that mercy which caused God to clothe Himself in human flesh, to endure innumerable sufferings and humiliations, to take upon Himself the transgressions of the world, and for these transgressions to expire as a malefactor on an infamous gibbet? God is infinite in all His attributes; and, therefore, the justice with which He will punish man will equal the boundless mercy with which He redeemed him.
When God first came upon earth there was nothing in us to excite His mercy; but at His second coming our every sin will be an additional reason for Him to exercise His justice. Judge, therefore, how terrible it will be. "At His second coming," says St. Bernard, "God will be as inflexible and as rigorous in punishing as at His first coming He was patient and merciful in forgiving. There is now no sinner living who is cut off from His reconciliation; but in the day of His justice none will be received." These words of St. Bernard are confirmed by the royal prophet, who tells us: "Our God is the God of salvation; and of the Lord, of the Lord are the issues from death. But God shall break the heads of His enemies; the hairy crown of them that walk on in their sins."[1] Behold, then, how great is God's mercy to those who are converted to Him, and how great is the rigor with which He punishes obdurate sinners.
The same truth is manifested by God's patience with the world, and with the vices and disorders of every sinner in particular. How
- ↑ Ps. lxvii. 21, 22.
