Page:SermonsFromTheLatins.djvu/607

 Saviour, and  except  that  Christ  wept  over  Jerusalem because she  had  not  known,  and  that  in  this,  her  day, what things  were  for  her  peace,  God  made  no  move, but bore  with  them. But His  day  came  when  the Romans came,  and  when  the  whole  Jewish  nation was given  up  to  fire  and  sword  and  famine  and  pestilence and  banishment  and  slavery;  But  even  the horrors of  Jerusalem's  siege,  though  a  figure,  are  but a faint  reflection  of  the  woes  to  come. That and such like  calamities  which  the  world  has  yet  known were, says  St.  Clement,  "  but  the  skirmishes  which precede  the  final  and  decisive  conflict  between  the forces  of  guilt  and  retribution." O God! if a  brush between the  outposts  be  such,  what  shall  be  the  horrors of  the  general  engagement? Wisdom (v.  18) describes God  as  "  putting  on  the  armor  of  His  zeal and  wielding  the  sword  of  His  wrath  and  shooting as  missiles  shafts  of  lightning  and  thick  hail  from  the clouds,  and  inciting  the  winds  and  the  seas  to  rage against  and  destroy  His  enemies." " That  day,"  says the Prophet  Sophronius,  "  is  a  day  of  wrath,  a  day  of tribulation  and  distress,  a  day  of  calamity  and  misery, a  day  of  darkness  and  obscurity,  a  day  of  clouds  and whirlwinds.  I  will  distress  men,  and  they  shall  walk like  blind  men,  and  their  blood  shall  be  poured  out as  earth  and  their  bodies  as  dung.  Neither  shall their  silver  and  gold  be  able  to  deliver  them  in  the day  of  the  wrath  of  the  Lord."

Brethren, though  many  descriptions  of  the  last  day are found  in    Scripture,  the  Lord's  account  is,  naturally, unsurpassed. And verily,  the  subject,  the  death