Consideration XXVII — The Eternity of Hell

"Et ibunt hi in supplicium aeternum" (Matt. 25:46).

Point I

If hell were not eternal, it would not be hell. A pain that does not last long is not a great pain. For one sick person an abscess is cut open; for another a gangrene is cauterized; the pain is great, but because it ends shortly, it is not a great torment. But what a pain it would be if that cutting or that operation of fire were to continue for a week, for an entire month! When a pain lasts a very long time, even though it be light — such as a pain in the eyes or a toothache — it becomes unbearable. But what am I saying — pain? Even a play, a concert that went on too long, or lasted a whole day, could not be endured for the tedium. And if it lasted a month? A year? What will hell be, where one does not always hear the same play or the same music; where there is not just a pain in the eyes or the teeth; where one does not feel merely the torment of a cut or a red-hot iron — but where there are all torments, all pains; and for how long? For all eternity: "Cruciabuntur die ac nocte in saecula saeculorum" (Rev. 20:10).

This eternity is a matter of faith; it is not merely some opinion, but a truth attested to us by God in so many Scriptures: "Discedite a me, maledicti, in ignem aeternum" (Matt. 25:41). "Et hi ibunt in supplicium aeternum" (Matt. 25:46). "Poenas dabunt in interitu aeternas" (2 Thess. 1:9). "Omnis igne salietur" (Mark 9:48). Just as salt preserves things, so the fire of hell, at the same time that it torments the damned, performs the office of salt by preserving their life. "Ignis ibi consumit," says St. Bernard, "ut semper reservet."

Now what madness it would be for someone who, to enjoy a day of amusement, would condemn himself to being shut up in a pit for twenty or thirty years! If hell lasted a hundred years — what am I saying, a hundred? — if it lasted only two or three years, it would still be a great madness, for a moment of vile pleasure, to condemn oneself to two or three years of fire. But we are not speaking of thirty, or a hundred, or a thousand, or a hundred thousand years; we are speaking of eternity — of suffering forever the same torments, which will never end or diminish in the slightest. The saints, then, had good reason — while they were alive and even in danger of being damned — to weep and tremble. Blessed Isaiah, even while living in the desert amid fasting and penance, wept saying: Ah, wretched me, for I am not yet free from damnation! "Heu me miserum, quia nondum a gehennae igne sum liber!"

Affections and Prayers

Ah, my God, if You had sent me to hell, as I have deserved so many times, and then by Your mercy had drawn me out, how grateful I would have been to You! And what a holy life I would have begun to lead! And now that with even greater mercy You have preserved me from falling into it, what shall I do? Shall I return to offend You and provoke You to anger, so that You finally send me to burn in that prison of Your rebels, where so many already burn for fewer sins than mine? Ah, my Redeemer, this is what I have done in the past; instead of using the time You gave me to weep over my sins, I spent it offending You all the more. I thank Your infinite goodness for having endured me so long. If it were not infinite, how could it ever have borne with me? I thank You, then, for having waited for me with such patience until now; and I thank You above all for the light You now give me, by which You make me recognize my madness and the wrong I have done You in outraging You with so many sins. My Jesus, I detest them and repent of them with all my heart; pardon me through Your passion; and assist me with Your grace, that I may offend You no more. Justly must I now fear that at another mortal sin You may abandon me. Ah, my Lord, I beg You, place this just fear before my eyes whenever the devil tempts me again to offend You. My God, I love You, and I wish to lose You no more; help me with Your grace.

Help me, O Most Holy Virgin; grant that I may always have recourse to you in my temptations, so that I may never again lose God. Mary, Mary, you are my hope.

Point II

Whoever once enters hell will never leave it for all eternity. This thought made David tremble, saying: "Neque absorbeat me profundum, neque urgeat super me puteus os suum" (Ps. 68:16). Once the damned person has fallen into that pit of torments, its mouth closes and never opens again. In hell there is a door for entering, but there is no door for leaving: "Descensus erit," says Eusebius of Emesa, "ascensus non erit." And he explains the words of the Psalmist: "Neque urgeat os suum; quia cum susceperit eos, claudetur sursum, et aperietur deorsum." As long as the sinner lives, he can always have hope of remedy; but once death catches him in sin, every hope is finished for him. "Mortuo homine impio, nulla erit ultra spes" (Prov. 11:7). If only the damned could delude themselves with some false hope, and so find some relief from their desperation. That poor bedridden man, covered with sores, has already been given up by the doctors as incurable; but still he flatters himself and consoles himself saying: Who knows, perhaps later some doctor or remedy will be found to cure me. That wretch condemned to the galleys for life also consoles himself, saying: Who knows what may happen, and I may free myself from these chains. If only, I say, the damned could similarly say: Who knows whether one day I will leave this prison — and so deceive themselves at least with this false hope. No, in hell there is no hope, neither true nor false; there is no "who knows." "Statuam contra faciem" (Ps. 49:21). The wretch will always see before his eyes his condemnation written — that he must always remain weeping in that pit of pains: "Alii in vitam aeternam, et alii in opprobrium, ut videant semper" (Dan. 12:2). Hence the damned person not only suffers what he suffers at every moment, but at every moment he endures the pain of eternity, saying: What I now suffer, I must suffer forever. "Pondus aeternitatis sustinet," says Tertullian.

