Christian standing on the verge of life, and ready to meet death with the testimony of a good conscience, and the well-grounded hopes of entering into the joys of his Lord. It is in this last scene that he is enlivened and consoled, by the strong faith and confidence he has in the goodness and mercies of his heavenly Father, and in the infinite merits of Jesus Christ his Redeemer. The assurance of a well-spent life, the price and merit of those virtues which his humility suppressed and concealed from the eyes of men; the multitude of good works which triumphantly surround him; the perfect conformity to the will of God, and other happy dispositions with which he closes his eyes and yields up his soul into his Creator's hands, make him cheerfully take his leave of this world, and welcome the happy hour that is to put an end to his labours and unite him to his God. O what satisfaction is it to him, to see himself drawing nigh the gates of heavenly Jerusalem, and upon the point of being admitted into the eternal mansions of glory, and associated to the blessed choirs of Angels and Saints? Having before him this bright prospect, he considers the pangs of death and the pains of his dissolution to be nothing else but the breaking down of that partition which stands betwixt his soul and the sight of that Supreme Being, which is going to manifest itself to him in the fulness of joy, and whose particular providence supports and protects the just man under the shadow of its wings, at the critical hour of death; so that they may say with the Psalmist, Ps. xxii. Though I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils, for thou, O Lord, art with me; and again, I rejoice at the things that are said to me, we shall into the house of the Lord, Ps. cxxi. Blessed then are they who thus die in the Lord, for their works shall follow them, says St. John in the Apocalypse, c. xiv. On the other hand, nothing can be conceived more wretched, more dismal or more deplorable than the death of the wicked, who, ready to be cited before the awful tribunal of an injured God, have nothing to offer him but a long train of crimes and disorders. They see themselves just launching forth into eternity with all their iniquities, and with the just apprehensions of what shall follow after their death. The malice and deformity of their sins, which the subtlety of their self-love industriously disguised before, will then be set before their eyes in a true light. The crimes, which before seemed but small faults, by reason of an inveterate habit contracted in vice, will then appear depicted in the blackest die, and prey on their conscience like so many gnawing worms. They will accompany them at their departure out of this world, and, as the Scripture says, they will sleep with them in the grave. Is there no means of salvation therefore left for them at their dying hour? God indeed may shew mercy to them at the last gasp, for which reason we are not to form a rash judgment, nor pass sentence on any particular sinner; but is it credible that sinners who abuse God's mercy, and tempt him by designing

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to live in sin and then to die in grace, after glutting themselves with worldly delights, should snatch Heaven in a moment, which the best Christians with difficulty do in many years? How can they expect to be favoured at their death with an extraordinary. miracle of grace, whose life earned nothing but anger, and who sacrificed the principal part of it to the service of the devil and to the gratification of their brutish appetites? How can their conversion be deemed sincere, who resolve only to abandon their criminal pleasures when they can enjoy them no more, and to cease to sin when the ability of sinning is taken from them? However, if a sinner be so unfortunate as to have his repentance to begin at the end of his life, he is not to despair, but should do all that is then in his power, and endeavour to bewail his sins in the bitterness of his soul, begging mercy and pardon for the sake of Jesus Christ. A man who is in danger of being drowned, ought to lay hold of a twig or a bulrush, in order to effect his escape, if he can. But as it would be madness to plunge himself into a whirlpool, because there is a bulrush or a twig at the water edge that he may lay hold of, so in like manner, it is the height of madness for a sinner to leave the concern of dying well to the hazard of the last hour, or to venture his eternal salvation on so desperate an issue as a deathbed repentance. The only time you can depend on, my brethren, is the present time, whilst you are in health, and capable of having recourse to the throne of grace with the necessary dispositions. If you sincerely wish to die the death of the just, and finish your days in peace with God, begin without further delay to live the life of the just, and to spend the remainder of your days in the service of God. Remember your last end, and be ever watchful and always prepared, because you know not the day nor the hour, as our Lord says in the Gospel. Latet ultimus dies, ut observentur omnes dies. The last day is concealed from us, says St. Augustine, that we may watch every day, and not be surprized by death, which comes like a thief at midnight, when least expected, Matt. c. xxiv. O merciful Jesus, who neither in life nor in death forsakest those who put their trust and confidence in thee, grant that we may live in thy grace and die in thy favour. Preserve us from setting our affections on this sinful Babylon, and enable us to break through all difficulties that oppose our passage to a happy eternity. O may thy sacred name be the last accent of our tongue, the last motion of our heart, the last sigh of our soul, that whenever we depart this life, we may, through thy merits, be admitted into the mansions of everlasting bliss; which, my brethren, I wish you all, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

TWENTY-FOURTH AND LAST SUNDAY
AFTER PENTECOST.

On the vile Sin of Impurity.

Cum videritis abominationem desolationis stantem in loco sancto-qui legit intelligat. Mat. c. xxiv. v. 15.

When ye shall see the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place, ke that reads let him understand. Mat. c. xxiv. v. 15.

