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All men were dead by sin, and they would have remained dead if the Eternal Father had not sent His Son to restore them to life by His death. But how? what is this? A God to die for man! A God! And who is this man? “Who am I?” says St Bonaventure. “O Lord, why hast Thou loved me so much?” But it is in this that the infinite love of God shines forth. By this hath the charity of God appeared. The Holy Church exclaimed on Holy Saturday, “O wonderful condescension of Thy mercy towards us! O inestimable affection of charity! that Thou mightest redeem a slave, Thou didst deliver up Thy Son.” O immense compassion! O prodigy! O excess of the love of God! to deliver a servant and a sinner from the death that he deserves, His innocent Son is condemned to die. Thou, then, O my God, hast done this that we might live by Jesus Christ. Yes, indeed, it is but meet that we should live for Him, Who has given all His blood and His life for us. My dear Redeemer, in the presence of Thy wounds and of the cross on which I see Thee dead for me, I consecrate to Thee my life and my whole will. Ah, make me all Thine, for from this day forward I seek and desire none but Thee. I love Thee, infinite Goodness, I love Thee, infinite Love; while I live may I always repeat, My God, I love Thee, I love Thee; let my last words in death be, My God, I love Thee, I love Thee!
Consider that you are dust, and to dust you will return. The day will come when you will die and rot in a place where worms shall be thy covering. (Is 14:11) The same fate awaits all, high and low, the prince and the peasant. As soon as the soul will have left the body, with the last gasp it will go into eternity and the body will return to dust. Thou shalt take away their breath and they shall return to their dust. (Ps 103:29) Picture to yourself a person who has recently expired. Behold that corpse lying on the bed, the head fallen on the chest, the hair disordered and bathed in the sweat of death, the eyes sunken, the cheeks hollow, the face of an ashy hue, the tongue and the lips the colour of lead, the body cold and heavy. The beholders grow pale and tremble. How many at the sight of a deceased parent or friend have changed their life and left the world! But still more horrible is it when the body begins to decay. Twenty-four hours have not elapsed since the death of that youth, and an offensive odour is already perceptible. The windows must be opened, and incense must be burnt, and haste be made to transfer the body to the church and to bury it, that the whole house may not be infected. “And if,” says an author, “that body has belonged to one of the great or the rich ones of the earth, it will only send forth a more intolerable stench.” Behold to what that proud, that voluptuous man is come! The favourite, the desired one of society, now become the horror and the abomination of all who behold him. His relations hasten to remove him from the house, and people are hired to bear him away, that, enclosed in a coffin, they may cast him into a grave. Formerly he was renowned for his talents, his elegance, his graceful manners, and his wit; but no sooner is he dead than he is forgotten. Their memory hath perished with a noise. (Ps 9:7) On hearing the news of his death, some say that he was an honour to his family; others, he has provided well for his family; others grieve because the departed had done them some service; some rejoice because his death brings some advantage to them. However, in a short time no one will name him any more; and even from the very first his dearest friends will not hear him mentioned, that their grief may not be renewed. In the visits of condolence other things are talked of; and if anyone should chance to allude to the departed, the relations exclaim, “For mercy’s sake, never name him to me!” Consider that, as you have done at the death of your friends and relations, so others will do by you. The living appear upon the stage to occupy the wealth and the places of the dead, and of the dead little or no esteem or mention is any more made. At first the relations are afflicted for some days; but they quickly console themselves with that share of property which falls to them, so that in a short time they will rejoice at your death, and in that very room where you have breathed forth your soul, and have been judged by Jesus Christ, they will dance, eat, play and laugh as before. And your soul, where will it then be? O Jesus, my Redeemer, I return Thee thanks for not having taken me out of this life whilst I was Thy enemy. How many years have passed since I deserved to be in hell! Had I died on such a day, or on such a night, what would have become