Four last things


In Christian eschatology, the Four Last Things are Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell, the four last stages of the soul in life and the afterlife. They are often commended as a topic for pious meditation; Saint Philip Neri wrote, "Beginners in religion ought to exercise themselves principally in meditation on the Four Last Things". Traditionally, the sermons preached on the four Sundays of Advent were on the Four Last Things.
The 1909 Catholic Encyclopedia states "The eschatological summary which speaks of the 'four last things' is popular rather than scientific. For systematic treatment it is best to distinguish between individual and universal and cosmic eschatology, including under : death; the particular judgment; heaven, or eternal happiness; purgatory, or the intermediate state; hell, or eternal punishment; and under : the approach of the end of the world; the resurrection of the body; the general judgment; and the final consummation of all things." Pope John Paul II wrote in 1984 that the "judgment" component encompasses both particular judgment and general judgment.

Books

Numerous theologians and Christian apologists have written on the Four Last Things; published accounts include:

16th century and earlier

A Catholic sermon on the Four Last Things features in James Joyce's novel A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man ; a "hellfire" sermon in the Protestant revivalist tradition appears in Stella Gibbons's Cold Comfort Farm.

The four last things

Death

explains that "there are three principal reasons why all sensible people fear death so much: First, because the love of life, the dread of death is inherent in human nature. Secondly, because every rational being is well aware that death is bitter, and the separation of soul and body cannot take place without inexpressible suffering. Thirdly, because no one knows whither he will go after death, or how he will stand in the Day of Judgment."
Or as Alphonsus Liguori wrote in his meditations: "We must die: how awful is the decree! We must die. The sentence is passed: It is appointed for all men once to die. Heb. 9:27"

The Last Judgment

Of the final judgment, Alphonsus Liguori writes that, "the last day is called in Scripture a day of wrath and misery; and such it will be for all those unhappy beings who shall have died in mortal sin; for on that day their most secret crimes will be made manifest to the whole world, and themselves separated from the company of the saints, and condemned to the eternal prison of hell, where they will suffer all the agonies of ever dying yet always remaining alive."

Heaven

Of heaven, Richard Challoner in his famous work Think Well On't writes, " Consider, that if God's justice is so terrible in regard to his enemies, how much more will his mercy, his goodness, his bounty declare itself in favour of his friends! Mercy and goodness are his favourite attributes, in which he most delights: his tender mercies says the royal prophet, Ps. 144. ''are over all his works.''

Hell

writes concerning The nature of hell: "Hell is a perpetual prison, full of fire and of innumerable and very terrible torments, to chastise perpetually such as die in mortal sin. Or, again, hell is an eternal state, wherein sinners, for the punishment of their sins, want all that good which they may desire for their content, and endure all kinds of evils which they may fear for their torment. So that in hell is joined together the privation of all that good which men enjoy in this life and angels in the other, and the presence of all those evils which afflict men in this life and the devils in the other."

Artworks

The Four Last Things are a common theme of artistic and literary works as well as theological works.
WorkTypeCreatorYearNotesRefs
The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last ThingsPaintingHieronymus Boschc.1500
Christ painting the Four Last Things in the Christian HeartEngravingAnton Wierix1585One of 18 copperplate engravings published as Cor Iesu amanti sacrum
"One Thing is Needful, or Serious Meditations upon the Four Last Things"PoemJohn Bunyan1683
The Four Last Things SculptureAnton Neu, based on ideas from the Asam brothers1751Stucco cartouches in the vestibule of Weltenburg Abbey chapel
The Four Last ThingsSculptureJosef Stammelc.1760In Admont Abbey
Novissima PaintingsJosé Gervásio de Sousa Lobo1792–3Originally made for the sacristy of the in Ouro Preto; currently in the in the same city.
Die vier letzten DingeOratorioJoseph Leopold Eybler1810
Die letzten DingeOratorioLouis Spohr1826--
Cantata of the Last Things of ManCantataLadislav Vycpálek1920–22Czech title Kantáta o posledních věcech člověka
The Four Last ThingsPoetry collectionMadeleva Wolff1959Poems with theological themes
No. 18 FilmHarry Everett Smith1990sIntended as his masterwork
"Die vier letzten Dinge "Symphony1996–97For organ and orchestra