‘No rest for the wicked has a literal meaning – that the wicked shall be tormented in Hell.

The phrase was originally expressed as ‘no peace for the wicked’ and refers to the eternal torment of Hell that awaited sinners. Not surprisingly, the it derives from the Bible – Isaiah 57. The expression was first printed in English in Miles Coverdale’s Bible, 1535:

20: But the wicked are like the raginge see, that ca not rest, whose water fometh with the myre & grauel.
21 Eueso ye wicked haue no peace, saieth my God.