of me for all eternity? My God, I return Thee thanks. I accept of death as a satisfaction or my sins, and I accept of it the manner in which it may please Thee to send it to me; but since Thou hast waited for me until now, oh, wait for me yet a little longer. Suffer me, therefore, that I may lament my sorrow a little. (Job 10:20) Give me time to weep over my offences against Thee, before Thou comest to judge me. I will no longer resist Thy calls. Who knows but these words which I have just read are Thy last call to me? I acknowledge that I do not deserve mercy: Thou hast pardoned me so often, and I have again ungratefully offended Thee. A contrite and humble heart, O God, Thou wilt not despite. (Ps 4:19) Ah, Lord, since Thou canst not despise a humble and penitent heart, behold the traitor who, humbled and repentant, has recourse to Thee. Cast me not away from Thy face. (Ps 50:13) Thou hast said, Him that cometh to Me I will not cast out. (Jn 6:37) It is true that I have offended Thee more than others, because I have been favoured more than others with light and grace; but the Blood Thou hast shed for me gives me courage, and proffers pardon to me if I repent. Yes, O my Sovereign Good, I do repent with my whole soul for having insulted Thee. Pardon me, and give me grace to love Thee for the future. I have long enough offended Thee. As for the remainder of my life, no, my Jesus, I will not spend it in offending Thee; I will spend it wholly in weeping over the displeasure I have given Thee, and in loving Thee with all my heart, O God, worthy of infinite love. O Mary, my hope, pray to Jesus for me.†
That you may see more clearly what you are, O Christian soul, follow the advice of St Chrysostom: “Go to the grave; contemplate dust, ashes, worms, and sigh.” Behold how that corpse first turns yellow and then black. Afterwards, the entire body is covered with a white, disgusting mould; then comes forth a clammy, fetid slime which flows to the earth. In that putrid mass is generated a great multitude of worms, which feed on the flesh. Rats come to feast on the body; some attack it on the outside; others enter into the mouth and bowels. The cheeks, the lips, and the hair fall off. The ribs are first laid bare, and the arms and the legs. The worms, after having consumed all the flesh, devour one another; and, in the end, nothing remains but a fetid skeleton, which in the course of time falls to pieces; the bones separate from one another and the head separates from the body. “They became like the chaff of a summer’s threshing-floor, and they were carried away by the wind.” [Daniel II, 35] Behold what man is: he is a little dust on the threshing-floor, which is blown away by the wind. Behold a young nobleman, who was called the life and soul of conversation; where is he now? Enter into his apartment; he is no longer there. If you look for his bed, his robes, or his armour, you will find that they have passed into the hands of others. If you wish to see him, turn to the grave, where he is changed into corruption and withered bones. O God! that body, pampered with so many delicacies, clothed with so much pomp, and attended by so many servants, to what is it now reduced? O ye saints! who knew how to mortify your bodies for the love of that God whom alone you loved on this earth, you well understood the end of all human greatness, of all earthly delights; now your bones are honoured as sacred relics, and preserved in shrines of gold, and your souls are happy in the enjoyment of God, expecting the last day, on which your bodies shall be made partners of your glory, as they have been partakers of your cross in this life. The true love for the body consists in treating it here with rigour and contempt, that it may be happy for eternity; and in refusing it all pleasures which might make it miserable forever. Behold, then, O my God, to what my body, by which I have so much offended Thee, must be reduced! To worms and rottenness. This does not afflict me; on the contrary, I rejoice that this flesh of mine, which has made me lose Thee, my Sovereign Good, will one day rot and be consumed. What grieves me is, that, to indulge in these wretched pleasures, I have given so much displeasure to Thee. But I will not despair of Thy mercy. Thou hast waited for me in order to pardon me. “The Lord waiteth, that He may have mercy on you.” [Isaias XXX, 18] Thou wilt forgive me if I repent. O Infinite Goodness, I repent with my whole heart of having despised Thee. I will say, with St Catherine of Genoa, “My Jesus, no more sins! No more sins!” I will no longer abuse Thy patience. O my crucified Love, I will not wait until the confessor places the crucifix in my hands at the hour of death. From this moment I embrace Thee; from this moment I recommend my soul to Thee. Into Thy hands O Lord I commend my spirit. [Psalm XXX, 6] My soul has been so many years in the world, and has not loved Thee. Give me light and strength to love Thee during the remainder of my life. I will not wait to love Thee at the hour of death. From this moment I love Thee; I embrace Thee and unite myself to Thee; and I promise never more to depart from Thee. O most holy Virgin! Bind me to Jesus Christ, and obtain for me the grace never to lose Him more. †
