys, why
do ye wait for us, why do ye keep us so long, why do ye bear with us, why do ye
not bury us from the lamentable sight? Oh, sufferings of that world and
sufferings of this world, how very different ye are! Oh, time present, how
blinding, how deceiving thou art, that we should not have foreseen this in the
bright days of our youth, which we wasted so luxuriously, which will never more
return! Oh, that we had but one little hour of all those vanished years! Yet
this is denied by God's justice, and without any hope for us, ever must be
denied. Oh, suffering, and distress, and misery, in this forgotten land, where
we must be separated from all that is dear, without solace or hope, for ever
and ever! Nothing else would we desire than that if there was a millstone as
broad as the whole earth, and in circumference so large that it everywhere
touched the heavens, and that if there came a little bird every hundred
thousand years, and took from the stone as much as the tenth part of a grain of
millet, so as in ten hundred thousand years to peck away from the stone as much
as an entire grain of millet; we unfortunates would desire nothing more than
that, when the stone came to an end, our torments too might terminate; and yet
even this cannot be. Behold, such is the song of woe which succeeds the joys of
this world.
The Servant.--Oh, Thou severe Judge, how
terrified are the depths of my heart, how powerless sinks my soul beneath the
load of sorrow and compassion for those unhappy spirits! Who is there in the
world that hears this, and is so insane as not to tremble at such fearful
distress? Oh, Thou, my only love, forsake me not! Oh, Thou, my only chosen
consolation, do not thus separate from me! Sooner than be thus separated from
Thee, my only love, for ever and ever (I will say nothing of the rest), oh,
misery of misery! I would prefer to be tormented a thousand times a day. When I
but think of such a separation, my heart for anguish is like to break. Yes,
tender Father! do with me here what Thou wilt, Thou hast my free consent, but,
oh, deliver me from this woeful separation, for I could by no means endure
it.
Eternal Wisdom.--Cast away thy fear. That
which is united in time remains undivided in eternity.
The Servant.--Oh, Lord, would that all men
heard this, who still consume their days so foolishly, so that they might
become wise, and might reform their lives, before these things should overtake
them. Oh, ye senseless, obdurate men! how long will ye protract your
foolishness, sinful lives? Be converted to God, and shield yourselves against
this wretched misery, and lamentation of eternal woe.