The loss of the soul a loss everlasting.
Fourthly, As the loss of the soul is a loss peculiar to itself, a loss double, and a loss most fearful, so it is a loss everlasting. The soul that is lost is never to be found again, never to be recovered again, never to be redeemed again, its banishment from God is everlasting; the fire in which it burns, and by which it must be tormented, is a fire that is ever, everlasting fire, everlasting burnings; the adder, the snake, the stinging worm, diet not, nor is the fire quenched; and this is a fearful thing. A man may endure to touch the fire with a short touch, and away; but to dwell with everlasting burnings, that is fearful. Oh, then, what is dwelling with them, and in them, forever and ever!
We use to say, light burdens far carried are heavy; what, then, will it be to bear that burden, that guilt, that the law and the justice and wrath of God will lay upon the lost soul forever? Now tell the stars, now tell the drops of the sea, and now tell the blades of grass that are spread upon the face of all the earth, if thou canst: and yet sooner mayest thou do this than count the thousands of millions of thousands of years that a damned soul shall lie in hell. Suppose every star that is now in the firmament was to burn, by himself, one by one, a thousand years apiece, would it not be a long while before the last of them was burned out? and yet sooner might that be done than the damned soul be at the end of punishment.
There are three things couched under this last head that will fill up the punishment of a sinner. 1. The first is, that it is everlasting. 2. The second is, that, therefore, it will be impossible for the souls in hell ever to say, Now we are got halfway through our sorrows. 3. The third is, and yet every moment they shall endure eternal punishment.
1. The first I have touched upon already, and, therefore, shall not enlarge; only I would ask the wanton or unthinking sinner, whether twenty, or thirty, or forty years of the deceitful pleasures of sin is so rich a prize, as that a man may well venture the ruin, that everlasting burnings will make upon his soul for the obtaining of them, and living a few moments in them. Sinner, consider this before I go any further, or before thou readiest one line more. If thou hast a soul, it concerns thee; if there be a hell, it concerns thee; and if there be a God that can and will punish the soul for sin everlastingly in hell, it concerns thee; because,
2. In the second place, it will be impossible for the damned soul ever to say, I am now got halfway through my sorrows. That which has no end has no middle. Sinner, make a round circle, or ring, upon the ground, of what bigness thou wilt; this done, go thy way upon that circle, or ring, until thou comes to the end thereof; but that, sayest thou, I can never do; because it has no end. I answer, but thou mayest as soon do that as wade halfway through the lake of fire that is prepared for impenitent souls. Sinner, what wilt thou take to make a mountain of sand that will reach as high as the sun is at noon? I know that thou wilt not be engaged in such a work; because it is impossible, thou should ever perform it. But I dare say the task is greater when the sinner has let out himself to sin for a servant because the wages is everlasting burnings. I know thou mayest perform thy service; but the wages, the judgment, the punishment is so endless, that thou when thou hast been in it more millions of years than can be numbered, art not, nor never yet shalt be, able to say, I am halfway through it. And yet,
3. That soul shall partake in every moment of that punishment that is eternal. 'Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire' (Jude 7).
(1.) They shall endure eternal punishment in the nature of punishment. There is no punishment here wherewith one man can chastise another that can deserve a greater title than that of transient, or temporary punishment; but the punishment there is eternal, even in every stripe that is given, and in every moment that it grappled with the soul; even every twinge, every gripe, and every stroke that justice inflicted, leaved anguish that, of their condition according as will best stand within the nature of punishment, is eternal behind it. It is eternal, because it is from God, and lasts forever and ever. The justice that inflicts it has not a beginning, and it is this justice in the operations of it that is always dealing with the soul.
(2.) All the workings of the soul under this punishment are such as cause it, in its sufferings, to endure that which is eternal. It can have no thought of the end of punishment, but it is presently recalled by the decreed gulf that bindeth them under perpetual punishment. The great fixed gulf, they know, will keep them in their present place, and not suffer them to go to heaven (Luke 16:26). And now there is no other place but heaven or hell to be in; for then the earth, and the works that are therein, will be burned up. Read the text, 'But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat; the earth also and all the works that are therein shall be burned up' (2 Peter 3:10).
