Page:Sermons for all the Sundays in the year.djvu/398

 sword, a vengeance which is irrevocable. ” I, the Lord, have drawn my sword out of its sheath, not to be turned back." (Ezech. xxi. 5.) 10. Death, which is so terrible in this life, is desired in hell by the damned; but they never shall find it. ” And in these days men shall seek death, and shall not find it: and they shall desire to die, and death shall fly from them." (Apoc. xi. 6.) They would wish, as a remedy for their eternal ruin, to be exterminated and destroyed. But ” there is no poison of destruction in them." (Wis. i. 14.) If a man, condemned to die, be not deprived of life by the first stroke of the axe, his torture moves the people to pity. Miserable damned souls! They live in continual death in the midst of the pains of hell: death excites in them all the agony of death, but does not give them a remedy by taking away life. “Prima mors," says St. Augustine, ” animam nolentem pellit de corpore, secunda mors nolentem tenet in corpore. ” The first death expels from the body the soul of a sinner who is unwilling to die: but the second death that is, eternal death retains in the body a soul that wishes to die. ” They are laid in hell like sheep; death shall feed upon them." (Ps. xlviii. 15.) In feeding, sheep eat the blades of grass, but leave the root untouched; hence the grass dies not, but grows up again. It is thus that death treats the damned; it torments them with pain, but spares their life, which may be called the root of suffering. 11. But, if these miserable souls have no chance of release from hell, perhaps they can at least deceive or flatter themselves with the hope, that God may one day be moved to pity, and free them from their torments? No: in hell there is no delusion, no flattery, no perhaps; the damned are as certain as they are of God’s existence that their hell shall have no end. ” Thou thoughtest unjustly that I shall be like to thee; but I will reprove thee, and set before thy face." (Ps. xlix. 21.) They shall for ever see before their eyes their sins and the sentence of their eternal condemnation. ” And I will set before thy face." 12. Let us conclude. Thus, most beloved brethren, the affair of our eternal salvation should be the sole object