Let us now pass from the dining hall to the bedchamber, or the beds. The saints shall rejoice in glory, says David: they shall be joyful in their beds (Ps. 149). This bed is nothing else than the complete repose of the blessed, and that sleep of which the same David sings in another place: When He shall give sleep to His beloved: behold the inheritance of the Lord (Ps. 126). Of which rest he says in another place: In peace in the selfsame I will sleep, and I will rest (Ps. 4). Finally, this is that rest of which it was said to St. John: Write: Blessed are the dead, who die in the Lord. From henceforth now, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; for their works follow them (Rev. 14). It is a great good, and one proper to the blessed. For in this life no one at all is free from toil; and those who seem to be at rest, as nobles and the rich, are beset by yet greater anxieties. For not without cause did our Lord compare riches to thorns, in the parable of the sower (Matt. 13). And Job says: The life of man upon earth is a warfare (Job 7). And one of his companions: Man, he says, is born to labour, and the bird to fly. And Sirach: A great occupation, he says, is created for all men, and a heavy yoke is upon the children of Adam, from the day of their coming out of their mother's womb until the day of their burial into the mother of all; their thoughts, and fears of the heart, the imagining of expectation, and the day of the end, from him who sits upon a glorious throne down to him who is humbled in earth and ashes; from him who wears purple and bears a crown, to him who is covered with rough linen (Sir. 40). Thus far Sirach, wherein he teaches most beautifully that no mortal at any time has a share in rest. I will briefly explain this passage, so that all may understand how highly that sleep — that is, the rest of the blessed — ought to be prized. A great occupation, he says, is created for all men, and a heavy yoke is upon the children of Adam. Occupation is opposed to rest; but because many are occupied in pleasant things — in hunting, in laughter, in song, in dancing — he adds, And a heavy yoke, to show that he is speaking of a laborious and troublesome occupation, in which no one delights and which all men shun. And this most troublesome occupation he says was created for men — that is, attached and appointed to man from his very creation as an indivisible and inseparable companion. Which he explains, lest anyone should fail to understand, saying: From the day of their coming out of their mother's womb, until the day of their burial into the mother of all. And so it has gone more gently with oxen, which bear the heavy yoke by day and rest by night, than with men, who are forced to bear the heavy yoke day and night. Then he briefly touches part of the troublesome occupations that press upon the necks of mortals like a very heavy yoke: thoughts, and fears of the heart, the imagining of expectation, and the day of the end. The first part of the troublesome occupation is the thought of things to come: for a man is ever anxious about the morrow, and says within himself: What will come after this? Shall we lose even that little good which we enjoy? From these springs a continual fear of heart, which suffers not a man to rest. And this thought, together with its offspring, which is fear, is twofold: the one which the mind fashions for itself; the other which is necessary and which no one can escape. Of the former he says, The imagining of expectation; of the latter, The day of the end.
Man devises — that is, fashions for himself — various expectations of things to come, which torment no less than if they were certainly to come. But the thought and fear of death, which he calls the day of the end, torments most of all; for all await it with such fear that the Apostle, writing to the Hebrews, calls it a continual bondage: since the expectation of death turns bitter all the delights of this life (Heb. 2). Finally, Sirach adds that this laborious occupation is so common to all the children of Adam that it reaches all men, from the first to the last: from him who sits aloft upon a throne, and wears a crown, and is clad in purple, down to him who lies on the ground and is clothed in rough linen.
And in all these things men, since Adam's sin, are more unhappy than all the beasts: for the beasts live without fear, are not anxious about the morrow, and neither remember past toil nor are anguished by the expectation of things to come. And therefore the wise Sirach said that this yoke is upon the children of Adam, both to exclude the beasts, which are free from this yoke, and to show that the cause of this misery was the sin of the first man.
Most wretched, however, is the life of those who do not aspire to the heavenly house, for they will find far worse in hell. For in this life no one is free from toil, yet it is toil joined with some consolation; but after this life, in hell, there is toil and pain without consolation or rest; only in the blessed house of God is there rest without any toil, and consolation without any pain. Rightly, therefore, does the Prophet sing: The saints shall rejoice in glory, they shall be joyful in their beds (Ps. 149); for they shall not rest like sleepers, who do not feel their rest, but shall rest with great exultation, knowing and acknowledging with eternal thanksgiving the boon of a most blessed repose, most free from all toil, pain, fear, trouble, and turmoil. Indeed, if there were nothing else in the house of the Lord but this everlasting rest, would it not be worth purchasing with all the toils of this life? And if in hell there were no other torment but an everlasting and restless watching, would it not be worth redeeming with all the prayers and tears of this life, by day and by night? For surely, as sweet as it will be for the blessed, at their departure from this world, to see the end of toil and pain, so bitter will it be for the wicked, at a like departure, to discern that no rest from toil and pain is henceforth to be hoped for. Death is said to be the last of terrible things; and yet, because death seems to hold some rest, therefore those most wretched men who shall go down into hell shall seek death, and shall not find it; and they shall desire to die, and death shall fly from them (Rev. 9). Thus the want of all rest will be judged a heavier evil than the last of terrible things itself. And yet so great is the blindness of mortals in this world that they count it as nothing to lose everlasting rest, and to go down to that place where the torments admit no rest at all.