and the fear of God; the other insolent, proud, dissolute. Two men meet; one goes regularly to church, to sermons and devotions, the other seldom; the one is resigned to the will of God in poverty, contempt, and adversity; the other lives in splendor, dignity, and superfluity. If we could see the heart, we should find out the different opinions those people form of each other. The vain woman, the tepid man would think: oh, what a simple woman or girl! what a melancholy man! See how abject they are, with their prayer-books always under the arm, the rosary always in the hand; they have no pleasure in life! They should enter religion and not live in the world. I would rather die than lead such a life as they lead! See, thinks the dissolute young man with scorn and contempt, what a stupid fellow that other is! how scrupulous he must be! He never omits going to church; never goes into society; he cannot know anything of the world; he ought to turn hermit. Alas! cries the rich man, how poor and miserable that other is! He has hardly enough bread to eat, all his clothes are on his back! God protect me from such misery! And so on. But the others have their say, too. For shame, they think, that men and women should be so haughty and conceited! How proud and stuck-up they are! How dissolute in their behavior! How vain and scandalous in dress! How inconsiderate in speech, how irreverent in the house of God; how luxurious in eating and drinking; how idle and useless in their mode of life! Are they Christians? Do they ever think of their souls? Do they expect to get to heaven? Thus they mutually reproach each other’s mode of life; just as the queen and the peasant girl found each other’s presence insupportable. Now, which of the two parties is right? Which will gain the victory?
The latter, when on their deathbeds, will acknowledge they were wrong. You who are skilled in the law know very well that if one of two contending parties gives way voluntarily to the other the latter gains the case, and the suit is at an end even before the judge pronounces sentence. Wait now, and see which of the parties in question will be the first to yield. “When he shall sleep, he shall open his eyes.” When they come to the point of death their eyes will be opened. Then will the dissolute young man moan and sigh, if not in words, at least with the heart, if so much time shall be given him: “Therefore we have erred.”[1] Ah, what a mistake I have made! In what a wretched, immoral, godless manner I have spent my young years! What will now be-
- ↑ Ergo erravimus.—Wis. v. 6.
