in alms the sum which I have destined for the poor, tell her on the part of God that in thirty days she will be struck by a sudden death." When the impious widow heard this solemn warning, she had the audacity to treat it as a dream, and persisted in her sacrilegious infidelity to her promise. Thirty days passed and the unfortunate woman, having gone to an upper room in the house, fell through the window and was killed on the spot.
Injustice towards the dead, of which we have just spoken, and fraudulent manoeuvres to escape the obligation of executing their pious legacies, are grievous sins, crimes which merit the eternal punishment of Hell. Unless a sincere confession, and at the same time due restitution be made, this sin will meet its chastisement not in Purgatory but in Hell.
Alas! yes, it is especially in the other life that Divine Justice will punish the guilty usurpers of the property of the dead. Judgment without mercy to him that hath not done mercy, says the Holy Ghost. [1] If these words be true, how rigorous a judgment awaits those whose detestable avarice has left the soul of a parent, a benefactor, for months, years, perhaps even for centuries, in the frightful torments of Purgatory. This crime, as we have said above, is the more grievous, because in many cases these suffrages which the deceased asks for his soul are but disguised restitutions. This fact is in some families but too often overlooked. People find it very convenient to speak of intrigue and clerical avarice. The finest pretexts are made use of to invalidate a last will and testament, which often, perhaps in the majority of cases, involves a necessary restitution. The priest is but a medium in this indispensable act, bound to absolute secrecy by virtue of his sacramental ministry.
Let us explain this more clearly. A dying man has been guilty of some injustice during his life. This is of a more frequent occurrence than we imagine, even in regard to men
- ↑ James ii. 13.
