body, he seeth Christ put on the cross : the good man to his consolation, the evil man to his confusion, to make him ashamed that he hath lost the fruit of his redemption.
Also the devil bringeth again into a man's, mind that is in point of death specially those sins that he hath done, and was not shriven of, to draw him thereby into despair. But therefore should no man despair in no wise. For though any one man or woman had done as many thefts, or manslaughters, or as many other sins as be drops of water in the sea, and gravel stones in the strand, though he had never done penance for them afore, nor never had been shriven of them before — neither then might have time, for sickness or lack of speech, or shortness of time, to be shriven of them — yet should he never despair; for in such a case very contrition of heart within, with will to be shriven if time sufficed, is sufficient and accepted by God for to save him ever- lastingly: as the Prophet saith in the psalm: Cor CONTRITUM ET HUMILITATUM, DeUS, NON DESPICIES. [Ps. 50:19] Lord God, Thou wilt never despise a contrite heart and a meek. And Exechiel saith also: In quacunque hora conversus furit peccator, etingemuerit, salvus erit. [Ezech. xxxiii. 12.] In what hour that ever it be that the sinful man is sorry inward, and converted from his sins, he shall be saved.
And therefore saint Bernard saith: The pity and mercy of God is more than any wickedness. And Austin, upon John, saith: We should never despair of no man as long as he is in his bodily life, for there
