Meditation Twenty-sixth.
On the fire of hell.
I. IT is certain that hell is a pit of fire, in which
the miserable souls of the wicked will be tormented
for ever. Even in this life the pain of burning is
of all others the most intense and dreadful: but
the fire of hell has the power of inflicting much
more excruciating torment, because it has been
created by God, to be the instrument of his wrath
upon his rebellious creatures. Go ye cursed, into
everlasting fire, is the sentence of the reprobate.
And as in this sentence of condemnation fire is
particularly mentioned, we may conclude that, of
all the torments with which the senses of the wicked
are afflicted, fire is the greatest. Ah! my God, for
how many years past have I deserved to bum in
this fire! but thou hast waited for me, to behold
me burning, not with this dreadful fire, but with
the blessed flames of thy holy love. Wherefore
do I love thee, my sovereign good, and desire to
love thee for ever.
II. In this world fire only burns outwardly, and does not penetrate our interior; but in hell the fire enters into the inmost recesses of its victims. Thou shalt make them as an oven of fire. Ps. xx. 10. Every one shall become as a furnace of fire, so that the heart shall burn within the chest, the bowels within the carcass, the brains within the skull, and even the marrow within the bones. Sinners, what are your feelings with regard to this fire? You, who cannot now bear a spark accidentally fallen from a candle, nor a house too hot, nor a ray of the sun upon your head, how will you endure to be permanently immersed in an ocean of fire, where you will be for ever dying, and yet never
