Are all persons agreed as to the existence of hell, and what is hell?Are all persons agreed as to the existence of hell, and what is hell?
It is wonderful the numerous opinions held as to what is hell, and whether there is a hell.
By the word hell Catholics mean that eternal punishment wherewith all the reprobates, whether fallen angels, or men who depart this life in the state of mortal sin, are punished. Hence the eternity of hell is its most terrible quality and its essence. Others, such as the Origenists, held that the reprobate - whether angels or man - would, after a very long lapse of time, repent and be restored to pardon and re-enter heaven. Now the Fifth and Seventh General Councils, in the years 563 and 787, condemned that doctrine as heresy. The Spiritualists of an early day held the same thing as to hell being merely temporary; and Mahomet taught that some of his followers should go to hell, but that they would not be left there always. He taught, however, that eternal punishment awaited the rest of the world. The Socinians teach that wicked men - either after their death, or at furthest after the Day of Judgment - will be resolved into original nothingness, and in this perpetual nothingness they find the explanation of the Scriptures eternity of hell.
The Protestants on this point have made a most singular revolution of doctrine. The first Protestants, when they separated from the Church, condemned prayers for the dead and denied the existence of purgatory. The latter Protestants deny the existence of an everlasting hell, and propose a temporary one; in other words, a Catholic purgatory. This they look upon as more philosophical and more humane, and therefore more enlightened. The Rationalists of course deny the doctrine in toto, as an absurd and inhuman fable. Alas for poor human beings! The pride of the intellect and the passions of the flesh, and the suggestions of the serpent, all leading astray; leading, like sea robbers, with ominous light to death and swift destruction.
44. Will the angels be punished eternally, and also all mankind dying in mortal sin?
Yes; angels and all men who die in mortal sin shall for ever be punished in hell.
The Scriptures say: "Which of you shall dwell with ever lasting burning?" (Isaiah 33:14)
"And many of those that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some unto life everlasting, and others unto reproach, to see it always." (Daniel 12:2)
"Depart from me, ye accursed, into everlasting fire, which was prepared for the devil and his angels . . . and these shall go into everlasting punishment." (Matthew 25:41,46)
There can be no question of the eternity of pains so plainly mentioned in these texts.
Again, the Scriptures say in a negative manner the same thing even more strongly.
"Their worm shall never die, and their fire shall never be extinguished." (Isaiah 66:24)
"And the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire." (Matthew 3:12)
"Better is it for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into unquenchable fire, where their worm dieth not, and their fire is not extinguished." (Mark 9:42)
It is furthermore proved from the unchangeableness of the position of the damned.
"And the tree, if it fall to the north or the south, wheresover it falls, there it shall lie." (Ecclesiastes 11:3)
Saint Luke tells us the answer of Abraham to the rich man buried in hell: "And besides all this between us and you, there is fixed a great chaos, so that they who would pass from hence to you cannot, nor from thence come thither." (16:26)
From these texts it is apparent that after this life there is no opportunity of doing penance, there is not offered any hope of pardon, but that the state of the damned is unchangeable, and hence their punishment continues for ever.
"If it is incomprehensible that God should have existed solitary through an eternity, is it not incomprehensible, too, that He should have ever given up that solitariness and have willed to surround Himself with creatures? Why was He not content to be as He had been? Why did He bring into existence those who could not add to His blessedness, and were not secure of their own? Why did He give them that gift which we see they possess of doing right or wrong as they please, and of working out their ruin as well as their salvation? Why did He create a world like that which is before our eyes, which at best so dimly shows forth His glory, and at worst is a scene of sin and sorrow? He might have made a far more excellent world than this - He might have excluded sin; but, oh! wonderful mystery, He has surrounded Himself with the cries of fallen souls, and has created and opened the great pit. He has willed after an eternity of peace to allow of everlasting anarchy, of pride, and blasphemy, and guilt, and hatred of Himself, and the worm that dieth not. Thus He is incomprehensible to us, mortal men." - Saint John Henry Newman
What the Fathers say - It must be remembered that, as a rule, it is when a doctrine of the Church is impugned that the Fathers speak with most emphasis on the point. Now the Origenists were the first to question the doctrine of eternal pains; and even before their time we have several of the Fathers using most emphatic language in regard to it. Thus -
Saint Clement of Rome: "The souls of all are immortal, even of the wicked, for whom it had been better they were not incorruptible; for, punished with everlasting punishment and unquenchable fire, and to their own loss not dying, they shall never reach an end of suffering."