Consider that God, having created the first man, in order that he might serve Him and love Him in this life, and be conducted afterwards to reign with Him forever in Paradise, enriched him for this end with knowledge and grace. But ungrateful man rebelled against God, refused Him the obedience which he owed Him in justice and gratitude; and thus, miserable sinner, was he left with all his posterity as a rebel, deprived of Divine Grace, and forever excluded from Paradise. Behold, then, after this ruin, caused by sin, all men lost! All were living in blindness, or in the darkness of the shadow of death. The devil had dominion over them, and hell destroyed innumerable victims amongst them. But God, seeing men reduced to this miserable state, was moved with pity, and resolved to save them. And how? He did not send an angel, a seraph; but to show the world the immense love that He bore to these ungrateful worms, “He sent His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh” [Romans VIII, 3]. He sent His own Son to become man, and to clothe himself with the same flesh as sinful man, in order that, by his suffering and death, He might satisfy the Divine Justice for their crimes, and thus deliver them from eternal death; and, reconciling them with His Divine Father, might obtain for them Divine Grace, and might render them worthy to enter into life eternal. Consider, on the one hand, the immense ruin that sin brings upon souls, as it deprives them of the friendship of God and of Paradise, and condemns them to an eternity of pain. And, on the other hand, consider the infinite love which God showed in this great work of the Incarnation of the Word, causing His only-begotten Son to sacrifice His divine life by the hands of executioners on a cross, in a sea of sorrows and of infamy, to obtain for us pardon and life eternal. Oh, in contemplating this great mystery and this excess of Divine Love, how can we do otherwise than exclaim: O infinite goodness! O infinite mercy! O infinite love! For a God to become man, and to die for me! But how is it my Jesus, that after Thou hast repaired this ruin of sin by Thy own death, I have so often wilfully renewed it again by the many offences I have committed against Thee? Thou hast saved me at so great a cost, and I have so often chosen to damn myself, in losing Thee, O infinite Good! But what Thou hast said gives me confidence that when the sinner who has turned his back upon Thee is converted to Thee, Thou wilt not refuse to embrace him: “Turn ye to Me, and I will turn to you” [Zacharias I, 3]. Thou hast also said, “If any man shall open to Me the door, I will come in to him” [Apocalypse III, 20]. Behold, Lord, I am one of these rebels, an ungrateful traitor, who have often turned my back upon Thee, and driven Thee from my soul; but now I repent with all my heart for having thus ill-used Thee and despised Thy grace; I repent of it and love Thee above everything. Behold, the door of my heart is already open; enter Thou, but enter never to leave it again. I know well that Thou wilt never leave me, if I do not again drive Thee away; but this is my fear, and this is the grace which I ask of Thee, and which I hope always to ask; let me die rather than be guilty of this fresh and still greater ingratitude. My dearest Redeemer, I do not deserve to love Thee after all the offences that I have committed against Thee, but for Thy own merits’ sake I ask of Thee the gift of Thy holy love, and therefore I beseech Thee make me know the great good Thou art, the love Thou hast borne me, and how much Thou hast done to oblige me to love Thee. Ah, my God and Saviour, let me no longer live ungrateful to Thy great goodness. My Jesus, I will never leave Thee again; I have already offended Thee enough. It is only right that I should employ the remaining years of my life in loving Thee and pleasing Thee. My Jesus, my Jesus, help me, help a sinner that wishes to love Thee! O Mary, my Mother, thou hast all power with Jesus, seeing thou art His Mother; beg of Him to forgive me; beg of Him to enchain me with His holy love. Thou art my hope; in thee do I confide. †
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