Second Part of Damnation

Which the schools (and justly) call paena sensus, the punishment of sense; if it were not for this, that men will be then sensible of, and feel both their loss and their gain, namely, the pain which they have gotten by their sins, damnation would seem to be but a dream, or an imagination; but their senses as well as their understanding, feeling as well as fancy, will tell them what a dreadful thing it is to be damned; a thing which I wish with all my soul, that none of you may ever know but by hearing of it, and that the hearing may be a means to prevent the feeling of it. But now, what shall I do? Who that has not been in Hell, can tell what Hell is? Who would go there (periculum facere) to try what it is? Surely, eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man to conceive, as what God has prepared for them that love him, so for them that hate him, that is, for sinners, impenitent sinners. It is sin's design and work to make man eternally miserable, to undo him soul and body for ever. Now the better to represent this doleful state and woeful misery, I shall search the Scriptures, and endeavor to fathom the depth of expressions used there, that we may learn from there what damnation is, and from there the sinfulness of sin, in relation to which I lay down three propositions in general.

1. This punishment that sinners must undergo, will be such a state of misery as all the miseries of this life are not to be compared with it, they are nothing to it: take the dregs of all the miseries of this life, and out of them extract an essence, the very spirit of miseries (as men do strong waters from the lees and dregs of wine and beer) it will fall infinitely short of this misery — damnation. The gripings and grindings of all the diseases and torments that men do or can suffer in this life, are but flea-bitings to it; to pluck out a right eye, to cut off a right hand, were a pleasure and recreation, in comparison of being damned in Hell (Matthew 5:29). A burning fever is nothing to burning in Hell; or rather, let me speak a true, though a great and big word, if all the miseries that have been undergone by all men in the world, were all met together and centered in one man, it were nothing to Hell; Hell would be a kind of Paradise, if it were no worse than the worst of this world.

2. This state will be a state clean contrary to that which the saints shall enjoy in eternity; their differing states are expressed in contrary terms, as (Mark 16:16): He that believes shall be saved, but he that believes not shall be damned. Now damnation and salvation are contrary states; that is a state all of evil, and of all evil, this all of good, and of all good. So (Matthew 25:46): The wicked shall go into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal. The life that saints obtain, sinners go without; and the misery that saints are delivered from, sinners are delivered to; as different as grief is from joy, as torment is from rest, as terror from peace, so different is the state of sinners from that of saints in the world to come (Romans 2:6-10).

3. This state, the damnation-state of sinners, will admit of no relief; it will be punishment without pity, misery without mercy, sorrow without succor, crying without comfort, torment without ease. The sinner can look for no relief from God, for God judges and condemns him; none from conscience, for that accuses and upbraids him; none from the devils, for they torment him; none from hope, for that is departed from him; none from time, for it is for ever. It is a state of all misery, it has no consolation, not so much as a little drop of water to cool the tongue; it is misery, all misery, nothing but misery, as sin is all sin, and nothing but sin.