Saint Irenaeus: "To whom the Lord hath said, Depart from me, ye accursed; they shall be damned for ever."
Saint Chrysostom: "Oh, that fire of hell, whosoever it seizes on shall ever burn, never have peace, and hence that fire is called unquenchable! Sinners, too, put on immortality, not for honour, but for a perpetual viaticum of their punishment; for he who has once been cast away by God into the fire may never again expect an end of pain."
This was the firm belief of the early ages. The acts of the martyrs tell us that the frequent answer of the Christian heroes was, when pressed and threatened to sacrifice to the idols, that they could not, lest they go to endless death and everlasting fire.
Action of the Church - In the Fifth General Council (553) Origen and Theodore of Mopsuestia were condemned by a solemn anathema, and all who supported this heresy.
Reverence for the great and venerable name of Origen, that early African Father and devoted disciple of the apostolic Clement of Alexandria, makes me say a word about his life and writings, and about this sect of the Origenists, on account of his great name and his venerable hairs being brought through their action into doubtful fame. Origen was born in the year 185, died 253, 68 years old. This was centuries before the unworthy sect arose that sheltered themselves under his honoured name. This sect consisted of certain monks in Egypt and Palestine, who upheld with contumacy certain errors, such as - (1) that Jesus Christ is the Son of God only by adoption, (2) that human souls existed before their union with earthly bodies, (3) that the pains of hell are not eternal, and (4) that even the demons shall one day be liberated from hell, and restored to eternal glory; and for authority they quoted the deep philosophic writings of this great Father, dead hundreds of years before. This is no place, indeed, to try to settle a question that has been a vexed one through all the centuries of the Church - namely, whether his writings gave grounds for these heresies or not. Tillemont, in his Memoirs, says: "His life, his knowledge, his talents made him the wonder of the age. Yet was he still more remarkable, because of the virulent persecution that all during life dogged his steps, either through his own fault, through his misfortune, or through the jealousy of rivals. He was driven from his country, deposed from the dignity of the priesthood, excommunicated by his own bishop and by others, at the same time that great saints believed him right and defended his cause, and that God Himself seemed to declare in his favour, by recalling through his means certain wandering sheep and inducing others to see the truth and enter the bosom of the Church, proselytes whom the Church has ever counted as her strongest defenders and her brightest ornaments. After his death the same fate seemed to pursue him that clung to him during life. Saints are found opposed to saints on the subject. Martyrs have been among his apologists, as well as among those that bitterly condemned him. Some have eulogised him as the greatest master-mind that the Church after the days of the Apostles saw; others have repudiated him as the father of heresies that were born after his day. This latter party receiving support from an emperor who wished to dominate over the affairs of the Church, got him struck with anathema, either by the Fifth Ecumenical Council, or by another held at the same time, and which has had on this point the support of all the Greeks."
Such the man, the depth of whose genius and the extent of whose knowledge even his very accusers are forced to admit and respect. He taught school at Alexandria, and on account of his unwearied and incessant toil in writing and teaching was called Adamant. He suffered persecution under Decius at the age of sixteen. It did not please God to then crown his young life with martyrdom after the example of Saint Leonidas,* his father. He was elevated to the priesthood by the bishops of Palestine, and during his life gave heroic examples of virtue. Saint Gregory Nazianzen and Saint Basil made extracts from his writings, and compiled them in one work. The Benedictines issued a collection of his works in 1759. This, in four volumes, seems to have been the last edition of his writings. Among his apologists were Saint Athanasius, Saint Gregory Thaumaturgus, and Saint Basil. In everything he wrote, Origen carefully distinguished what were the dogmas of the Church and what were matters of free discussion. In the preface to his work On Principles, he says: "No one can regard anything as truth which deviates from ecclesiastical and apostolic tradition." "It were well," says Ferrier, "had his partisans been as docile and as submissive to the Church as he, they would not have elevated into dogmas of faith questions which he put forward as matters of opinion, and they would thus have avoided dragging his venerable memory under condemnation and his noble life into disrepute."
