salvation, is a consideration which, besides animating the faithful to the observance of his commandments, must call forth the expression of their grateful homage in return for his beneficent condescension. Hence the Sacred Scriptures, in more passages than one, setting forth this invaluable blessing, admonish us to know our own dignity, and to appreciate the divine bounty: "This," says Moses, "is your wisdom and understanding in the sight of nations, that hearing all these precepts they may say: behold a wise and understanding people, a great nation; " [1] " He hath not done in like manner to every nation;" says the royal psalmist, " and his judgments he hath not made manifest to them." [2]
The circumstances which accompanied the promulgation of the Law, as recorded in the Sacred Volumes, also demand the attention of the pastor; they are well calculated to convey to the minds of the faithful an idea of the piety and humility with which they should receive and reverence a Law delivered by God himself. Three days previous to its promulgation, was announced to the people the divine command, to wash their garments, to abstain from conjugal intercourse, in order that they may be more holy and better prepared to receive the Law, and on the third day to be in readiness to hear its awful announcement. When they had reached the mountain from which the Lord was to deliver the Law by Moses, Moses alone was commanded to ascend; and the Lord descending from on high with great majesty, filling the mount with thunder and lightning, with fire and dense clouds; spoke to Moses, and delivered to him the Law. [3] In this the divine wisdom had solely for object to admonish us to receive his Law with pure and humble minds, and to impress the salutary truth, that over the neglect of his commands impend the heaviest chastisements of the divine justice.
The pastor will also teach that the commandments of God are not difficult of observance, as these words of St. Augustine are alone sufficient to show: " How, I ask, is it said to be impossible for man to love - to love, I say, a beneficent Creator, a most loving Father, and also, in the persons of his brethren, to love his own flesh? Yet, [4] he who loveth has fulfilled the Law. " [5] Hence, the Apostle St. John expressly says, that "the commandments of God are not heavy?" [6] for, as St. Bernard observes, "no duty more just could be exacted from man, none that could confer on him a more exalted dignity, none that could contribute more largely to his own interests." [7] Hence in this pious effusion addressed to the Deity himself, St. Augustine expresses his admiration of his infinite bounty: "What," says he, " is man thou wouldst be loved by him? And if he loves thee not, thou threatenest him with heavy punishment - Is it not punishment enough that I love thee not?"
