What does reason, what does conscience, what does self-interest
say? You would not be listless if I were to speak to you of your
property, your health, your reputation, but now I speak to you of
your souls--your precious, immortal souls--your own, your
greatest good--a good that you are in danger of losing--the good
whose loss is overwhelming and irretrievable. They are in your
hands for life or for death. It is said that to one of the
heathen soothsayers, who was famed for his skill in discovering
hidden things, a person once came with a living bird in his hand,
and asked the seer to tell whether it was living or dead. The
inquirer intended to crush the bird with his hand if the wise man
should say it was living, and to let it fly if he should say it
was dead, and thus in either case to put the pretended magician
to shame.
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But the soothsayer suspected the design, and answered: "The bird
is in your hand--to kill it or to let it live." So I answer you,
my brethren. Your souls are in your hands, to kill them or to let
them live. You can crush them in your grasp and smother their
convictions, or you can open your hand and let them fly forth in
freedom and gladness. Oh, have pity on your souls! Your souls are
yours. No one will be the loser by the loss of your souls but
yourselves. God will not be the less happy if you are damned; the
saints will not lose any of their happiness if you fail of your
salvation; the angels will be as light and blissful; the earth
will go on just the same as when you were on it; only you, you
yourselves will feel it, and you will feel it hopelessly. Ah,
then, take pity on your souls! You will one day wish that you had
done it. One of the courtiers of Francis the First of France,
when he was dying, said: "Oh! how many reams of paper have I
written in the service of my monarch! Oh! that I had only spent
one quarter of an hour in the service of my soul!" A quarter of
an hour! And you have days and weeks. Oh, then, once more I beg
you to take pity on your souls! If you have never before
seriously taken to heart your eternal interest, at least do so
now. Improve the time of this mission. It is the time of grace.
It may be to you the last call, the last opportunity. Make, then,
a good use of this time. Set aside the thought of other things,
and give yourself to this alone. Now you have an opportunity of
making your peace with God, and saving your soul. Think, now the
hour has come, foreseen by God from all eternity, when, answering
to the call of grace, I shall regain His favor, which, alas! I
have lost too long. What shall keep me back? See what is the
difficulty, and weigh it in the scales with your immortal soul.
Is confession difficult? A confession before the whole universe
will be more so. Is it hard to lose a little gain? It will be
more so to lose your soul.
{226}
Is it hard to break a tie of long standing? It will be hard to
break every tie, and to live in eternal desolation. Is it hard to
bear the remarks of companions? But how will you bear the taunts
and jeers of the devil and his angels? And those very companions
who have led you to hell will taunt you for your base compliance
to them. Let nothing, then, keep you back.
* * *
(Peroration. according to the circumstances.)
----------------
Sermon II.
Mortal Sin.
(Mission Sermon.)
"Know thou, and see,
that it is an evil and a bitter thing for thee,
to have left the Lord thy God."
--Jer. II. 19.
In the book of the prophet Ezechiel it is related that God showed
to the prophet in a vision the city of Jerusalem. It was all
stretched out before him in its greatness and in its beauty. The
magnificent temple was there, with its stones and spires
glittering in the sun; its streets were full of people,
prosperous and happy; a people who were in possession of the true
religion, who had been adopted by God as His children, and over
whom He had exercised a special protection. It was a beautiful
sight; beautiful to the eye, and well fitted to excite the most
religious emotions in the mind. But there was something that
checked these feelings of pleasure and delight. God permitted the
prophet to see the interior of that city. He unfolded before him
the secret abominations that were practised there.
{227}
He showed him the idolatries and impurities to which his chosen
people the Jews had delivered themselves up, and then in wrath
and indignation God complained of the people and said: "_The
iniquity of the house of Israel and of Juda is exceeding great;
and the land is filled with blood; and the city is filled with
perverseness, for they have said: The Lord hath forsaken the
earth, and the Lord seeth not_." [Footnote 16] Then the joy of
the prophet was turned in to sorrow.
[Footnote 16: Ezechiel ix. 9.]
To-night, my brethren, a vision meets my eye hardly less
beautiful than that which met the eye of the prophet. How
beautiful a sight is this church and this congregation! This
church is raised to the honor of the true God. Its walls are
salvation and its gates praise. And this congregation, beautiful
as it is in the assemblage of a multitude of living, intelligent
beings--where I see the old man with his crown of silver hair,
the young man and the young woman in the freshness of their bloom
and youth--is much more so regarded as a Catholic congregation,
as professing the true faith. But tell me--for I cannot look into
your hearts as the prophet did--tell me, does God see, beneath
this beautiful, outward appearance, the abominations of iniquity?
Does God this night see in this church some heart that is in
mortal sin? Some Catholic who has renounced, if not his faith, at
least the practice of his faith? Some child of passion who has
swerved from the path of justice, lost his conscience and the
sense of sin, and given himself to the service of the devil? Are
there any here to-night in mortal sin? There may be. I will
confess, and you will not think me uncharitable in doing so, I
believe there are some. I know not how many, but from what I know
of the world, I believe there are some here, in this
congregation, whose consciences tell them they are in mortal sin.
Oh! then, let me tell them what they have done. Let me show them
what mortal sin is. Let me prove to them that it is an evil and a
bitter thing for them to have left the Lord their God. This is my
subject to-night. I will show you the dreadfulness of mortal sin:
first, from its nature; secondly, from its effects on the soul;
and thirdly, from its eternal consequences.
