of the Almighty in the valley of Josaphat. The day of death will be for each one the day of his particular judgment, in which he shall appear before the same Judge and hear final sentence pronounced on him. Is death then so very far away from us? Can we foretell the time in which we shall die? May it not be this very day? Ah, how stupid we are and senseless in what concerns our eternal salvation! Why do we not stir ourselves now before it is too late, and make use of the faithful service and in tercession that Christ, our well-meaning Friend, Advocate, and Arbiter with the angry God has promised in our behalf, if we are only firmly resolved to avoid sin and amend our lives? Why do we not begin at once to love that most amiable Lover of our souls?
Conclusion and exhortation to fear the judgment. Sinners! I pity you, if more deaf than the dead, who will rise from their graves at the sound of the last trumpet, you stop your ears to my words, or rather to the words that God speaks to you by my mouth, and if in spite of the consideration of the final catastrophe which shall cause all nature to shudder you still remain in your old sins; if you refuse now to hearken to my words, which are intended only for your good and to induce you to amend your lives, you must hereafter hear another voice that of your Saviour—who will speak to you of nothing but your eternal reprobation and damnation! Christ Jesus, who art now our faithful Advocate and loving Saviour, and who wilt be hereafter the Judge of the living and the dead, I beg of Thee with the Prophet David in the name of all here present, “Pierce Thou my flesh with Thy fear,”[1] so that I may dread Thy judgments! Pierce my flesh, I say, because it is not enough merely to remember this fear now and then, or to speak of it and then forget it. Penetrate my whole body with this salutary fear! Pierce my eyes with it, that they may never look at impure objects; my tongue, that it may never sin by cursing, uncharitable talk, or unchaste discourse; my ears, that they may never hear detraction; my hands, that they may never be stretched out to take what I have no right to, or to indulge in unlawful actions. Pierce my whole flesh with Thy fear that it may lose its wantonness! And pierce my heart too, that it may never wilfully give admission to sinful thoughts, but rather love Thee with all its strength, and that I may thus one day hear from Thy lips the words: “Come, ye blessed, possess the kingdom prepared for you!” Amen.
- ↑ Confige timore tuo carnes meas.—Ps. cxviii. 120.
