Breviloquium

Consequently, what follows upon judgment must be discussed; and there are two such things, namely infernal punishment and heavenly glory.¹ Concerning infernal punishment, then, this must be held: infernal punishment is in a bodily place below, in which all the reprobate, both human beings and evil spirits, will be afflicted eternally. — They will be afflicted by the same bodily fire, which will burn and afflict spirits and bodies as well—yet it will not consume those bodies, but will always afflict them—some more, some less, according to the measure of their merits. — To this affliction by fire will be joined affliction according to all the senses; joined to it will be the punishment of the worm and deprivation of the vision of God, so that in these punishments there will be variety, and with variety severity, and with severity interminability, so that the smoke of torments may ascend for the punishment of the reprobate forever and ever.² The reason for understanding the foregoing is this: since the first principle, precisely because it is first, is supreme, whatever it has it has supremely; therefore it must be most upright. Since, then, in recompensing it acts according to uprightness, just as it cannot act against itself or deny itself³, so necessarily, with its uprightness demanding it, sin must be punished according to the measure of guilt, especially in those who, despising the law of mercy, through impenitence have run into the severity of justice. Since, then, it belongs to the severity of justice to consider guilt not only with respect to its root but also with respect to aggravating circumstances, it is most fitting that the just judge exact the due punishments from the ungodly down to the last penny,⁴ so that “the disgrace of sin without the beauty of justice” may not remain; and just as power is manifest in creating, wisdom in governing, and clemency in restoring, so supreme justice may be manifested in punishing. Since, then, divine justice must punish the ungodly sinner according to the measure of guilt, and mortal sin, which is followed by final impenitence, has the character of perpetual disorder, disordered desire, and manifold disorder, it must be punished by punishments eternal, severe, and manifold.

First, then⁵, because of perpetual disorder, the punishment must be perpetual, because the sin that one commits and of which one never repents endures perpetually in the soul, separates it from perpetual life, namely God, and proceeds from a will that in sin would wish to delight perpetually. And although that pleasure is passing and momentary, nevertheless, since the disorder has the character of perpetuity, the punishment corresponding to the disorder must lack an end; so that, just as man did not, by departing from sin, put an end to his own perpetuity⁶, so God in his perpetuity does not desist from punishing; and just as he sinned against the infinite, so he should have infinite punishment; and since he cannot have infinite punishment in intensity, let him have it at least in duration; and just as after death his will always clings to evil without receiving repentance, so God always afflicts him without changing his sentence, since the perpetuity of disorder in the damned ungodly requires this.

Again, since the punishment of disordered desire ought to be afflictive, because pleasure is punished by contrary sadness, and since the rational spirit in sinning turns itself toward its own good, both present and partial⁷, to be loved with disordered desire, and from this despises divine command and dominion, hence, in order that that wicked pleasure, in which pleasure and contempt are joined, may be perfectly punished, it is necessary that, for the punishment of that contempt and pleasure, the sinner, whether human being or spirit, be hurled into the lowest place and the one most distant from the state of glory, that is, into the deepest hell. — It is also necessary that there he be exposed to affliction by the lowest nature, and consequently suffer not from a spiritual substance but from a corporeal and lowest one, that is, from the dregs of worldly bodies, so that he may be fixed in the dregs and burned with fire and sulfur⁸. And since the spirit, which by nature is set above the body and has to flow into the body and move it, perverts the dignity of its nature through guilt and in a certain way subjects itself to the vileness and nothingness of sin, hence, according to the order of justice, it ought to be ordered so that both the sinful spirit and the human being are bound to bodily fire, not so that it may infuse life into it, but so that by divine decree it may receive punishment. For since it is inseparably bound to a thing that it hates through fear divinely infused and feels through the power of natural sensation, it must be tormented bitterly. — And because that fire acts only according to the disposition of sin, guilt, and stain proceeding from the wickedness of desire, and this is not equal in all, hence some are burned more by the same fire, but others less, just as straw is burned one way by the same fire and wood another⁹. — But since that distinction of sin and guilt, according to which the action of the fire is regulated, is uniform in the same person and never increases, decreases, or changes, hence, with divine command ordering it, the fire acts in such a way that it always burns and does not consume, always afflicts and does not destroy, because it does not act toward the multiplication of its form but toward the disturbance of the soul’s peace in the body, or of the spirit’s peace in itself. Hence there is not a new taking-away, but a continuation of the peace that has been taken away, so that in the same punishment neither severity removes eternity nor eternity removes severity.

Finally, since the punishment of manifold disorder should be manifold, and in every actual mortal sin there is a disordered turning away from supreme light and goodness, a disordered turning toward mutable good, and a disordering of the will against the dictate of right reason¹⁰, hence all who actually sin and will be damned will be punished with a threefold punishment: for turning away, deprivation of the vision of God; for turning toward, the punishment of material fire; for the conflict between will and reason, the punishment of the worm; so that, afflicted by this multiplicity of punishments, they may be tormented variously, severely, and eternally, and the smoke of torments may ascend forever and ever. Amen.