of pain into sorrow, into an invincible disquietude, collecting all ite thoughts only to contemplate its misery. Nothing can be thought of but its malady; restlessness trembling, burning heats, perspirations, faintings, and perpetually increasing disquietness. Where is then the reason of the man? Would you allow him in this state to decide on your smallest affairs? Would you find in him sense enough to judge of them with propriety? How then can he have enough to decide with propriety on the affairs of his soul? Besides the burden of the disease, there is another burden, that of the remedies. He is recommended to rest, sleep, and absence from whatever can disquiet him. Can he think seriously on his sins, without a cruel inquietude? Dispirited, disgusted with every thing, interrupted continually by the painful operations of the surgeons-not having sense enough to be persuaded that the love of life ought to overcome his disgust-can he have sufficient strength of mind to persuade himself that the love of his salvation ought to predominate over the love of his sin! Beside the burden of his malady, and that of the remedies, there is another burden, that of his affairs. A family in confusion, the heirs embroiled, accounts to settle, debts to pay; offices and employ. ments in danger; relations and friends in tears. All the world is fixing its eyes upon him; whatever arrests his attention seems to speak to him on business. And how can he think only on those affairs about which he has never thought before? Behold that man of importance who has never had time during so many years to study his own heart, and to scrutinize his conscience. Why? sometimes it was a load of trouble, sometimes a weight of infirmities, and sometimes a press of business, which rendered him incapable of application. In each of these embarrassments, taken separately, he never found himself sufficiently free, nor his reason sufficiently in exercise, to think upon God. Imagine this to be your case. How then can any alteration take place, my dear brother? How will your mind be prepared when all these embarrassments together shall overwhelm you at death? When all the parts of your frame shall say to you, by the exhaustion of your strength-think of us. When your domestics shall say to you, by their feebly-acknowl edged and ill-requited services-think of us. When your affairs shall say to you, by the disorder into which you have thrown themthink of us. When your creditors shall say to you, at the sight of their goods confounded with yours-think of us. When those persons who are dear to you shall say, by their sighs, alas! for the last time-think of us. Torn on every side, distracted by so many mouth, although in spite of Himself, employs that to destroy them which was designed for their salvation. But, Christians, to speak with the Holy Spirit, this has happened to the Jews only as a figure; it is only the shadow of the fearful curses of which the abuse of the merits and passion of the Son of God must be to us the source and the measure. I will explain myself. What do we, my dear hearers, when borne away by the immoderate desires of our hearts to a sin against which our consciences protest? And what do we, when, possessed of the spirit of the world, we resist a grace which solicits us, which presses us to obey God? Without thinking upon it, and without wishing it, we secretly pronounce the same sentence of death which the Jews pronounced against themselves before Pilate, when they said to him "His blood be upon us." For this grace which we despise, is the price of the blood of Jesus Christ; and the sin that we commit is an actual profanation of this very blood. It is, then, as if we were to say to God-"Lord, I clearly see what engagement I make, and I know what risk I run, but rather than not satisfy my own desires, I consent that the blood of Thy Son shall fall upon me. This will be to bear the chastisement of it; but I will indulge my passion; Thou hast a right to draw forth from it a just indignation, but nevertheless I will complete my undertaking." Thus we condemn ourselves. And here, Christians, is one of the essential foundations of this terrible mystery of the eternity of the punishments with which faith threatens us, and against which our reason revolts. We suppose that we can not have any knowledge of it in this life, and we are not aware, says St. Chrysostom, that we find it completely in the blood of the Saviour, or rather in our profanation of it every day. For this blood, my brethren, adds this holy doctor, is enough to make eternity, not less frightful, but less incredible. And behold the reason, This blood is of an infinite dignity; it can therefore be avenged only by an infinite punishment. This blood, if we destroy ourselves, will cry eternally against us at the tribunal of God. It will eternally excite the wrath of God against us. This blood, falling upon lost souls, will fix a stain upon them, which shall never be effaced. Their torments must consequently never end. A reprobate in hell will always appear in the eyes of God stained with that blood which he has so basely treated. God will then always abhor him; and, as the aversion of God from His creature is that which makes hell, it must be inferred that hell will be eternal. And in this, O my God, Thou art sovereignly just, sovereignly holy, and worthy of our praise and adoration. It the simple and ignorant! You now renounce your worldly wisdom. Your reasons now then are of no avail! You have now no more scruples in these matters! It is now no longer a dishonor to you to say, with all the Church, I believe! These two words are indeed very powerful to make such a wonderful revolution in your mind in a moment! But if you do believe with an undisguised faith, this is only the disposition of the understanding. What is there of the heart? for it is in the heart that conversion must be