of any other impressions than those of the judgments and vengeance
of God. Talk to them of his greatness, of his perfections, of his
benefits, or even of his rewards, and they will hardly listen to
you; and, if they are prevailed upon to pay some attention and
respect to your words, they will sound in their ears, but not reach
their hearts.... Therefore, to move them, to stir them up, to
awaken them from the lethargic sleep with which they are
overwhelmed, the thunder of divine wrath and the decree that
condemns them to eternal flames must be dinned into their ears:
"Depart from me, ye accursed, into everlasting fire" (Matt. XXV.).
Make them consider attentively, and represent to them with all the
force of grace, the consequences and horror of this word
"eternal."...

It is not imagination, it is pure reason and intelligence, that now in
Bourdaloue goes about the business of impressing the thought of the
dreadfulness of an eternity of woe. The effect produced is not that of
the lightning-flash suddenly revealing the jaws agape of an unfathomable
abyss directly before you. It is rather that of steady, intolerable
pressure gradually applied to crush, to annihilate, the soul:--

...Struck with horror at so doleful a destiny, I apply to this
eternity all the powers of my mind; I examine and scrutinize it in
all its parts; and I survey, as it were, its whole dimensions.
Moreover, to express it in more lively colors, and to represent it
in my mind more conformably to the senses and the human
understanding, I borrow comparisons from the Fathers of the Church,
and I make, if I may so speak, the same computations. I figure to
myself all the stars of the firmament; to this innumerable
multitude I add all the drops of water in the bosom of the ocean;
and if this be not enough, I reckon, or at least endeavor to
reckon, all the grains of sand on its shore. Then I interrogate
myself, I reason with myself, and I put to myself the question--If
I had for as many ages, and a thousand times as many, undergone
torments in that glowing fire which is kindled by the breath of the
Lord in his anger to take eternal vengeance, would eternity be at
an end? No; and why? Because it is eternity, and eternity is
endless. To number up the stars that shine in the heavens, to count
the drops of water