This unworthy and detestable sect, after its condemnation, separated into two parties that fiercely attacked each other, and after a time dwindled away from men's sight, and, were it not for the great name of Origen, would have faded away from men's memory too.
The Seventh General Council, held in the year 787, in its first act renews the condemnation here spoken of that, namely, against the great Origen and Theodore of Mopsuestia.
The Fourth Council of Lateran, held in the year 1215, in its first chapter thus defines: "The reprobate will, with the devil, receive perpetual pain; the just, with Christ, unending glory." The Council of Trent speaks of pain and eternal damnation due to mortal sin.
The Athanasian Creed declares: "Those who have done good deeds will go into life everlasting; those who have done evil into eternal fire."
And hence it is not lawful to pray for the damned, or to offer sacrifice for them, since they are beyond all hope; nay, we are rather required to curse them as the enemies (everlasting enemies) of God.
Theological Reason - This is a doctrine so terrible and so menacing that at no time could it be introduced into the Church's teaching without a loud and desperate protest being raised against it. At no time of the Church is there evidence of such a protest . being raised; therefore this doctrine must have come down from the time of the Apostles.
Even the heathen poets speak of the eternity of their blessed and of their damned. What would our own reason tell us? That if God give the good eternal rewards, there is a strong presumption that the wicked suffer eternal pains. But it is so terrible to think of unending punishment. It is terrible; but God will send no man there without himself having chosen it.
Saint Bernard says a very striking thing: "If these pains had not been for ever, the Son of God would never have died to redeem us from them." A certain proportion exists between the infinite redemption purchased by Christ and the infinite - i.e., eternal - punishment induced by sin.
Would it be against God's justice and God's hatred of sin if, in the next life, sin were not punished eternally?
Yes; for if, in the next life, the wicked after a longer or shorter term of punishment would be restored to blessedness and peace, then that blessedness and peace would be the reward of impiety, and God's supreme authority and His divine providence could thus be slighted with impunity. Or if, after a longer or shorter term of punishment, the wicked were to be resolved into original annihilation, then there would be no examples of his eternally rigid justice; and His divine justice, being rigid and eternal, demands that those who despise it mortally shall, in the next life, know no pardon and no respite.
Saint Thomas uses the following argument: "Mortal sin is a turning away, knowingly and willingly, from God. It would not be a mortal sin unless it were an absolute turning away, and that knowingly and willingly, in a creature who is both rational and free - an act of bitter, malicious, mortal disobedience and revolt. A free reasoning creature knows that that sin is there, that that state continues - chooses to remain in that state, chooses to die in that state; then unquestionably if he chooses to do so, God is not to blame. If he selects eternal punishment rather than God's friend ship, then it is a man's own act; and never does God refuse to receive him into favour, provided a man wishes to be received into favour."
Let an example be taken from human legislation. Civilised society has its ordinary government. This well-regulated government makes its laws and attaches punishments. It it be proved that a man with malice aforethought transgresses against the laws, then he is, in the estimation of his fellowmen, justly punished for it, especially if the laws be just ones, and the punishment be proportionate to the crime. Now God is (1) a just law-giver, and (2) the punishments He metes are scrupulously proportionate and just. Therefore if He decree eternal punishment, and that a man chooses to transgress, a man justly suffers the penalty. Again, God's own laws demand it! In the present order of creation, who would obey His laws if eternal punishment were taken away, seeing that while it exists so many transgress them?
Father Faber says: "It is of faith that God's harvest of glory out of that unutterable gloom is immense; for the lost soul is as much an unwilling worship of His justice as the converted soul is a willing worship of His love. . . . Neither is that horrible place without a most blessed result on the salvation of many souls through the holy and salutary fear which it breeds in them, and the loose and low notions of God which it corrects in the unthinking. . . . Verily it is well for our own sakes to think sometimes of that horrid place. As truly as fair France lies across the Channel, as truly as the sun is shining on the white walls and gay bridges and bright gardens and many-storied palaces of its beautiful capital, as truly as that thousands of men and women are living real lives and fulfilling various destinies, so truly is there such a place as hell, all alive this hour with the multitudinous life of countless agonies and innumerable gradations of despair." - All for Jesus
Plato says: "The wicked, whose perverse reason has deserved the fate of the reprobate, are doomed to a life of slavery and fear, and their punishments, which shall continually harass without improving them, are useful only as witnesses of their frightful and painful eternity. I know little can be made of a man's mere statement; but having for a long time weighed this matter, I find nothing more consonant with justice, reason, and the essence of truth than the fact of eternal pain."
