MEDITATION VIII.
ON THOSE THINGS THAT CAUSE ANGUISH AND AFFLICTION TO A MAN ON THE APPROACH OF DEATH.
Those things that may cause me great affliction and anguish at the hour of death may be reduced to three classes: some past— others present — and others to come. And in order to have the more feeling of this, I should represent that hour to myself as if I were stretched in my bed forsaken by the physicians and without hope of life. This is not difficult to realise, for it is possible that while I am saying, or reading, or thinking on this, there may be remaining to me no more than one day of my life; and seeing that one day must be the last, I may imagine that it is this present day,
POINT I.
First, I will consider the great anguish and affliction which the remembrance of all things that are past will cause me, running through the principal.
1. First, I shall be greatly afflicted with the remembrance of my past sins, and all the liberties, impurities, revenge, ambition, and covetousness that I have committed in the course of my life; also, of the slackness in the service of Almighty God, the negligences and omissions, and all the rest of my sins that have not been much bewailed and amended. I should imagine that there is at that instant an army made up of all my sins, as of " bulls," " lions," " tigers," [1] and other savage beasts, that rend in pieces my heart, or like an army of terrible serpents, that gnaw and bite my conscience, and neither the riches nor pleasures that I enjoyed can avail me to close up their cruel mouths; for the delight of sin being past there remains nothing but
- ↑ Ps. xxi. 13.
