This page needs to be proofread.
46
WEDNESDAY.
any fruit of correction, to have Thy rod laid on us and yet to retain our sins! What remains to be done unto a soul that after chastening returns to its sins!
And now not for the sick only, but for those whose sickness is unto death, for the dying, most merciful Saviour, for the dying do I come before Thee with most anxious prayer. For them I pour out my soul with an intensity of desire. By Thine own feeling of the pains of death, by Thine own experience of the mystery of death, by Thine own former pangs, have mercy upon them, both now and in the actual hour of death.
O Thou most gracious and most pitiful Lord, send the Holy Ghost the Comforter to strengthen and support those who are at the point to die, whose spirits are about to be loosed from their earthly house. Prepare them for the act of death; succour them in this their greatest need; enable them to resign themselves into Thy hands with perfect faith in Thy great mercy. Ease their bodily pains, that their souls may have power to pray. Let not the torment of the flesh distract and engross their souls. Let not Satan have power over them, nor his angels. Now, O Lord, now they need Thy presence. Thy strength,