Page:Sermons for all the Sundays in the year.djvu/65

 miserable goods, and abandon that God who is an infinite good, and who alone can make them happy. Of this the Lord complains, and calls on the Heavens to be astonished, and on its gates to be struck with horror: " Be astonished O ye Heavens, at this; and ye gates thereof, be very desolate, saith the Lord." He then adds: " For my people have done two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and have digged to themselves cisterns broken cisterns that can hold no water." (Jer. ii. 12 and 13.) We regard with wonder and amazement the injustice of the Jews, who, when Pilate offered to deliver Jesus or Barabbas, answered: " Not this man, but Barabbas." (John xviii. 40.) The conduct of sinners is still worse; for, when the Devil proposes to them to choose between the satisfaction of revenge a miserable pleasure and Jesus Christ, they answer: "Not this man, but Barabbas." That is, not the Lord Jesus, but sin.

6. " There shall be no new God in thee," says the Lord. (Ps. lxxx. 10.) You shall not abandon me, your true God, and make for yourself a new god, whom you shall serve. St. Cyprian teaches that men make their god whatever they prefer before God, by making it their last end; for God is the only last end of all: " Quid quid homo Deo anteponit, Deum sibi facit." And St. Jerome says: " Unusquisque quod cupit, si veneratur, hoc illi Deus est. Vitium in corde, est idolum in altari." (In Ps. lxxx.) The creature which a person prefers to God, becomes his God. Hence, the holy doctor adds, that as the Gentiles adored idols on their altars, so sinners worship sin in their hearts. When King Jeroboam rebelled against God, he endeavoured to make the people imitate him in the adoration of idols. He one day placed the idols before them, and said: " Behold thy gods, Israel!" (3 Kings xii. 28.) The Devil acts in a similar manner towards sinners: he places before them such a gratification, and says: Make this your God. Behold! this pleasure, this money, this revenge is your God: adhere to these, and forsake the Lord. When the sinner consents to sin, he abandons his Creator, and in his heart adores as his god the pleasure which lie indulges. "Vitium in corde est idolum in altari."