23. Demonstration. It accords most excellently with reason that God be, and be judged to be, the author of a moral order of such a kind that those who observe it attain the end of the order, which is comprised in perpetual felicity, while those who transgress and violate it fall away from the end of the order and incur perpetual misery.
For such an order both corresponds to the natures of things and appears expressed in material nature itself.
But the perpetuity of punishments is connected and coheres with an order of this kind once it has been appointed. Therefore well-considered reason approves that the moral order be fortified by perpetual punishments.
24. Again, that form of sanction cannot fail to accord with reason by which the divine honor is more fittingly provided for and human actions are regarded according to their dignity. But the divine honor is injured almost infinitely by sin, and the sins of men contract an almost infinite malice.
The divine honor is injured almost infinitely. This is understood if there be regarded, on the one side, the infinite dignity of God and the most perfect right by which he exacts honor from creatures, and, on the other, the infinite vileness of man and the most perfect duty by which he is obliged to honor God. Moreover, the malice of sin flows from the same causes from which the injury to God arises, and corresponds proportionately to the injury to God.
Since, therefore, the injury to God is almost infinite, the malice of sin also seems to touch the limits of the infinite. Therefore a sanction which makes satisfaction to the divine honor and by which the sins of men are regarded according to their dignity must approach the limits of the infinite, insofar as this can be done, and must express the infinite itself in some manner.
But it cannot approach the limits of the intensive infinite, nor in any way express the intensive infinite. Therefore it is exceedingly fitting that it approach the limits of the extensive infinite and in some measure depict the extensive infinite.
But it is that which is indefinite that depicts the extensive infinite and touches the limits of the extensive infinite. Therefore it is exceedingly fitting that violation of the divine law be sanctioned by indefinite and perpetual punishments.
25. Furthermore, a sanction of such a kind as a man might scorn not altogether without cause, and by the establishment of which it would be perpetually true that sin had not harmed the sinner, is altogether unworthy of God.
Come now, and suppose that punitive action is taken by God against sins only by punishments finite in duration. What will follow? This will follow first: that divine punishment would be scorned by man not altogether without cause.
For if it is finite, in comparison with the indefinite duration which remains it can be held as a point in comparison with a line extending indefinitely. Namely, it can be neglected not absurdly.
By a comparison I shall make what I think more evident. The ratio of any finite time to indefinite duration is less than that of one instant of the present life to the sum of the moments in which the duration of an entire life consists. Certainly, the latter ratio is between finite and finite, but the former is established between finite and indefinite. But it would belong to an altogether delicate and almost effeminate spirit to be greatly moved by a punishment which, destined to last for only a single instant of the present life, would have no force for the remaining course of life. Therefore
it would belong much more to a delicate and effeminate spirit to be greatly moved by a punishment which, comprised within a finite circuit, would produce no effect throughout an indefinite duration.
But a second thing also would follow: that it would be perpetually true that sin had not harmed those who sinned. For when the appointed time of punishment had elapsed, an indefinite time free of punishment would remain, during which indefinite time sinners would be at liberty to say: “We indeed sinned; but perpetually we shall experience no detriment from the sins by which we offended God and trampled upon the divine laws.”
Therefore, lest we fall into these and other absurdities of this kind, we must conclude that it was exceedingly fitting for perpetual punishments to be adjoined to the divine laws.
26. This is evident also from the fact that otherwise neither the observance of the moral order nor the good of human society would seem to have been provided for according to what was fitting.
Let histories be unrolled, let the annals of nations be consulted, and let daily experience be questioned. What do we learn? These are the things which we learn. We learn, I. that the path of virtue is arduous and that human nature shrinks from it. We learn, II. that human minds are very prone to vices, are vehemently enticed by the sweetness of the senses, and are not greatly moved by the bare appearance of rectitude. We learn, III. that there is need of continual exertion of the mind lest duties be violated and justice be injured. And finally we learn, IV. that without great virtues societies either are overthrown or so gradually rush toward worse things that at length they perish.
