Page:Sermons for all the Sundays in the year.djvu/191

 irregular life, to exclaim at death: O! that I had led a life of sanctity! O! that I had spent my years in loving God! How great is the anguish of a traveller, who, when the night has fallen, perceives that he has missed the way, and that there is no more time to correct his mistake! Such shall be the anguish at death of those who have lived many years in the world, but have not spent them for God. "The night cometh when no man can work." (John ix. 4.) Hence the Redeemer says to all: “Walk whilst you have light, that the darkness overtake you not." (John xii. 35.) Walk in the way of salvation, now that you have the light, before you are surprised by the darkness of death, in which you can do nothing. You can then only weep over the time which you have lost. 10. “He hath called against me the time." (Thren. i. 15.) At the hour of death, conscience will remind us of all the time which we have had to become saints, and which we have employed in multiplying our debts to God. It will remind us of all the calls and of all the graces which he has given us to make us love him, and which we have abused. At that awful moment we shall also see that the way of salvation is closed for ever. In the midst of these remorses, and of the torturing darkness of death, the dying sinner shall say: O fool that I have been! life misspent! lost years, in which I could have gained treasures of merits, and have become a saint! but I have neglected both, and now the time of saving my soul is gone for ever. But of what use shall these wailings and lamentations be, when the scene of this world is about to close, the lamp is on the point of being extinguished, and when the dying Christian has arrived at that great moment on which eternity depends? 11. ”Be you then also ready; for, at what hour you think not, the Son of Man will come." (Luke xii. 40.; The Lord says: ”Be prepared." He does not tell us to prepare ourselves when death approaches, but to be ready for his coming; because when we think least of death, the Son of Man shall come and demand an account of our whole life. In the confusion of death, it will be most difficult to adjust our accounts, so as to appear