or mitigation. Such, O Jesus, would have been my lot, hadst thou called me out of life in my sins. Dearest Redeemer, I refuse not to suffer, but will truly love thee.
II. In this life by constantly suffering pain we become accustomed to it and better able to bear it; time mitigates sufferings which at first were most grievous to us. But will the souls in hell, by eternally suffering the torments which they endure, by the habit of enduring them for so many years, will they ever find their intensity diminished? No, for the torments of hell are of such a nature that, at the end of a hundred or a thousand years, those souls will experience the same degree of pain from them as when they first descended into that bottomless abyss. “ In thee, O Lord, have I hoped, let me never be confounded.” I know, O Lord, that I have frequently deserved hell, yet I know likewise that thou dost not desire the death of the sinner, but that he be converted and live. O my God, I will not continue obstinate, but will repent with my whole soul of all my sins, and will love thee more than myself; do thou restore me to life, to the life of thy holy grace.
III. In this life when a person suffers he has the pity and sympathy of his relatives and friends; and these afford at least some comfort. But how miserable would it be for a man in the most excruciating pains, to be upbraided and reproached by his relatives and friends with the misdeeds for which he was suffering, saying to him without pity: “ Rave on in rage and despair; thou hast deserved all that thou sufferest.” The miserable wretches in hell suffer all kinds of torments, suffer them continually without any relief or comfort, and have none to compassionate them. Not even God can compassionate them, for they are his enemies: nor Mary, the mother of mercy: nor the angels, nor