But what follows from this? That it is altogether necessary that men not lack motives by which they may be effectively deterred from transgression of their duties. But how are you to deter them effectively? By the threat of an evil of such a kind that they shudder at it and, in order to avoid it, forcefully repress and constantly restrain the incentives of sin, although most vehement.
But will so great a force inhere in the threat of an evil which will cease, which is finite, and from which men have nothing to fear perpetually? That which ceases and which you will at length avoid either does not deter or does not deter to such a degree that it can appear adequate for containing men in their duty.
Therefore the love by which God pursues the observance of order, and the providence by which he governs human society, seem to demand that the punishments by which the divine laws are sanctioned be eternal.
27. In order that these considerations may strike minds even more effectively, we propose some arguments employed by the ancients.
I. Accordingly, Augustine, in the work The City of God,1 asks: “Why is it unjust that, whereas the judges of this world, punishing many sins by the sword, exclude men forever from the society of human life, the Lord of the eternal city should cast out forever from his city the impious and his enemies, who sin unceasingly, and cause those who are impure and unjust toward God and neighbor, perpetually malevolent, to remain under his wrath and the curse of him and of the law?”
Theodore, bishop of Abucara, agrees, writing in his disputation against Origen:2 “We know all justice either from the law of God, or from laws which men have enacted, or from natural things. But none of these kinds of justice inflicts a temporal punishment. A man commits fornication, theft, or murder in the space of one hour; but the law of God and the laws of men, by condemning a murderer to capital punishment and visiting an extreme penalty upon some criminal, do not take punitive action against him for the space of one hour. Rather, if they punish him by death, they visit him with an eternal punishment; or if they flog him, they thereby inflict upon him prolonged pain. Indeed, if you also caught an adulterer with your wife or daughter, you would judge that he should not be punished for the space of one hour, but slain—which is indeed the eternal punishment of men. But the very natures of things also conduct themselves in the same manner. For when we have been forbidden, for example, to drink cold water or to use any harmful kind of food, and nevertheless strive after what is forbidden, we assuredly pay prolonged punishments. Thus it very often happens that from drinking cold water, contact with fire, or the use of vinegar, we incur a continual disease; but nature is most just.”
II. Basil has these most excellent words:3 “This is one of the devices of the devil: that men, as though forgetful of these and like things which are set down in very many places of the sacred writings, may fashion for themselves an end of punishments, so that they might sin with greater audacity.”
Jerome also presses this argument, gravely warning:4 “This perverse dogma utterly overturns the fear of God, while men easily lapse into vices, thinking that even the devil, who is the author and fountain of all sins, can be saved once he has done penance.”
III. There is also another argument which Basil urges in the passage cited: “If there will at some time be an end of eternal punishment, without controversy there will also be an end of eternal life. But if we can in no way understand this concerning eternal life, what reason can be brought forward why eternal punishment is said to have an end? For the addition of eternity is adjoined equally to both the one and the other.”
IV. Jerome, however, assails the opinion of those who did not fear to teach that there would one day be a restoration of the damned as a plainly unworthy invention, when he proceeds in the same passage which we cited a little before: “For if all rational creatures are equal, and by their own choice are either raised upward by virtues or plunged into the depths by vices, and if after a long circuit and infinite ages there will be a restoration of all things and one dignity of those who serve, what distinction will there be
between a virgin and a prostitute? What difference will there be between the Mother of the Lord and, what it is a crime even to say, the victims of public lusts? Will the devil and Gabriel be the same? The Apostles and the demons the same? The Prophets and the false prophets the same? The Martyrs and the persecutors the same? Imagine whatever you please: double the years and times, and heap infinite ages upon the torments; if the end of all is alike, all the past is as nothing, because we do not ask what we once were, but what we shall always be.”
V. Wherefore, lest anyone, led by a fallacious persuasion, become estranged from right reason, he adds:5 “We know that God is merciful, nor do we who are sinners delight in his cruelty; but we read:6 ‘The Lord is merciful and just, and our God hath mercy.’ The justice of God is encompassed by mercy, and it proceeds to judgment with such an escort: he so spares that he judges, he so judges that he has mercy. ‘Mercy and truth have met each other; justice and peace have kissed each other.’”7