Of judgement and the punishments of sinners
CHAPTER 24
OF JUDGEMENT
AND THE PUNISHMENTS OF SINNERS
In all things look to the end, and consider that you shall stand before the strict Judge, from whom there is nothing hid; who takes no bribes, and receives no excuses, but will judge that which is just.
O wretched and foolish sinner, who are sometimes afraid of the countenance of an angry man! what answer will you make to God who knows all your evil deeds?
Why do you not make provision for yourself against the Day of Judgement, when no man can be excused or defended by another, but each one will have enough to do to answer for himself?
Now is your labour profitable, your tears acceptable, your groans heard, your sorrow satisfactory before God and availing to cleanse your soul.
2. The patient man has a great and wholesome purgatory; who, suffering wrongs, is more sorrowful for another's malice than for the injury to himself; who prays gladly for his adversaries, forgiving their offenses from his heart; who delays not to ask pardon of others; who is sooner moved to pity than to anger; who does frequent violence to himself, and strives to bring his flesh wholly into subjection to the spirit.
It is better to purge away our sins and cut off our vices now, than to keep them for purgation hereafter.
Truly we deceive ourselves, through the inordinate love we bear the flesh.
3. What else will that fire feed upon but your sins?
The more you spare yourself now and follow the flesh, so much the more dearly shall you pay for it hereafter; and the more fuel do you lay up for that fire.
In what things a man has sinned, in those things shall he be the more grievously punished.
There the slothful shall be pricked with burning goads, the gluttonous tormented with extreme hunger and thirst. There the lustful and the lovers of pleasure shall have burning pitch and stinking brimstone rained upon them; and the envious, like mad dogs, shall howl with pain.
4. There is no vice but shall have its own peculiar torment.
There the proud shall be filled with all confusion, and the avaricious pinched with the most miserable penury.
Chapter 24 of the judgement
There one hour of punishment shall be more grievous than a hundred years of the most bitter penance here.
There is no rest there, nor comfort, for the damned;^ whereas here we have some respite from labour, and enjoy the comfort of our friends.
Be solicitous and sorry for your sins now, that in the Day of Judgement you may be safe with the blessed. For then the just shall stand with great constancy against those that have afflicted and oppressed them.^ Then shall he stand up to judge who now humbly submits himself to the judgements of men.
Then shall the poor and humble have great confidence, but the proud shall be encompassed with fear.
5. Then will it appear that he was wise in this world, who for Christ's sake learned to be a fool and despised."
Then every tribulation borne with patience shall be pleasing, and all iniquity shall stop her mouth.* Then shall every devout man rejoice, and all the ungodly shall mourn.
Then shall the flesh exult that was aflSicted, more than if it had always been fed on dainties.
Then shall the mean habit shine, and the fine garment be tarnished.
Then shall the poor cottage be praised above the gilded palace.
Then shall enduring patience more avail than all the power of the world.
Then shall sunple obedience be exalted beyond all worldly cleverness.
6. Then shall a pure and good conscience bring more joy than learned philosophy.
Then shall the contempt of riches far outweigh all the treasures of worldlings.
Then shall you find more comfort in having prayed devoutly than in havmg feasted daintily.
Then shall you rejoice more for having kept silence than for having talked much.
Then shall holy works be of greater value than many fair words.
Then shall strictness of life and hard penance please more than all the delights of earth. iMark ix, 43-49.
'Wisdom V, 1.
• 1 Corinthians Iv, 10.
* Psalm cvi, 42.