VIII. Fourth plague: burning desire for consummated felicity with the resumed body; Bernard; souls under the altar
VIII. The last plague of the soul in death is that which implants in her a certain burning — painless yet — desire of felicity to be consummated together with the resumed body. Hence Bernard in the treatise On Loving God: The freed souls, he says, even of the saints are bound to bodies — if not by life or sense, certainly by natural affection — so that without these they neither will nor are able to be consummated. And in sermon 4 on the feast of the saints: There will not be integral beatitude until the whole human being is cared for. Nor indeed is this privation to be lightly estimated. Tertullian seems to acknowledge a certain great punishment in it at the end of On the Soul: In sum, he says, when we understand by that prison which the Gospel demonstrates the inferi, and interpret the last farthing — a little also deferred by the delay of the resurrection — as to be paid there: no one will doubt that the soul pays something among the inferi, the fullness of the resurrection through the flesh also being safe.
And indeed their desire toward bodies is vehement. Therefore in the Apocalypse they are even introduced crying under the altar, concerning which Gregory in the Moral Exposition on Job chapter 1, book 2, chapter 4: What is it to say that souls petition for vengeance, except to desire the last day of judgment and the resurrection of extinguished bodies? For their great cry is a great desire. And Bernard in sermon 3 on Palm Sunday: Those who die in the Lord rest from labor, but they do not meanwhile rest from crying. Finally under the throne of God the souls of the slain cry, because although they have nothing that molests, they do not yet have what delights, until the resurrection follows rest, until Passover follows the sabbath.
Latin
VIII. Ultima animae in morte plaga est, quae illi aestuans quoddam, anodon absque dolore tamen, desiderium infigit, felicitatis una cum resumto corpore consummandae. Hinc Bernhardus de concept. s. de diligendo Deo: Animae solutae, inquit, etiam sanctorum ligatae corporibus sunt, etsi non vita vel sensu, certe affectu naturali, ita ut absque his nec velint nec valeant consummari. Et serm. 4. in fest. sanct. Non erit integra beatitudo, donec integer homo cuidetur. Neque sane leviter de hac privatione censendum est. Magnam quandam in ea poenam Tertullianus agnoscere videtur lib. de anima in fine. In summa, inquiens, cum carcerem illum quem Euangelium demonstrat, inferos intelligimus, & novissimum quadrantem modicum quoque dilatum mora resurrectionis illic luendum interpretamur: nemo dubitabit animam aliquid pensare penes inferos, salva resurrectionis plenitudine per carnem quoque. Atque sane, vehemens earum ad corpora desiderium est. Ideo in Apocalypsi sub altari etiam clamantes introducuntur, de quo Gregorius expos. moral. in cap. 1. Jobi lib. 2. cap. 4. Quid est animas vindictae petitionem dicere, nisi diem extremum judicii & resurrectionem extinctorum corporum desiderare? Magnus quippe earum clamor, magnum est desiderium. Et Bernhardus serm. 3. domin. de ramis palmarum: A labore quiescunt, qui in Domino moriuntur, sed non quiescunt interim a clamore. Denique sub throno Dei clamant animae occisorum, quia, etsi nihil habent quod molestet, nondum tamen habent quod delectet, donec requiem resurrectio, donec sabbatum pascha sequatur.