Voltaire: "The belief in purgatory as well as in hell is of the most ancient antiquity."
D'Alembert writes to him and says: "I think I have at last hit on the certainty of the non-existence of hell."
Voltaire replies: "You are indeed fortunate! But I am far from being so persuaded."
What is the nature of the punishment in hell?
The punishment is twofold: one class of punishment is essential, such as that which necessarily pursues sin; the other is accidental, such as the fury of the demons or the wailing of the damned. Of the first description there are two kinds - the pain of Loss and the pain of Sense.
What is meant by the pain of Loss?
By it is meant the separation of the soul ever more from God.
By mortal sin the soul voluntarily turned from God. By its final impenitence it lost the power of evermore turning to Him. In this life that appeared a little matter; but in the next, when the soul shall have been divested of the body, then it will be filled with intelligence, and that intelligence will only make it regret. The soul of the just is filled with intelligence, and it enjoys God with the fulness of that intelligence; the soul of the reprobate is likewise filled with intelligence, but it is only to wish that it had never got it.
In Matthew (25:41) our Blessed Lord tells what will be the sentence of the reprobate: "Depart from Me," etc., meaning eternal departure, eternal separation. This separation, with its consequent remorse, is often alluded to in Scripture as "the worm that dieth not," meaning thereby the continual anguish and grief of soul that shall seize on the reprobate and never leave them, because of the loss of happiness and the beatific vision for ever. And as it is beyond the sight of man's eye, and the hearing of man's ear, and the thought of man's heart to conceive the joys that God has in store in the beatific vision for those that love Him, so is it equally beyond man's power to conceive what that pain of loss is which the reprobate feel.
Christ says, moreover, that He will call them accursed. Now, the curse of God alone is a withering thing. God spoke, and all things were made. God spoke, and the depths of hell sprang into existence. Nothing more effective of evil can be imagined than God's curse, and therefore is that dungeon fitly called "a place of torments." Bossuet says on this word accursed: "It contains within itself an imprecation against the unhappy soul, which tears out from the minutest fibre of its being all the capacity it once had to receive enjoyment from bliss, as well as the power to perform the least good action." (Meditations on the Gospel) This pain of loss is so great as to make the pain of sense be accounted as small in comparison. Saint Chrysostom says: "To have lost so much seems to me of such great pain, that hell with all its pains were nothing but for this loss." (Homily on the Epistle to the Philippians)
Do the fallen angels possess all their natural powers and intelligence?
Yes; they know God, they know themselves, they know mankind. They know all that the angels in heaven, by their natural powers, know. But this knowledge and all these natural powers, gigantic and superhuman as they are, are turned into destructive engines of evil - evil for themselves and for others.
"Proud spirits," cries Bossuet, "without losing your sublime intelligence God has turned it against your own breasts as an instrument of punishment. Everything bright and glorious in you is transformed into evil. Those intellects, that shone like the stars of the morning, are become the agents of duplicity and guile."
Can they ever have a thought of doing good?
They never have, and they never will. As in heaven there is never a thought of evil, so in hell there is never a thought of good; not that the reprobate are compelled, but because being separated from God, accursed by Him, and never more capable of returning to Him, their thoughts are continually evil.
"The angels who remained constant," says Saint Bonaventure, "were confirmed through grace, and those who fell were henceforward abandoned by God's grace. The good were so far confirmed by grace that they cannot sin; the wicked through malice are rendered so obstinate that they cannot have even a good thought or a good wish, although at times what they do wish for is good: for at times they wish that to be done which God wishes - and hence what is good and just - but it is not with a good will or a good intention they desire it.
"But since," he continues, "the good cannot transgress, and the wicked cannot either wish well or do well, it may appear that they have not free-will. And Saint Jerome says it is God alone on whom sin cannot fall. To which difficulty we reply, that the good have been confirmed in such grace that they cannot sin, and the wicked so hardened in malice that they cannot do good; and yet both have free-will - because, the good, without any pressure and without any necessity, of their own accord and unconstrained, select what is good and avoid what is evil, all the time, no doubt, assisted by grace; the wicked, on the other hand, abandoned by grace, of their own choice avoid what is good and pursue what is evil, and yet they have free-will, but so depressed and so corrupted that they cannot rise to what is good.