consummated. That heart ought to be free, sincere, and firm, which is truly converted: this is absolutely necessary. But the will of a dying sinner, far from being free, is forced; far from being firm, is weak, and always ready to change; far from being sincere, is double and disguised, and counterfeited. What appearance is there of conversion in the heart thus disposed? There is no conversion without liberty. But is the divorce which is made at such a time from sin, free? Is it not really forced? Is it not the effect of fear and necessity? You forsake your sins? You are deceived, says St. Ambrose. Your sins forsake you! You say that you forsake, at least, the occasions and the objects of them. You are wrong, they are the occasions and the objects which forsake you! With what grief do you see them escaping! What would you not do still to recall them! And you boast that you have forsaken them! You say you offer your life to God in expiation for your sins. Imaginary sacrifice! Vain and foolish presumption! It is God who takes your life away from you. You have never dreamed but of life, while there was the least hope of saving it. You have struggled to preserve it even to the last spark. And now you pretend to offer it, and to sacrifice it to God, when it is no longer your own! But suppose the offering to be free, suppose the change to be unconstrained what is its duration? Till death? Ah, would to God that it were! For, without noticing the usual relapses of the greater part of those who escape the danger, how much is to be feared from inconstancy and lightness of heart, even in the moment of death? To how many unforeseen assaults and new temptations is the man then exposed? You have never known how to combat them during life, how then can you repulse them at death? How necessary was it for you in full health to receive supplies of grace when you visited the Church, that sacred place, where you applied to receive them? What was then wanted to recall you to sin? Often nothing else but a recollection, an idea, a sudden return of affection for some detested objects. When in full health, nothing more was requisite to bring conduct and inducing the practice of good works, and let it not fall upon me for my wanderings, my infidelities, my obstinacy, and my impenitence! This, my brethren, is what we ought to ask today from Jesus Christ crucified. It is with these views that we ought to go to the foot of His cross and catch the blood as it flows. He was the Saviour of the Jews as well as of us; but this Saviour, says St. Augustin, the Jews have converted into their judge. Avert from us such an evil! May He who died to save us be our Saviour! May He be our Saviour during all the days of our lives! And may His merits, shed upon us abundantly, lose none of their efficacy in our hands, but be preserved entire by the fruit we produce from them! May He be our Saviour in death! And at the last moment, may the cross be our support, and thus may He consummate the work of our salvation which He has begun! May He be our Saviour in a blessed eternity, where we shall be as much sharers in His glory as we have been in His sufferings! ried itself without any difficulty? You were created to love God; for this is the end of man. You were created to love God, but you have never loved Him in the whole course of your life, and yet you expect to love Him at the moment when you are about to die, and even in that deplorable moment you want aid to love Him! : Poor substitute for a duty necessarily personal! Useless substitute! The love of God on the lips of a minister, only at the moment when it ought to be in the midst of your heart! If this love was there, if it was in your heart, how would it make you feel the evil of sin! how would it make you feel itself! Can a heart love with out feeling it? By what outgushings will not the love of God make itself known in the hearts of penitent saints? To what lengths did not the love of God go in the heart of Saint Paul? He loved God so as to call all the powers of earth, heaven, and hell to be witnesses of his love so as to defy all creatures to separate him from his love! "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ ?" This man says that he is a penitent, Sirs, that is to say that there is nothing that can dispute the first place in his heart with God. That is to say that he no longer loves any thing that is opposed to God, nor more than God, nor like God. There is no conversion unless we have all these preferences for God. And how can we have them, and feel nothing? -and not be able, without being taught, to say to God, "my God, I love Thee?" Ah! Thou wilt then be the only being, O thou God of inexhaustible goodness-Thou wilt be the only being that can be loved, without feeling that we love Thee, and without being able to express it! We may then die, like Christians, in the hope of Thy glory, without ever having exercised the essential act of a Christian during life, and knowing how to exercise it after death! Think, sirs, on the grief of a zealous and sincere minister at the sight of this stupidity in a dying man! Perplexed about what he must do, not daring to deprive him of hope, and seeing no foundation on which to give him encouragement! Fearing lest he should flatter him by too much tenderness, and still more lest he should drive him to despair by too much boldness! Mistrusting equally his pity and his zeal-Ah! if in this embarrassment he could release you from the obligation of loving God-if he could make up for your insensibility by the ardor of his words, and the tenderness of his heart-might not this be acceptable with God? No, this will not do, my dear brother! We must personally believe and personally love. O moments lost forever, in which, during the whole course of your life, you might have loved God, might have learned to love Him, might have accustomed yourself to love |