The Project Gutenberg EBook of Happiness in Purgatory, by Anonymous
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Title: Happiness in Purgatory
Author: Anonymous
Editor: Very Reverend Augustine Francis Hewit, CSP
Release Date: December 3, 2010 [EBook #34557]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HAPPINESS IN PURGATORY ***
Produced by Michael Gray, Diocese of San Jose
HAPPINESS IN PURGATORY.
Published April, 1897,
in
THE CATHOLIC WORLD
A Monthly Magazine of General Literature and Science
HAPPINESS IN PURGATORY.
T may be
said of Purgatory that if it did not exist it would
have to be created, so eminently is it in accord with
the dictates of reason and common sense. The natural
instinct of travellers at their journey's end is to
seek for rest and change of attire. Some are begrimed
with mud, others have caught the dust of a scorching
summer day; the heat or cold or damp of the journey has
told upon them and their attire. Perhaps, even, the way
has made them weary unto sickness, and they crave for
an interval of absolute repose.
Travellers from earth, covered with the mud and dust of
its long road, could never wish to enter the
banquet-room of eternity in their travel-stained
garments. "Take me away!" cried Gerontius to his angel.
It was a cry of anguish as well as desire, for
Gerontius, blessed soul though he is, could not face
heaven just as earth had left him. He has the true
instinct of the traveller at his journey's end. Dust,
rust, and the moth have marked their presence, and even
the oddities and eccentricities of earthly pilgrimage
must be obliterated before the home of eternity can be
entered. De mortuis nil nisi bonum is
interpreted, nothing short of heaven for those who have
crossed the bourne. But, if the heavenly gates are
thrown open to the travellers all weary and footsore,
"not having on a nuptial garment," no heterogeneous
meeting here on earth could compete with the gathering
of disembodied spirits from its four quarters. It is
human ignorance alone which canonizes all the departed,
and insists on a direct passage from time to heaven.
The canonization is not ratified in heaven, because
heaven would not exist if it took place. The Beatific
Vision is incompatible with the shadow of imperfection.
To act as if it were belongs to the same order of
things as rending the garment of Christian unity.
Purgatory makes heaven, in the sense that heaven would
not be possible for men without it. As well might we
try to reach a far-off planet, which is absolutely
removed from our sphere, an unknown quantity, though a
fact science does not dispute. Heaven without Purgatory
is a far-off planet which must ever remain beyond our
touch and ken, for it would be easier that we in our
present condition should traverse space than that the
sinner should see God face to face.
The vestibule of heaven, in which souls tarry in order
to make their preparations, and to be prepared for the
feast of eternity, can scarcely be an abode of pure
suffering. Heart and mind, as they exist in the
anima separata—that is, understanding and
love—are at rest. On earth mind and heart are the
source of the greatest pain as well as the greatest
joy. The severest pain of body may be accompanied by
happiness and a mind at rest, whereas remorse makes
life unbearable. Hidden criminals at large have not
unfrequently given themselves up to justice in order to
arrive at peace by a public execution, that being the
penalty demanded by their tortured conscience. Death,
however ignominious, rather than remorse—the
backbite of inwit, in the quaint language of our
forefathers. Remorse is not in the organs of sense, but
a purely intellectual operation, proper to man. It
cannot be softened by worldly prosperity or riches,
fame or success. On the other hand, a good conscience
is a well-spring of happiness, be the outward
circumstances of a man's life what they may. Bodily
pain would add to the torture of remorse, just as it
might deaden the joy of a good conscience, per
accidens, as theologians say. Conjointly with the
mind, the heart causes the keenest sufferings and the
deepest joys of human life, joys and sufferings which
are acted upon in the same way indirectly by pain of
body. A severe toothache, for instance, quickens the
pangs of remorse, whilst it deadens joy proceeding
either from the intellect or the heart. It would madden
a bride on her wedding morning, without in reality
affecting her happiness. The root of both joy and grief
is in the soul, not in the body. Conscience is the
"worm which never dieth"—that is, hell, the
torment created by man himself for his own punishment.
The same applies to Purgatory, as far as conscience has
been sinned against. The soul has created its own
torment, but in Purgatory the fires die out because
they deal with the anima separata, never with
the senses. In each case the nature of the fire, which
may not be material and is exercised on spirits, must
remain mysterious to us. At least we can understand it
by analogy. Remorse in the tortured soul of a murderer
is sufficient to destroy the prosperous and pampered
life of the body. Intensify it by the measure of
eternity, and it may alone constitute hell. That is
probably what theologians mean when they say that the
fire of hell and that of Purgatory are identical. What
fire is to the body, that burning sorrow is to the
spirit, who sees things in their true light, and weighs
lost opportunities in the balance of the next world.