"Nay," he goes on, "the good have free-will much more largely since their confirmation than before. For, as Augustine lays down in his Enchiridium, they are not wanting in free-will because they do not wish evil; for much more free is that will which is not a slave to sin. Nor, again, is that will to be blamed by which the good wish to be blessed as they are - so that they do not desire to be unhappy, but that even they cannot possibly wish it. The good angels, then, cannot possibly wish evil, or desire to be unhappy; and this is the case, not from any privilege of their own nature, but the effect of grace. Before their confirmation in grace the angels could have sinned, and some did, and became demons; and from this Augustine, in his work against Maximinus, thus argues: The nature of heavenly creatures could die, because it could sin; and angels have sinned and become demons, and those that did not sin could have sinned; but if to any creature the privilege be granted that it cannot sin, this is not from its own nature, but from God's grace. Hence, God alone is the only being who, not by the grace of anyone else, but of His nature, has not sinned, does not sin, and never shall. That they could have sinned was then proper to them from their nature; that now they cannot is not from nature, i.e., free-will, but from grace; from which grace it arises that that very free-will cannot be so base as to bow to sin. And thus write Jerome and Isidore."
Do these evil acts increase and re-increase their punishment?
No; the reprobate are now past the state of meriting or dementing. Just as the elect in heaven do not merit new bliss by their continual praise of God, so the reprobate in hell do not incur new punishments.
From what, then, essentially arises the pain of loss?
From the ceasing of the intercourse between the soul and its Creator; and because of that ceasing, every evil, natural and supernatural, follows. This is the awful thing about mortal sin the absolute turning away from God, especially when by our own power we are absolutely unable de condignio to return again. May God in His mercy save us from such an evil. Prayer will incline the ear of God to us, and will urge Him to stretch forth His hand to save that is, while we are in this life; and He Himself has said:, "Turn to Me and I will turn to you." But once the moment of final impenitence comes on once this life is past and eternity begins then adieu to all that is good or enjoyable for evermore.
52. What is meant by the pain of Sense?
By the pain of sense, the Scriptures and tradition mean the torment of fire. Bellarmine, Suarez, Petavius, Peronne, and others look upon fire as the agent of pain in hell. It has never been denied by any person of authority, and, as Vasquez remarks, is opposed to no teaching or decree of the Church. Scripture always speaks of it as "inextinguishable fire," "eternal fire".
Tradition teaches the same. Pope Saint Gregory says: "As blessedness rejoices the elect, so is it necessary (as I believe) that from the day of death fire should burn the reprobate, and that fire I hold to be corporeal; for, when divine truth inculcates that the rich man was punished by fire, what doctor will deny that the souls of the reprobate are held in fire?" Saint Augustine says: "Incorporeal spirits shall there be imprisoned to be tortured by corporeal fires, burnt by them in strange, ineffable, but most real ways. . . . That Gehenna shall be corporeal fire, and shall torture the bodies of men together with their souls; the demons, however, only spiritually, for they have no bodies. Yet a true fire shall it be, that of both, as divine truth proclaimeth."
The Council of Florence thus decrees: "The most holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes, and teaches that no one who does not belong to the Catholic Church [i.e., either to the body or the spirit] shall enter into eternal life, but shall go into everlasting fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels." (ex decreto pro Jacobitis)
Reason even seems to point out the appropriateness, that the soul that has turned from God to corporeal things should by a corporeal element be tormented.