ALTHOUGH this sacred text is literally understood of the profanation and destruction of the beautiful temple of Jerusa lem, yet it may be justly applied, in a moral sense, to the abomination of desolation that the base vice and odious sin of impurity brings into the holy place, and sets up in the soul of a Christian, which by baptism becomes the living temple of God and the sanctuary of the Holy Ghost, according to these words of the Apostle, Do ye not know that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in ye? 1 Cor. c. v. v. 16, Yes, my brethren, such is the dignity, such is the happiness of a Christian as long as he preserves the grace, and lives up to the character of his baptism; but the instant he profanes and defiles his soul and body with the vile sin of impurity, he ceases to be the temple of God, and becomes a sink of filth and abomination, and a receptacle or dwelling-place of the devil. St. Gregory the Great remarks, that there are different sorts of devils, and that they have their distinct appellations, this difference arising from the different kinds of sins into which they endeavour to draw poor deluded sinners. There are devils of pride, devils of avarice, devils of lechery, of anger, of glut tony, of envy, of jealousy, of illusion and error, and each of them has his particular character as well as his proper function, The devil of lust, or the impure and unclean devil, is called Asmodeus, and his principal study is to get possession of the sinner's heart, and to infect it with the contagion of sensual and carnal pleasures. His malice is such, that if he happens to be dislodged and expelled by means of a sincere repentance, he meditates a speedy return, and sets all his engines at work to procure admittance again, according to these words of the

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Gospel: When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he finds no rest or case till he returns to his former abode, and he brings seven other devils along with him to take up their dwelling place in the unhappy sinner's soul, Luke, c. xi. v. 24. O how deplorable must the state of that soul be which is thus converted into a receptacle of so many infernal spirits? How odious and detestable must it appear in the sight of a God of infinite sanctity? Nothing can be more opposite to the purity and spirituality of his nature; nothing can remove a Christian at a greater distance from him, whom none but the pure and the clean of heart shall see, Mat. c. v. v. 8. May I not, then, justly call the sin of impurity an abomination of desolation, since it is so in reality both in its own nature and effects, as it renders the sinner odious and abominable in the eyes of God, and reduces him to the most miserable of all states? No crime enslaves him more, or involves him in greater misfortunes; no crime is more shameful, more productive of fatal disorders, or forms in the heart a more insupportable sting and remorse of conscience. In short, it is one of the seven capital sins, one of the greatest obstacles of salvation, the seminary of all vices, the poisonous source of numberless evils, and the general cause of the eternal damnation of thousands. To inspire you, therefore, with all the hatred and abhorrence that this foul and destructive monster deserves, and to arm you against its most dangerous influences, is the design of the following discourse, wherein I shall first lay before you its enormous malignity; and secondly, its most effectual remedies and preservatives. Purify our hearts, O Divine Spirit, and cleanse my tongue and lips, as thou didst heretofore cleanse the lips of the Prophet Isaias, that I may expatiate on this subject to thy honour and glory, and to the edification of thy servants assembled here in thy name. Obtain for us this favour, O immaculate mother of Jesus; it is what we humbly request, through thy intercession, greeting thee in the words of the Angel. Ave Maria.

Of all the crimes that the unhappy children of Adam are prone to, lust or impurity is the most pernicious and destructive to man, and the most filthy, the most odious and detestable in the sight of God. Its crying malice appears evidently from the hatred and abhorrence which the Almighty has frequently testified against it, and from the many severe and visible scourges with which he has in his wrath punished it even in this life, and the still greater punishments which he has denounced against it in the next life. There is no crime that the sacred Scripture gives us a more frightful idea of; no crime that it declares to be more injurious to God, more dis honourable to man, or more deserving of the vengeance and thunderbolts of Heaven. As soon as this foul monster appeared on earth, to shew how odious and abominable it was in the eyes of God, the Scripture makes use of the strongest figures of speech, and says that God, whose nature is incapable of

grief, or repentance, or any other passion, was grieved to the heart, and even repented that he had created man, Gen. c. vi. v. 5, 6. What a strange expression, and how strongly does it give us to understand the enormity of the sin of lust? We do not read that the Lord was inwardly touched with sorrow of heart, or shewed regret for having created the Angels or our first parents after their fall. We are not told that he repented after the murder of Abel committed by Cain, nor after the other crimes committed in the ages immediately ensuing the creation; but if it were possible, he repented as soon as the horrid sin of impurity forced its way into the world, and he resolved to destroy man from the face of the earth, nay, even the very beasts, the reptiles, and the fouls of the air, which were made for the use and service of man. All flesh had. corrupted its ways, and the sin of impurity had become so general, that the earth was defiled with wickedness. In order, therefore, to cleanse it from such abominations, the Lord sent the waters of the universal deluge, wherein all mankind, without distinction of age or sex, were swallowed up and drowned, except eight just persons, who were saved in Noah's Ark for re-peopling a better world.

It was also the heinous crime of impurity, that drew down from the Heavens dreadful showers of fire and sulphur, to burn all the inhabitants of five cities alive, and to reduce the neighbouring country into ashes. They had given themselves up to sins of impurity, and the malice of their crimes was so enormous, that, as the Scripture says, it cried to Heaven for vengeance, Gen. xviii. In consequence of which the Almighty, to shew his detestation of their wickedness, rained down fire and brimstone upon them, overthrew their cities, and destroyed their country, which before was like a Paradise, Gen., c. xiii. but was then turned into a lake of stinking water, and, remains to this day, for all posterity, a standing and eternal monument of God's aversion to the vile sin of impurity and uncleanness. We read another instance hereof in the Book of Genesis, where it is related, that Onan, having defiled the marriage-bed by a sin of lust, was immediately struck dead, because he had done a detestable thing, c. xxxviii. v. 9, 10. The Book of Numbers likewise informs us, that no less than twenty-four thousand persons were put to death at one time, by the express command of God, in punishment of this odious sin, c. xxv. v. 9. These and several other visible judgments of this sort, recorded in Holy Writ, are convincing proofs of the enormity of the sin of impurity, and sufficiently shew how abominable it must be in itself, and how detestable in the eyes of God, whose infinite justice never punishes a sin more than it deserves, and whose infinite mercy generally pu nishes it less than it deserves, especially in this world, where the works and effects of his mercy to his creatures, are above all his other works, and surpass the effects of his justice as Kk

VOL. II.