Page:The Way Of Salvation- Meditations For Every Day Of The Year (IA TheWayOfSalvation1836).pdf/115



I. A DAY will come, which will be the last of days, when this world will be no more. Before the coming of the Judge, fire will descend from heaven, and consume every thing that is upon the earth: The earth and the works which are in it shall he burnt up. 2 St. Peter, iii. 10. So that in that day every thing upon the earth will be reduced to ashes. O God, what will all the vanities of this world then appear, for which so many now sacrifice the salvation of their souls. What appearance will all the highest dignities of this earth then make, its purple its crowns and its sceptres? O the folly of those who shall have loved them! And O the lamentations of those who for the love of such vanities shall have lost their God!

II. The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall rise again. 1. Cor. xv. 52. This trumpet will call all men together from their graves to come to judgment. O how beautiful and resplendent will the bodies of the just appear! Then shall the just shine like the sun! St. Matt, xiii. 43. On the contrary, how ugly and deformed will the bodies of the reprobate appear! What a torment will it be to these wretched souls to be again united to their bodies, for whose gratification they have lost heaven and lost their God, to be cast with them for ever into hell, there to burn together in eternal flames! Happy shall they then be, who shall have denied their bodies all gratifications displeasing to God; and who, in order to hold them m greater subjection, shall have mortified them by fasting and penance! O Jesus, turn not thy face away from me, as I have deserved. How often, for the sake of grati-