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has sat down at the right hand of the Father; so ought both the body and soul to suffer, die, rise again and ascend to heaven.

All these things are accomplished during this life, in the soul, but not in the body. The soul suffers and dies to sin in penitence and in baptism; the soul is raised to a new life in these sacraments; and at last, the soul quits the earth, and ascends to heaven in the holy paths of a heavenly life; as St. Paul says, "our conversation is in heaven."

But none of these things take place in the body during this present life; they will occur hereafter. For, in death, the body dies to its mortal life; at the judgment, it shall rise to new life; and after the judgment, it shall ascend to heaven, and dwell there forever. Thus the same train of events happens to the body as to the soul, only at different times; and these changes in the body do not take place till those of the soul are complete, that is, after death; so that death is the crown of blessedness to the soul, and the dawn of happiness to the body also.

These are the wonderful ways of Divine wisdom respecting the salvation of souls; and St. Augustine teaches us, that God has adopted this arrangement to prevent a serious evil; for if the period of spiritual regeneration had been the period of the death and resurrection of the body also, men would have submitted to the obedience of the gospel only from the love of life; but by the present arrangement, the power of faith is more fully manifested, whilst the way to immortality is traced through the shades of death.

IV.

It would be wrong that we, like angels who have not the

passions of our nature, should not feel and mourn over the afflictions and misfortunes of life. It would not be right either, that we should sorrow without consolation, like the heathen, who have no knowledge of grace. But it is right that we should be afflicted and comforted as Christians, and that the consolations of grace should rise superior to the feelings of nature, so that grace should not only be in us, but victorious in us; so that, in hallowing the name of our heavenly Father, his will should become ours; that his grace should reign over our nature, and that our afflictions should be, like the substance of a sacrifice which grace completes, and consumes to the glory of God; and that these individual sacrifices should honor and anticipate that universal sacrifice, in which our whole nature shall be perfected by the power of Jesus Christ.

Hence we derive benefit from our imperfections, since they serve as matter for such sacrifices. For it is the object of true Christians to profit by their own imperfections, inasmuch as "all things work together for good to the elect."

And if we are careful, we shall find great profit and edification in considering this matter as it is in truth. For since it is true, that the death of the body is only the image of the death of the soul, and that we build on this principle, that we have reason to hope for the salvation of those whose death we mourn; then it is certain, that if we cannot check the tide of our grief and distress, we may derive from it this benefit, that if the death of the body is so dreadful, as to give rise to such emotions, that of the soul would have caused us agonies far more inconsolable. God has sent the former to those for whom we weep; but we hope he has averted the latter. See then in the magni

tude of our woes, the greatness of our blessings; and let the excess of our grief, be the measure of our joy.

There is nothing which can lessen our joy, but the fear that their souls may languish some time under those sufferings destined to purge them from the remains of the sins of this life; wherefore we should carefully endeavor to appease the wrath of God towards them.

Prayer and sacrifices are a sovereign remedy for their sufferings. But one of the most substantial and useful charities towards the dead, is to do the things which they would order us if they were still in the world, and to place ourselves for their sake in the condition in which they would wish us now.

By this practice, we should make them, as it were, live again in us, as their counsels would be living and acting in us; and as heresiarchs are punished in another life for the sins into which they have led their sectators, in whom the poison still lives, so the dead are rewarded beyond their own merit, for the virtues to which they have given occasion by their counsels and example.

V.

Man is evidently too weak to judge accurately of the train of future events. Let our hope, then, be in God; and do not let us weary ourselves by rash and unjustifiable anticipations. Let us commit ourselves to God for the guidance of our life, and let not discontent have dominion

over us.

Saint Augustine teaches us, that there is in each man, a serpent, an Eve, and an Adam. Our senses and natural propensities are the serpent; the excitable desire is the Eve; and reason is the Adam. Our nature tempts us per

petually; criminal desire is often excited; but sin is not completed till reason consents.

Leave then this serpent and this Eve to act if we cannot prevent it; but let us pray to God so to strengthen our Adam by his grace, that he may remain victorious, that Jesus Christ may be his conqueror, and may dwell in us for ever.

CHAPTER XXI.

PRAYER FOR THE RIGHT USE OF SICKNESS.

1.

O LORD, whose Spirit is in all things so good and gracious, and who art so merciful, that not only the prosperities, but even the humiliations of thy elect are the results of thy mercy; graciously enable me to act in the state to which thy justice has reduced me, not as a heathen, but as a true Christian; that I may recognize thee as my Father and my God, in whatever state I am, since the change in my condition, makes no change in thine; since thou art always the same, though I am ever variable; and that thou art no less God, when thou dost minister affliction or punishment, than in the gifts of consolation and peace.

II.

Thou hast given me health to serve thee, and I have profanely misused it. Thou has now sent sickness to correct me, suffer me not so to receive it as to offend thee by my impatience. I have abused my health, and thou hast rightly punished me; let me not abuse thy correction also.

And since the corruption of my nature is such, that it renders thy favors hurtful to me, let thy Almighty grace, O God, make thy chastenings profitable. If, in the vigor of health, my heart was filled with the love of this world, destroy that vigor for my salvation, and unfit me for the enjoyment of this world, either by weakness of body, or by overcoming love, that I may rejoice in thee alone.

III.

O God, to whom at the end of my life, and at the end of this world, I must give an account of all that I have done; O God, who permittest this world to exist, only for the trial of thine elect, and the punishment of the wicked; O God, who leavest hardened sinners to the luxurious but criminal enjoyments of this world; O God, who causest this body to die, and at the hour of death doth separate our souls from all that in this world they have loved; O God, who at the last moment of my life, dost tear me from all those things to which I am attached, and on which my heart has been fixed; O God, who wilt consume at the last day, the heavens and the earth, and all creatures that are therein, to show to all the world that nothing exists but thyself, and that nothing but thyself is worthy of love, because thou only dost endure; O God, who wilt destroy all these vain idols, and all these fatal objects of our af fections; I praise thee, and I will bless thee, O my God, all the days of my life, that it hath pleased thee to anticipate in my favor, the event of that awful day, by destroying already, as it respects me, all these things, through the weakness to which thou hast reduced me. I praise thee, O my God, and I will bless thee all the days of my life, that it hath pleased thee to reduce me

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