Page:SermonsFromTheLatins.djvu/143

 it were,  a  vast  cesspool  into  which  all  the  impurities of the  world,  like  the  contents  of  so  many  teeming sewers, are  poured. Since the  bodies  of  the  damned are in  a  state  of  never-ending  decay,  a  fetid  stench will arise  from  them  as  from  the  bodies  of  a  mighty host slaughtered  and  abandoned  on  the  field  of  battle. Packed in  like  sheep  in  a  pen,  unable  to  move a muscle  to  alleviate  their  pain,  handcuffed  to  the decaying body  of  a  fellow-sufferer  and  saturated through and  through  with  a  living  flame  that devours but  does  not  consume,  tortures  but  does  not kill! Oh, let  me  look  at  a  burning  building,  and  ask myself if  this  fire,  which  God  created  for  man's  use and comfort,  is  so  awful  in  its  nature  and  so  destructive in  its  effects,  what  must  that  fire  be  which  God created expressly  to  be  the  instrument  of  man's  punishment! The sufferings  of  St.  John  cast  into  a caldron  of  boiling  oil;  of  St.  Lawrence  slowly  roasted on a  gridiron;  of  the  blessed  martyrs  cast  into  fiery furnaces and  vats  of  molten  metal;  of  the  early Christians covered  with  pitch  and  tar  and  set  fire  to by  Nero  to  light  the  streets  of  Rome;  the  sufferings of all  these  were  as  nothing  beside  the  burning  of  a soul  in  hell. Ah! well they  knew  it,  for  did  they  not suffer so  in  order  to  avoid  the  greater  pains  of  hell? For the  fire  of  hell  is  a  spiritual  living  thing  that feeds alike  on  soul  and  body. But this  is  the  least part of  the  anguish  of  my  soul — its  worst  pain  is  the pain of  the  loss  of  God — the  one  being  in  all  the world for  whom  my  soul  craves. God who  lifted  me out  of  the  dirt  of  my  nothingness  and  adopted  me  as