purified from your crimes, you at least feel contrition for them; that you come to lament them at the foot of the altar; and that your confusion and the sincere regret of your faults are now to begin here your justification and your innocence.
If, sinners, it is your desires toward a more Christian life which alone can authorize your appearing in this holy place; and if you come not here to lament over your crimes, but bring with you, even to the foot of the altar, the will, and the actual and rooted affection for them, the church, it is true, who sees not, nor judges the heart, excludes you not from these sacred walls; but God invisibly rejecteth you. In his eyes you are accursed and excommunicated, and have no right in the altar or in the sacrifices; you are one who comes to stain, by your sole presence, the sanctity of the awful mysteries, to seat yourself in a place where you have no right to be seated, and from whence the angel of the Lord, who watches at the gate of the temple, invisibly chases you, as he formerly chased the first sinner from that place of innocence and of sanctity which the Lord sanctified with his presence.
And, in effect, to feel guilty of the most shameful crimes, and to come to appear here in the most holy place of the earth; to come to appear before God, without being, at least, touched with shame and sorrow, without thinking, at least, upon the means of quitting so deplorable a situation, without at least wishing it, and forming some sentiments of religion; to bring even to the foot of the altar defiled bodies and souls; to force the eyes even of God, as I may say, to familiarize themselves with guilt, without at least confessing to him the sorrow of thus appearing before him, covered with shame and reproach, and saying to him, like Peter, * Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful man;" or, like the prophet, " Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities," that I may be worthy of appearing here in thy presence, — is to profane the temple of God, to insult his glory and majesty, and the sanctity of his mysteries.
For, my dear hearer, be whom ye may who come to assist here, you come to offer up spiritually with the priest the awful sacrifice: you come to present to God the blood of his Son, as the propitiation of your sins: you come to appease his justice, through the dignity and the excellence of these holy offerings; and to represent to him the claim which you have upon his mercies, ever since the blood of his Son hath purified you; and that you no longer form, in one sense, with him, but one same priest and one same victim. Now, when you appear with a hardened and corrupted heart, without any sentiment of faith, or any desire of amendment, you disavow the ministry of the priest who offers in your stead: you disavow the prayers he sends up to the Lord, in which, through the mouth of the priest, you entreat him to cast his propitious looks on these holy offerings which are upon the altar, and to accept of them as the price of the abolition of your crimes: you even insult the love of Jesus Christ himself, who renews the grand object of your redemption, and who presents you to his Father as a portion
