Page 158 - a-portrait-of-the-artist-as-a-young-man

separation, knowing full well that it is unchangeable: this
is the greatest torment which the created soul is capable of
bearing, POENA DAMNI, the pain of loss.
The second pain which will afflict the souls of the
damned in hell is the pain of conscience. Just as in dead
bodies worms are engendered by putrefaction, so in the
souls of the lost there arises a perpetual remorse from the
putrefaction of sin, the sting of conscience, the worm, as
Pope Innocent the Third calls it, of the triple sting. The first
sting inflicted by this cruel worm will be the memory of
past pleasures. O what a dreadful memory will that be! In
the lake of all-devouring flame the proud king will remem-
ber the pomps of his court, the wise but wicked man his
libraries and instruments of research, the lover of artistic
pleasures his marbles and pictures and other art treasures,
he who delighted in the pleasures of the table his gorgeous
feasts, his dishes prepared with such delicacy, his choice
wines; the miser will remember his hoard of gold, the robber
his ill-gotten wealth, the angry and revengeful and merci-
less murderers their deeds of blood and violence in which
they revelled, the impure and adulterous the unspeakable
and filthy pleasures in which they delighted. They will re-
member all this and loathe themselves and their sins. For
how miserable will all those pleasures seem to the soul con-
demned to suffer in hellfire for ages and ages. How they will
rage and fume to think that they have lost the bliss of heav-
en for the dross of earth, for a few pieces of metal, for vain
honours, for bodily comforts, for a tingling of the nerves.
They will repent indeed: and this is the second sting of the

158 A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man