53. How, then, is that material fire generated? Is it extrinsic or intrinsic to the soul?
It is a question among theologians. Saint Augustine, Saint Gregory, Estius, Suarez, and others hold that the reprobate are tortured in some wonderful and ineffable ways by a fire extrinsic to them, yet indissolubly united to them, and for this a positive action on the part of God is required; just as when a soul is united to a corporeal substance that we call a body, the soul is acted on by that body in some wonderful ways, that metaphysicians even are unable to account for. Even while in this life, if a person be burnt, the soul is affected mediately, that is - through the medium of the body - by fire. Others think that fire is intrinsic to the soul, deduced and evolved from the midst of the damned person. In one who is sick with internal pains, even on this earth, a fire seems to be raging. "That torturing fire in the sick person," says Bonal, "is the consciousness of the most violent separation of the parts of a living body. Now, in the reprobate there is no divine influx, whereby those parts would be united for the good of the body; therefore," he continues, "in the bodies of the reprobate there is going on an everlasting and most violent disintegration of the parts, and hence these bodies become totally and perpetually as if on fire." This might answer with regard to bodies, but it does not seem to touch at all on the subject of souls. Typically, too, the Scripture seems to say this in Isaias (33:11): "Ye shall conceive heat, ye shall bring forth stubble, your breath as fire shall devour you." "A fire that is not kindled shall devour him." (Job 20:26) "I will bring forth a fire from the midst of thee to devour thee." (Ezechiel 28:18)
What the great Saint Thomas says is this: "In a two-fold manner natural fire is generated in its own self, from its own natural principle, evolved as in flint or coal; and secondly, artificially, and introduced by violence, as iron heated in a furnace. But whether the fire of hell exist of its own self, or in what material it exists, if a strange one, is totally unknown to us." - Saint Thomas, Supplement, question 97, answer 6
Is the pain of hell the same in all?
As regards duration it is the same in all; as regards intensity it is unequal, because proportioned to the number and gravity of the crimes. It is equal in duration, because every soul for eternity will be an enemy of God. The inequality will be because some have transgressed more, some less.
The Scripture says: "He shall be punished for all that he did, and yet shall not be consumed; according to the multitude of his devices, so also shall he suffer." (Job 20:18) Saint Paul says: "Do not err. God will not be mocked as a man sows, so shall he reap." (Galatians 6:8) "As much as she hath glorified herself, and lived in delicacies; so much torment and sorrow give ye to her." (Apocalypse 18:7)
Are the pains of hell immutable as to intensity?
Some, especially of the elder theologians, taught that the pains of hell may in process of time become mitigated that is, between the date of the particular judgment and the day of the general judgment - but that even these pains so mitigated would, after the general judgment, continue unchangeable, and therefore become everlasting.
Saint Thomas says: "It can be said that even in the case of the damned mercy is not wholly unrepresented, inasmuch as they are punished less than their just due. At the end of life they come to judgment damnable and damned, they there fore receive then the final retribution of their deeds, just as the saints their reward in glory; hence neither can their punishment be diminished, as neither can the glory of the saints be increased, at least as to its essential reward - quantum ad premium essentiale." Thus, according to Saint Thomas, if there be a diminution, it can only be in what is accidental, not in what is essential.
Taking, however, into account the parable of the rich glutton, even that accidental diminution seems to be not very strongly supported; for if anything could be accounted an accidental diminution, surely the comfort of one drop of water might; yet that one drop was to be refused, and evidently our Blessed Lord meant this for a typical case. It may be safely said that no theologian now holds it. Again, the practice of the Church is directly against it. It neither prays, nor will it permit prayers to be offered for the damned. "But we have not spoken sufficiently of the vastness of the empire of the Precious Blood. Let us look for a moment at its extremes. On the one hand it includes the first-fruits of creation, the souls of infants those flowers whom our Lord gathers in the pure fragrance of their first blooming; on the other hand, the refuse of creation those whom God has cast off for ever. The latter lie in outer darkness. Their exile is eternal. Yet even there we find the energy of the Precious Blood. Inconceivable as are the severities of hell, they are less than rigorous justice would exact. They are so precisely because of the Precious Blood. Before the days of Peter Lombard the generality of theologians held that, as time went on, there were some mitigations of the fierce punishments of hell. They sank after a while to a lower level. There were expiations which were only temporal and not eternal. There were con-donations within certain limits. Peter Lombard, as Saint Thomas himself says, innovated upon this teaching, and Saint Thomas followed in his steps. Suffice it to say that, if, independent of all hell being below the rigour of justice because of the Precious Blood, there were any such mitigations as the elder theologians believed, they also came, without a doubt, from the Precious Blood. To it alone can they be due, if they exist at all." - Father Faber, Precious Blood
All the opinions of theologians are summed up in these striking words of Saint Thomas: "On account of the perfect blessedness of the Saints, there is nothing in heaven which is not a source of joy; so, with the damned, there is nothing in hell which is not food for sorrow, nor anything pertaining to sorrow wanting, so that their misery might be complete." "Oh, what a terrible thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God!"