Eighteenth Day
Man sins, and thus turns away from God; the punishment, therefore, must be an eternal or temporary deprivation of God, the highest good of man. He sins, and thus turns towards a created good, and derives pleasure and satisfaction from it; the punishment, therefore, for this illicit, sensual pleasure, is the pain of sense, the pain inflicted by created things. Now fire is a pain of sense; and it is a doctrine sufficiently warranted by Scripture and tradition, that the fire of purgatory is a real fire, by which the souls are chastised and purified. The Holy Fathers explain that the greatest imaginable sufferings here on earth, the most dreadful martyrdom of the holy confessors of Christ, the worst pains of the most terrible illness, can bear no comparison with the torments and pains suffered by the poor souls in purgatory. Well known is the exclamation of St. Augustine, “Here burn, here cut, here crucify, but spare me in eternity, O God!” The sufferings of this life can be soothed by consolation, can be softened by many distractions; now and again there is a respite granted to the greatest sufferer, and time heals many woes. But the sufferings of purgatory continue without any alleviation or interruption.
Prayer.
Release, O Lord, etc., etc.