ments, our ardour for the world, pleasures, and fortune: and, because it is not certain that we shall die to-day, we live as if we were to live for ever.
Observe, my brethren, that this uncertainty is in effect accompanied with all the circumstances most capable of alarming, or at least engaging the attention of a prudent man, who makes any use of his reason. In the first place, the surprise of that last day you have to dread, is not one of those rare and singular accidents which befal only some unfortunate wretches, and which it is more prudent to disregard than to foresee. In order to be surprised by death, the question at present is not that the thunder should fall upon your heads, that you should be buried under the ruins of your palaces, that you should be swallowed up by the waves, nor many other accidents, whose singularity renders them more terrible, though less dreaded; it is a common evil; not a day passes, without furnishing some examples; almost all men are surprised by death; all see it approach, while they believe it yet at a distance; all say to themselves, like the foolish man in the gospel, " Why should I be afraid? I have many years yet to come/' In this manner have you seen depart, your relations, friends, and almost all those whose death you have witnessed; every instance surprised you; you expected it not so soon; and you endeavoured to account for it by human reasons, such as the imprudence of the patient, or the want of proper advice and medicines; but the only and true reason is, that the hour of the Lord always takes us by surprise.
The earth is like a vast field of battle, where we are every day engaged with the enemy. You have happily escaped to-day; but you have witnessed the fall of many, who, like you, expected to survive: to-morrow you again must enter the lists; and who has told you that fortune, so capricious with regard to others, to you alone will continue favourable? And since you at last must perish there, are you prudent in building a fixed and permanent habitation on the very spot, perhaps, intended for your tomb? Place yourselves in any possible situation, there is not a moment but may be your last, and has actually been so to some of your brethren; no brilliant action, but may terminate in the eternal shades of the graves; and Herod is struck in the midst of the servile and foolish applauses of his people: no day set apart for the solemn display of worldly magnificence, but may conclude with your funeral pomp; and Jezebel was precipitated, the very day she had chosen to show herself in her greatest pride and ostentation, from the windows of her palace: no festival but may be the feast of death; and Belshazzar expired in the midst of a sumptuous banquet: no repose but may conduct you to an everlasting sleep: and Holofernes, in the heart of his army, and conqueror of so many kingdoms and provinces, fell under the stroke of a simple Jewish woman: no disease, but may be the fatal term of your course; and every day you see the slightest complaints deceive the opinions of the most skilful and the expectations of the patient, and
