have more common sense; think of what you are doing! Open your mouth and disclose your sins candidly in a much more merciful tribunal: in the holy sacrament of penance, and repent of your wickedness! Hear what St. John Chrysostom says: Your sins are written in the great account-book; your tears are like the sponge, and with them you can wash all the black record away, so that the book will be found clear and stainless.[1] O desirable penance, says St. Bernard, and good the judgment that will withdraw and hide me from the strict justice of God![2] according to the words of St. Paul: “But if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.”[3] But we, my dear brethren,—and this is the chief part of this meditation,—shall henceforth have a still greater horror of all sin, and shall fear nothing more than to offend God deliberately, lest that intolerable shame should fall to our lot on the last day; and now we shall practise the works of Christian humility, justice, and mercy, that we may then be exalted to eternal honor and glory. Amen.
Another introduction to the same sermon for the second Sunday of Advent.
Text.
Ait illi: Tu es qui venturus es?—Matt. xi. 3.
“He said to Him: Art Thou He that art to come?”
Introduction.
What answer does Christ make to this question? Nothing more than to say: “Go and relate to John what you have heard and seen;” from My works he shall soon know who I am. My dear brethren, the same question shall one day be put to us by the elect, when the angel shall sound the trumpet to call the dead from their graves before the tribunal of the Almighty. Art thou he that art to come with us on the right hand, or is thy place on the left among the demons? Art thou to rejoice with us forever in heaven, or to burn with the reprobate in hell? Alas for us if our works do not give us a favorable answer, etc. Continues as above.
