Page:Sermons by John-Baptist Massillon.djvu/272

 the world  praises  and  inspires,  had  drawn  upon  us  the  contempt  even of the  world;  virtue,  which  the  world  censures  and  combats,  attracts to us,  however  unwillingly  on  its  part,  its  veneration  and  homages.

What, my  dear  hearer,  prevents  you  then  from  terminating  your shame, and  your  inquietudes,  with  your  crimes? Is it  the  reparations of  penitence  which  alarm  you? But the  longer  you  delay, the more  they  multiply,  the  more  debts  are  contracted,  the  more you increase  the  necessity  of  new  rigours  to  your  weakness. Ah! if the  reparations  discourage  you  at  present,  what  shall  it  one  day be, when,  your  crimes  multiplied  to  infinity,  almost  no  punishment whatever shall  be  capable  of  expiating  them? They shall  then plunge you  into  despair;  and  you  will  adopt  the  miserable  part  of casting  off  all  yoke,  and  of  no  longer  reckoning  upon  your  salvation;  you  will  raise  up  to  yourself  new  maxims  and  modes  of  reasoning, in  order  to  tranquillise  your  mind  in  freethinking;  you  will consider as  needless  a  penitence  which  will  then  appear  to  you  impossible. When the  embarrassments  of  the  conscience  come  to  a certain  point,  we  feel  a  kind  of  gloomy  satisfaction  in  persuading ourselves that  no  resource  is  left;  we  calm  ourselves  on  the  foundations of  truths,  when  we  see  ourselves  so  far  removed  from  what they prescribe;  we  fly  to  unbelief  for  a  remedy  from  the  moment that we  believe  it  is  no  longer  to  be  found  in  faith;  from  the  moment that the  chaos  becomes  inexplicable  to  us,  we*  have  soon  settled  it in  our  minds  that  all  is  uncertain. And, besides  what  should  there be so  melancholy  and  so  rigorous  in  reparations,  whose  only  merit ought to  spring  from  love?

Unbelieving soul! you dread  being  unable  to  support  the  holy sadness of  penitence;  yet  you  have  hitherto  been  able  to  bear  up against  the  internal  horrors  of  guilt:  virtue  in  your  eyes  seems  wearisome beyond  sufferance;  yet  you  have  long  dragged  on  under  the stings of  an  ulcerated  conscience,  which  no  joy  could  enliven. Ah! since you  have  hitherto  been  able  to  bear  up  against  all  internal anguish, the  bitterness,  the  disgusts,  the  gloomy  agitations  of  iniquity, no  longer  dread  those  of  virtue:  in  the  pains  and  sufferances inseparable from  guilt,  you  have  undergone  trials  far  beyond  what may be  attached  to  virtue;  and  doubly  so,  because  grace  softens, and renders  even  pleasing,  the  sufferings  of  piety,  while  the  only sweetener of  guilt  is  the  bitterness  of  guilt  itself.

My God! is it  possible,  that,  for  so  many  years  past,  I  have  had strength to  wander  in  such  arduous  and  dreary  ways,  under  the  tyranny of  the  world  and  of  the  passions,  and  that  I  should  be  unable to live  with  thee,  under  all  the  tenderness  of  thy  regards,  under the wings  of  thy  compassion,  and  under  the  protection  of  thy  arm? Art thou  then  so  cruel  a  master? The world,  which  knows  thee not, believes  that  thou  renderest  miserable  those  who  serve  thee: but we,  O  Lord,  we  know  that  thou  art  the  gentlest  and  best  of masters,  the  tenderest  of  all  fathers,  the  most  faithful  of  all  friends, the most  munificent  of  all  benefactors;  and  that  thou  givest  a  foretaste, by  a  thousand  inward  consolations  with  which  thou  indulgest thy servants  here  below,  of  that  eternal  felicity  which  thou  preparest  for  them  hereafter.