Whether Hope Is in the Damned?
Objection 1: It would seem that there is hope in the damned. For the
devil is damned and prince of the damned, according to Matt. 25:41:
"Depart . . . you cursed, into everlasting fire, which was prepared
for the devil and his angels." But the devil has hope, according to
Job 40:28, "Behold his hope shall fail him." Therefore it seems that
the damned have hope.
Obj. 2: Further, just as faith is either living or dead, so is hope.
But lifeless faith can be in the devils and the damned, according to
James 2:19: "The devils . . . believe and tremble." Therefore it
seems that lifeless hope also can be in the damned.
Obj. 3: Further, after death there accrues to man no merit or demerit
that he had not before, according to Eccles. 11:3, "If the tree fall
to the south, or to the north, in what place soever it shall fall,
there shall it be." Now many who are damned, in this life hoped and
never despaired. Therefore they will hope in the future life also.
_On the contrary,_ Hope causes joy, according to Rom. 12:12,
"Rejoicing in hope." Now the damned have no joy, but sorrow and
grief, according to Isa. 65:14, "My servants shall praise for
joyfulness of heart, and you shall cry for sorrow of heart, and shall
howl for grief of spirit." Therefore no hope is in the damned.
_I answer that,_ Just as it is a condition of happiness that the will
should find rest therein, so is it a condition of punishment, that
what is inflicted in punishment, should go against the will. Now that
which is not known can neither be restful nor repugnant to the will:
wherefore Augustine says (Gen. ad lit. xi, 17) that the angels could
not be perfectly happy in their first state before their
confirmation, or unhappy before their fall, since they had no
foreknowledge of what would happen to them. For perfect and true
happiness requires that one should be certain of being happy for
ever, else the will would not rest.
In like manner, since the everlastingness of damnation is a necessary
condition of the punishment of the damned, it would not be truly
penal unless it went against the will; and this would be impossible
if they were ignorant of the everlastingness of their damnation.
Hence it belongs to the unhappy state of the damned, that they should
know that they cannot by any means escape from damnation and obtain
happiness. Wherefore it is written (Job 15:22): "He believeth not
that he may return from darkness to light." It is, therefore, evident
that they cannot apprehend happiness as a possible good, as neither
can the blessed apprehend it as a future good. Consequently there is
no hope either in the blessed or in the damned. On the other hand,
hope can be in wayfarers, whether of this life or in purgatory,
because in either case they apprehend happiness as a future possible
thing.
Reply Obj. 1: As Gregory says (Moral. xxxiii, 20) this is said of the
devil as regards his members, whose hope will fail utterly: or, if it
be understood of the devil himself, it may refer to the hope whereby
he expects to vanquish the saints, in which sense we read just before
(Job 40:18): "He trusteth that the Jordan may run into his mouth":
this is not, however, the hope of which we are speaking.
Reply Obj. 2: As Augustine says (Enchiridion viii), "faith is about
things, bad or good, past, present, or future, one's own or
another's; whereas hope is only about good things, future and
concerning oneself." Hence it is possible for lifeless faith to be in
the damned, but not hope, since the Divine goods are not for them
future possible things, but far removed from them.
Reply Obj. 3: Lack of hope in the damned does not change their
demerit, as neither does the voiding of hope in the blessed increase
their merit: but both these things are due to the change in their
respective states.
_______________________