Let us therefore pray to the Lord, as St. Augustine prayed: "Hic ure, hic seca, hic non parcas, ut in aeternum parcas." Here burn me, here cut me, here spare me not, that You may spare me for eternity. The punishments of this life pass away. "Sagittae tuae transeunt, vox tonitrui tui in rota" (Ps. 76:18). But the punishments of the next life never pass. Let us fear these; let us fear that thunder — "vox tonitrui tui in rota" — that is, the thunder of the eternal condemnation that will issue from the mouth of the judge at the judgment against the reprobate: "Discedite a me, maledicti, in ignem aeternum." And it says "in rota"; the wheel is a figure of eternity, which has no end. "Eduxi gladium meum de vagina sua irrevocabilem" (Ezek. 21:5). The punishment of hell will be great, but what should terrify us most is that it will be an irrevocable punishment.

But how, an unbeliever will say, what justice is this — to punish a sin that lasts a moment with an eternal punishment? But how, I answer, can a sinner dare, for a pleasure of a moment, to offend a God of infinite majesty? Even in human judgment, says St. Thomas, punishment is not measured according to the duration of time, but according to the nature of the crime: "Non quia homicidium in momento committitur, momentanea poena punitur." For a mortal sin, one hell is not enough: for the offense against an infinite majesty, an infinite punishment is due, says St. Bernardine of Siena: "In omni peccato mortali infinita Deo contumelia irrogatur; infinitae autem iniuriae infinita debetur poena." But because, says the Angelic Doctor, a creature is not capable of a pain infinite in intensity, God justly makes the pain infinite in duration.

Moreover, this pain must necessarily be eternal — first, because the damned can no longer make satisfaction for his guilt. In this life the penitent sinner can make satisfaction insofar as the merits of Jesus Christ are applied to him; but the damned is excluded from these merits. Hence, since he can no longer appease God, and his sin is eternal, his punishment must also be eternal. "Non dabit Deo placationem suam, laborabit in aeternum" (Ps. 48:8). Hence the Bellovacensis says: "Culpa semper poterit ibi puniri, et nunquam poterit expiari." For, as St. Antoninus says, "ibi peccator poenitere non potest"; and therefore the Lord will remain forever angry with him. "Populus cui iratus est Dominus usque in aeternum" (Mal. 1:4). Moreover, even if God wished to pardon the damned, the damned does not wish to be pardoned, because his will is obstinate and confirmed in hatred against God. Innocent III says: "Non humiliabuntur reprobi, sed malignitas odii in illis excrescet." And St. Jerome says: "Insatiabiles sunt in desiderio peccandi." Whence the wound of the damned is desperate, since he refuses even to be healed. "Factus est dolor eius perpetuus, et plaga desperabilis renuit curari" (Jer. 15:18).

Affections and Prayers

So then, my Redeemer, if at this hour I were damned, as I have deserved, would I be obstinate in hatred against You, my God, who died for me? O God, what a hell this would be — to hate You who have loved me so much, and who are an infinite beauty, an infinite goodness, worthy of infinite love! So, if I were now in hell, I would be in so unhappy a state that I would not even want the pardon You now offer me? My Jesus, I thank You for the mercy You have shown me, and since now I can be pardoned and can love You, I wish to be pardoned and I wish to love You. You offer me pardon, and I ask it of You, and I hope for it through Your merits. I repent of all the offenses I have done You, O infinite Goodness, and You, pardon me. I love You with all my soul. Ah, Lord, what evil have You done me that I should hate You as my enemy forever? And what friend have I ever had who has done and suffered for me what You, O my Jesus, have done and suffered? I beg You, do not permit me to fall again into Your displeasure and lose Your love; let me die first rather than have this supreme ruin befall me.

O Mary, enclose me under your mantle, and do not permit me to come out again to rebel against God and against you.

