3. What will our notion of this earth be, when we are forced to quit it? Let us now take advice from death - it is a faithful counsellor - it will not deceive us. What will become of this beauty, this money, this pleasure, this honour? What will be our thoughts of them at the hour of death? In our lifetime, appearances often deceive us; but, at our death, we shall see things as they really are. Man, whilst alive, esteems the world - man, when dying, despises it. But which should we reasonably believe - man living, or man at the point of death? Ah, how trifling will the world appear by the light of that torch which faintly glimmers near the bed of death! but, alas, it will then be no longer time to undeceive ourselves.
[Think seriously on what you chiefly apprehend, were you this moment to die, and regulate it immediately. Accustom yourself to perform every action as if you were to die instantly after. Above all things, observe this practice in the use of the sacraments.]
" Death and I are divided but by a single step ” ( 1 Kings xx. ).
“ There is no to-morrow for a Christian ” ( Tertullian ).
FIFTH DAY: ON THE LAST JUDGMENT.
1. I must one day appear before the tribunal of Jesus Christ, to be there judged for the good or the evil I shall have done. There is nothing more formal or express in the Gospel than this truth: I believe it as firmly as if the last trumpet had already sounded to call up all the dead to judgment.
2. What shall we say at the sight of so many bad thoughts, of so many criminal actions, of so many graces despised! Oh, what a terrible day is the day of God's wrath!--where the in most recesses of the heart shall be openly exposed; where every fault shall be strictly examined. If the just themselves shall be hardly found just, what will become of unhappy sinners!
3. What sentence must an impenitent sinner expect from an offended and inexorable God? O, tremendous condemnation! Depart, ye accursed, &c. Alas! where shall those miserable wretches go, to whom you thus give your malediction? To what part of the world shall they retire when they withdraw from you? Where can there be so miserable a dwelling? To be banished the presence of God! to be accursed of God! O, what a shocking destiny!
[ Imagine yourself now before the tribunal of Christ. What are you most ashamed of at this very moment? Reflect seriously on it, and remember that all your secret sins shall be exposed at the day of Judgment, if you do not here efface them by a sincere repentance.]
“ Who shall be able to stand before the face of his wrath" (Nahum i. ) .
“ Woe even to the praiseworthy of life, if without meroy, O God! thou shalt examine it” ( St. Augustine).
SIXTH DAY: ON HELL.
1. How great would be our horror if the shrieks of the damned, if their groans and blasphemies could reach us! They roar like wild beasts - they accuse themselves of their sins - they
