Thus in this way they shall be worse tormented by the saints than by the demons; the heaven above will be more intolerable to them than hell itself. As Salvianus says: “God will send them a hell from above.”[1]
Thirdly: they shall be tormented by the fact that God and His saints shall mock at them in their pains. O just, and at the same time merciful God! what is this? Have not those wretches pains enough in the infernal abyss that Thou must torture them even from heaven? But if they are obliged always to behold Thy heaven in that manner, to their own torment, at least do Thou show, or allow Thy elect to show them some pity. No; the accursed ones have not merited even that comfort. “I will laugh,”[2] is the pitiless answer, at your eternal ruin. “He that dwelleth in heaven shall laugh at them: and the Lord shall deride them,”[3] says the Lord by the Prophet David. “And I will clap My hands together,” He says again by the Prophet Ezechiel, when I see them burning in the fire, and hear their howls and lamentations; then shall I rejoice, “and I will clap My hands together, and will satisfy My indignation.”[4] And My elect in heaven will also exult over and mock at the damned in hell. “And the smoke of their torments shall ascend up forever and ever,”[5] according to the revelation of St. John in the Apocalypse; that is, the saints in heaven shall always see how the reprobate are tortured in hell. And what will they think and say about it? They will adore the justice of God, and cry out with joy and exultation: Amen! Alleluia! It is right, O Lord! So let it be! Amen! Alleluia! Praise be to God! They have deserved it!
What a fearful torment that is! And that to my mind, my dear brethren, is the most intolerable torment of the damned. When a man is insulted here on earth, or is overwhelmed by some grievous calamity, and that in presence of his opponent and bitter enemy, who laughs and jeers at him, that mockery seems to him more intolerable than the affront or misfortune itself. What bitter pain it must then cause the damned to see in their God and in the blessed in heaven their sworn, eternal enemies, whose happiness makes them burst with envy, and to be forced to bear forever the mockery and ridicule that those enemies shall cast upon them in their misery? And so it will be, my dear
