POINT II.
1. Secondly, I am to consider that God our Lord, seeing the forgetfulness and pride of Adam, condemned him to the sentence of death, and to return into the dust of which he was formed, wherein principally He intended three ends for his good and ours.
i. To chastise his sin with it, and that we ail might perceive how grievous an evil sin is, seeing it is sufficient to destroy and to turn into dust so beautiful and rich a frame as is man; for if Adam had not sinned he had not died, but had been translated into heaven in body and soul with all his integrity and perfection. But through his sin the soul is forced to abandon the body, and the body is dissolved or unwalled and turned into small dust, according to that of the apostle, " By one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death." [1]
ii. The second end was that the memory of death, and that we are to return to dust, might be a most effectual medicine for our pride, seeing it was not sufficient to humble us that He had made us of dust. So that the dust and dirt of the earth which I see and feel is not only a signal to recall to my remembrance the original from whence I began, but also the end in which I am to stay; and when I behold it I should imagine that it is crying out and saying to me, " Remember thou art to return to earth and dust, and that like me thou shalt be trampled and trodden upon." Then "why" art thou " proud ?" [2] Thou art now flesh, thou shalt shortly be dust; wherefore art thou puffed up?
Colloquy. — O Father of mercy, I give Thee thanks that with the chastisement of my sin Thou hast made a medicine for my pride! Grant me that I may not be deaf to these cries that dust giveth me, that the
