Page:MeditationsOnTheMysteriesOfOurHolyV1.djvu/238

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Almighty God does him wrong, complaining against Him as against one unjust.

5. The will will be obstinate and obdurate in sin, and in the hatred of Almighty God, of His saints, and of men, without being able to be appeased, or changed, or to repent what it does; and, desiring to do his own will, he shall never be able to do it in anything that may be for his comfort; for already they have bound him hand and foot to "cast him into exterior darkness," [1] not permitting him liberty to exercise the works of light or joy. Hence a man's own will not being fulfilled shall be the hell of itself, to chastise it for those manifold times that, in this life, it did fulfil it contrary to the will of Almighty God.

6. Finally, I will consider that the heart of one of the damned is like a most bitter sea, into which enter the rivers of most terrible torments. Five for the five exterior senses, and other five for the five interior faculties; in order to chastise the sins they committed against the ten commandments of God's law, or against any one of them. For, as the apostle says, " Whosoever" shall " offend in one point is become guilty of all." [2]

Colloquy. — Then what greater unhappiness can there be than that those faculties which God our Lord gave me to enjoy Him, and to ennoble myself, should be converted into my cruel executioners, to torment and confound me? Immense God, aid me to mortify and subdue the faculties which Thou hast given me, and let me be their tormentor in this life rather than they should be mine in the life to come! Amen.

POINT IV.

Pain of loss, — Fourthly, I am to consider that pain which they call of loss, or damnation.

  1. Matt. xxii. 13.
  2. Jac. ii. 10.