Point III

Death in this life is the thing most feared by sinners, but in hell it will be the most desired. "Quaerent mortem, et non invenient; et desiderabunt mori, et mors fugiet ab eis" (Rev. 9:6). Hence St. Jerome wrote: "O mors quam dulcis esses, quibus tam amara fuisti!" O death, how sweet you would be to those to whom you were so bitter! David says that death will feed upon the damned: "Mors depascet eos" (Ps. 48:15). St. Bernard explains that just as a sheep, feeding on grass, eats the leaves but leaves the roots, so death feeds upon the damned — it kills them every moment, but leaves them life to continue killing them with pain for all eternity: "Sicut animalia depascunt herbas, sed remanent radices; sic miseri in inferno corrodentur a morte, sed iterum reservabuntur ad poenas." So St. Gregory says that the damned dies every moment without ever dying: "Flammis ultricibus traditus semper morietur." If a man dies killed by pain, everyone pities him; if only the damned had someone to pity him. No, the wretch dies of pain every moment, but he has no one, nor will he ever have anyone, to pity him. The Emperor Zeno, shut up in a tomb, cried out: Open for me, for pity's sake! He was heard by no one, and so he was found dead of desperation, having eaten the flesh of his own arms. The reprobate cry out from the pit of hell, says St. Cyril of Alexandria, but no one comes to draw them out, and no one has compassion on them: "Lamentantur, et nullus eripit; plangunt et nemo compatitur."

And for how long will this misery of theirs last? Forever, forever. It is related in the Spiritual Exercises of Father Segneri the Younger (written by Muratori) that in Rome, when the devil who was in the body of a possessed man was asked how long he had to remain in hell, he answered with fury, striking his hand on a chair: "Forever, forever!" So great was the terror that many young men of the Roman Seminary who were present made a general confession and changed their lives at this great sermon of two words: "Forever, forever." Poor Judas! Seventeen hundred years have already passed since he entered hell, and his hell is still just beginning. Poor Cain! He has been in the fire for five thousand seven hundred years, and his hell is just beginning. Another demon was asked how long ago he had gone to hell, and he answered: "Yesterday." How yesterday, he was told, if you have been damned for five thousand and more years? He answered again: Oh, if you knew what eternity means, you would well understand that five thousand years are not even a moment in comparison. If an angel said to a damned soul: You will leave hell, but only after as many centuries have passed as there are drops of water, leaves on trees, and grains of sand in the sea — the damned person would rejoice more than a beggar upon hearing the news that he has been made a king. Yes, because all these centuries will pass, they will be multiplied an infinite number of times, and hell will still be just beginning. Every damned soul would make this bargain with God: Lord, increase my punishment as much as You wish; make it last as long as You please; but put an end to it, and I am content. But no, this end will never come. The trumpet of divine justice will sound nothing else in hell but "forever, forever, never, never."

The damned will ask the demons: What hour of the night is it? "Custos, quid de nocte?" (Is. 21:11). When does it end? When do these darknesses, these screams, this stench, these flames, these torments end? And the answer will be: Never, never. And how long will they last? Forever, forever. Ah, Lord, give light to so many blind souls who, when begged not to damn themselves, answer: In the end, if I go to hell, I will bear it. O God, they have no patience to endure a little cold, to stay in a room too warm, to suffer a blow — and then they will have the patience to remain in a sea of fire, trampled by devils and abandoned by God and by all, for all eternity!

Affections and Prayers

Ah, Father of mercies, You do not abandon those who seek You. "Non dereliquisti quaerentes te, Domine" (Ps. 9:11). In the past I have so many times turned my back on You, and You have not abandoned me: do not abandon me now that I seek You. I repent, O supreme Good, of having made so little account of Your grace, exchanging it for nothing. Look upon the wounds of Your Son; hear His voice, which prays You to pardon me, and pardon me. And You, my Redeemer, remind me always of the sufferings You endured for me, the love You bore me, and my ingratitude, by which so many times I deserved hell: so that I may always weep for the wrong I have done You and always live burning with Your love. Ah, my Jesus, how shall I not burn with love for You, when I think that for so many years I should have been burning in hell, and continuing to burn for all eternity, and that You died to free me from it, and with such mercy You have freed me? If I were in hell, I would now hate You and would have to hate You forever; but now I love You and wish to love You forever. This I hope through Your blood. You love me, and I also love You. You will love me always, if I do not leave You. Ah, my Savior, save me from this disgrace — that I should ever leave You — and then do with me what You will. I deserve every punishment, and I accept it, provided that You free me from the punishment of being deprived of Your love.

O Mary, my refuge, how many times I myself have condemned myself to hell, and you have freed me! Free me now from sin, which alone can deprive me of the grace of God and bring me to hell.