By sorrow and love earth shows us the material, to
speak in human language, out of which Purgatory is
made. The pangs of remorse deaden the most intense
bodily pain, and the power of love does more than
render hard things sweet. Many waters cannot quench
charity, neither can the floods drown it, says the
voice of love in the Canticles. Whether human or
divine, it is as a burning fire, which consumes all
minor cares. I will not deal with passion, but with
love in its noblest form and expression; the love, for
instance, of a mother, or of a wife, or of an affianced
bride. Earth has nothing better in the natural order
than disinterested affection, a foreshadowing of
Purgatory as much as the torture of remorse. Sin will
not be there, neither will money-making; love will be
the coin of the realm. Non subtrahuntur
deliciæ sed mutantur. As the action of
purification is perfected, each human intelligence in
Purgatory will be more and more fixed on God. The soul
disengaged from the senses will learn all the more
promptly the lesson of Purgatory, if it has not been
learnt here, the perfect love of God. There is joy in
suffering under these conditions, a joy which makes
pain acceptable. A promessa sposa will be
patient with sudden illness, and racking pain, if they
promise to be temporary. She can afford to be so as
long as her heart is fixed on the wedding day. The
sposo, indeed, may weary of a sick affianced
bride, and court another. This can happen in human
things, but never in Purgatory. The souls there are
fixed on the Unchangeable One, who can never prove them
false; so be the suffering what it may, they can afford
to bide his time, secure that the reward of their
heart's long watching will never pass away. Their
wedding day is far removed from the vicissitudes of
earth, and the fever-tossed brides may suffer in
perfect peace.
On earth it is more difficult to unlearn than to learn
afresh, and it must be feared that to the great
majority Purgatory is an unlearning. The idols, the
false standards of the world must be swept away. In the
first instant of eternity the soul has an intuitive
perception of her errors. It may be likened to arrival
in a foreign land, of which the language has been badly
learnt at home. English-French will serve as a
comparison. It is very soon proved to be no French at
all. The foreigner immediately says: "I am all wrong. I
must begin again." He had much better have learnt no
French—at least his professor will think
so—for he has to unlearn more than he learns, his
expressions, his quantities, his pronunciation. Fully
aware as he now is of his shortcomings, the work of
imparting real knowledge will take time.
We say that knowledge is power. In Purgatory it is
love; and who can call the process of arriving at it
all painful, even if accompanied by torments? It is the
burst of eternal day, coming gradually to those who
ascend the steep mountain-side of Purgatory.
In it, as in the Father's house, there are many
mansions. Whilst the saint may be punished with the
pain of loss only, the sinner may be racked with fiery
torments, "saved yet so as by fire." Whatever the
"mansion," the suffering proceeds from the same cause,
varying in degree: remorse for the past, love of God in
the present. That which on earth causes our torture and
our joy is prolonged in Purgatory, with this
difference: Here our minds and hearts are
unquiet because they are not fixed on God: there
knowledge and love will be first established on their
true centre, and then perfected.
There is one single and unique instance of purgatory on
earth—not purgatory in the loose sense in which
the expression is often used. Suffering by itself is
not synonymous with Purgatory. There must be the
absolute certainty of heaven, which has been given only
once. Amen, Amen, I say to thee, this day shalt thou
be with me in paradise. The word was spoken by our
Lord himself to one in fearful torture and ignominy.
Was the good thief conscious of pain with that divine
promise ringing in his dying ears? It may well be
doubted.
He has spoken the same word to each of the holy souls:
"Thou shalt be with me in paradise"; and they are so
moulded to his will that his hour is theirs. They long
to hear this day, but the security of Our Lord's
promise tempers their suffering and puts it far above
all pains and sorrows of earth. Who would not submit to
be crucified, if To-day thou shalt be with me in
paradise were the reward? Yet a state of
crucifixion and perfect security is that of the souls
whose blessedness exceeds their torments.
These thoughts may possibly suggest comfort to some who
confuse suffering with unhappiness. They are not
synonymous. Let us rather think of the holy souls as in
the condition of the good thief. If they are suffering
the torments of crucifixion they have heard the word
which is to be their joy through eternity: Thou
shalt be with me in paradise!
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