If we consider the pains of Hell we gain by our sins, we would have stronger reason to avoid sin
2 min • Digitized on October 11, 2023
From The Sinner’s Guide, page 107
By Venerable Louis of Granada
CHAPTER X.
THE TENTH MOTIVE FOR PRACTISING VIRTUE; THE THOUGHT OF HELL, THE FOURTH OF THE FOUR LAST THINGS.
The least part of the happiness we have endeavored to portray should be sufficient to inflame our hearts with a love of virtue. Nevertheless wre shall also consider the terrible alternative of misery reserved for the reprobate. The sinner cannot comfort himself by saying; “After all, the only resuit of my depraved life will be that I shall never see God. Farther than this I shall have neither reward nor punishment.” Oh! no; we are all destined to one or the other—either to reign eternally with God in Heaven or to burn for ever with the devils in hell.
This happiness and misery, either of which must inevitably be our portion, are represented by the two baskets of figs which Jeremias saw in the vision, one containing “very good figs, like the figs of the first season, and the other basket very bad figs, which could not be eaten.” God willed thus to represent to His prophet the two classes of souls, one of which forms the object of His mercy, and the other of His justice. The happiness of the first is unequalled, and the misery of the second is also incomparable; for the just enjoy the perpetual vision of God, which is the greatest of all blessings, while the wicked are for ever deprived of this vision, and thereby suffer the greatest of all evils.
If men who sin so rashly would weigh this truth they would know the terrible burden that they lay upon themselves. Those who earn their living by carrying burdens first estimate the weight they are to bear, that they may know whether it is beyond their strength. Why, then, O rash man! will you for a passing pleasure so lightly assume the terrible burden of sin without considering your strength to bear it? Will you not reflect on the heavy weight you thus condemn yourself to bear for all eternity? To help you do this I shall offer you a few considerations which will enable you to realize in some measure the greatness of the punishment reserved for sin.