Page:Sermons by John-Baptist Massillon.djvu/53

Ser. 2. be gained by some, while with ease by others? Have you any other gospel to follow; other duties to fulfil; other promises to hope for, than those of the Holy Bible? Ah! since there was another way more easy to arrive at salvation, wherefore, ye pious Christians, who at this moment enjoy in heaven, that kingdom, gained with toil, and at the expense of your blood, did ye leave us examples so dangerous and useless?

Wherefore have ye opened for us a road, rugged, disagreeable, and calculated to repress our ardour, seeing there was another you could have pointed out, more easy, and more likely to attract us, by facilitating our progress? Great God! how little does mankind consult reason in the point of eternal salvation!

Will you console yourselves, after this, with the multitude, as if the greatness of the number could render the guilt unpunished, and the Almighty durst not condemn all those who live like you? But what are all creatures in the sight of God? Did the multitude of the guilty prevent him from destroying all flesh at the deluge? from making fire from heaven descend upon the five iniquitous cities? from burying, in the waters of the Red Sea, Pharaoh and all his army? from striking with death all who murmured in the desert? Ah! the kings of the earth may have regard to the number of the guilty, because the punishment becomes impossible, or at least dangerous, when the fault is become general. But God, who wipes the impious, says Job, from off the face of the earth, as one wipes the dust from off a garment; God, in whose sight all people and nations are as if they were not, numbers not the guilty: he has regard only to the crimes; and all that the weak and miserable sinner can expect from his unhappy accomplices, is to have them as companions in his misery. So few are saved, because the maxims most universally adopted are maxims of sin: so few are saved, because the maxims and duties most universally unknown, or rejected, are those most indispensable to salvation. Last reflection, which is indeed nothing more than the proof and the explanation of the former ones.

What are the engagements of the holy vocation to which we have all been called? The solemn promises of baptism. What have we promised at baptism? To renounce the world, the devil, and the flesh: these are our vows: this is the situation of the Christian: these are the essential conditions of our covenant with God, by which eternal life has been promised to us. These truths appear familiar, and destined for the common people; but it is a mistake. Nothing can be more sublime; and, alas! nothing is more generally unknown. It is at the courts of kings, and to the princes of the earth, that without ceasing we ought to announce them. Alas! they are well instructed in all the affairs of the world, while the first principles of Christian morality are frequently more unknown to them than to humble and simple hearts. At your baptism, you have then renounced the world. It is a promise you have made to God, before the holy altar; the church has been the guarantee and depository of it; and you have only been admitted