{228}
You know, my dear brethren, that we were created to love and
serve God in this life, and to be happy forever with Him in
heaven. God has given us this world, and our own nature, all that
we have or are; and He is willing that we should enjoy the world
and act out our nature. It is true, there are certain
restrictions which He has given us. These restrictions are
contained in His law, embodied in the ten commandments. In these
commandments God has circumscribed our liberty, has put limits to
what we may do; but I need not say that these limits have been so
fixed, not in order to abridge our happiness, but really to
increase it. So the case stands on God's part. But now, on our
part, we have an inclination to disregard the limits God has put
on our use of the world, and to place our happiness in the
creature. The world smiles before us, and we think this or that
enjoyment would make us happy. It may often happen that the very
enjoyment and comfort is one which God has forbidden; but no
matter, we are strongly inclined to seize it, nevertheless, and
to gratify our desire in spite of the prohibition. This
inclination is what is called concupiscence, and is sometimes
exceedingly strong, so that it is very difficult to resist it.
God has, however, always given us reason and faith, free will and
grace, to enable us to overcome it. This, then, being so, you see
that man stands between two claimants: the world on the one hand,
inviting him to follow his own corrupt inclinations; on the
other, God requiring him to restrain his passions by the rules of
virtue and religion. Now, what takes place under such
circumstances? Alas, my brethren, I will tell you what too often
takes place. I will tell you what takes place so commonly that
men take it for granted that it must be so--so commonly that the
majority of men cease to wonder at it--what happens every day,
every hour, every minute. It happens that men listen to the voice
of passion, renounce virtue and reason, stifle grace, and turn
away from God, to satisfy their desire for the creature. This is
what happens daily, hourly, momentarily; and this is mortal sin,
which is in its nature the greatest of all evils, considered in
its relation both to God and man, as I am about to show you in
this first part of my discourse.
{229}
Understand me, my brethren: the sin I am going to speak of is
_mortal_ sin. I do not say that every transgression of the
law of God is mortal. You know that it is not so. You know that
there some actions which men commit, which are forbidden, but by
which a man does not mean really to give up the friendship of
God--some sins which are not committed with full deliberation,
some sins in which the matter is very small, some sins which come
more from ignorance or frailty than from malice; and which God,
who sees things just as they are, does not regard as grievous. He
is displeased with them, but not mortally offended. He punishes
them, but not with the utter withdrawal of His favor. If He did,
who of us could be saved? But every sin in which the soul sees
clearly that she must choose between the friendship of God and
the gratification of unlawful passion--in which, with full
deliberation, in full defiance of any grave precept of God or the
Holy Church, she obeys the call of corrupt nature, every such sin
is mortal, that, is, grievously offends God and cuts off the soul
from His grace. Do you want to know what a mortal sin is? It is
an insult offered to God--Almighty God. One trembles to say it,
but so it is. Yes! if you have committed one mortal sin, you have
insulted Almighty God. And there is every thing in the act to
make the insult deep and deadly. The greatness of an insult is
measured by the comparative importance of the persons between
whom the offence passes. If one should come into the church and
strike the bishop on his throne, would you not feel more
indignant than if a common man in the street were the object of
the insult? You have heard how Pius the Sixth was insulted;
dragged about from place to place, until he died; and did you not
feel indignant that such outrages were committed on the person of
God's vicegerent?
{230}
Now, when you committed a mortal sin you insulted, not the
vicegerent of God, but God himself. You contemned His authority
and despised His greatness. Would you know Who it is Whom you
have offended? Look at that mountain trembling with earthquakes,
and breathing forth smoke and flame, hear the thunder roll around
its head, and see the lightning flash! Mark the people, how they
fall back affrighted and terrified! What is the cause of these
convulsions of nature, and this terror of the people? God is
speaking. He spake in Mount Sinai and the earth trembled before
Him; and it is His words then spoken that you have defied, O
sinner! Are you not afraid of His vengeance Whom you have
offended? Open the heavens and see the angels, thousands of
thousands and ten thousand times ten thousand, prostrate before
Him. See all the saints adoring Him--the Blessed Virgin Mary
herself trembling before His greatness. And you insult Him! What
are you? A creature, a dependant, a slave. What would a master do
if his slave should strike him? And you, a servant, a slave, a
mere nothing, have not hesitated to raise your hand against
Almighty God!
And for what have you done all this? For the pleasure of sin. You
have preferred a vile, temporary gratification, to the favor of
Almighty God. When you sinned, there was on one side the beauty
of God, the beauty of perfection, the splendor of grace, the joy
of saints, peace of conscience, heaven; on the other there was
the false pleasure of sin. You weighed them in the balance one
with another, and, oh folly! in your estimation a moment's sin
outweighed God and heaven and eternity. This is what the Almighty
complains of in Holy Scripture: "_They violated me among my
people for a handful of barley and a piece of bread to kill souls
which should not die_." [Footnote 17]
[Footnote 17: Ezech. xiii. 19.]
{231}
Oh! for how small a thing it is that you have been content to
lose God--a few dollars of unjust gain, human respect, the
gratification of revenge, a night's debauch, a half-hour's
indulgence of sinful thoughts, a forbidden word, an intoxicating
glass: for this you have thrown to the winds God and heaven. What
has He not done for you? He takes care of you and gives you all
you have. It is He who warms you by the sun, refreshes you by the
air, gladdens and nourishes you by the green field. It is He who
brought you through the dangerous time of childhood, Who led you
up through manhood, Who redeemed you by His blood, made you a
Catholic, and gave you your parents, friends, every blessing, and
the hope of heaven beyond this life, and you have grieved and
hated Him. See Jesus Christ before the Jews. He has spent His
life in doing them good. He has labored for them and is about to
die for them. And now they spit on Him, they buffet Him, they
crown Him with thorns and bow the knee in mockery before Him.
Nay, O sinner! thou art the Jew who did this. Thou by thy mortal
sin hast made him an object of scorn. Thou hast spit upon Him,
thou hast stabbed Him to the heart. Would you excuse a son from
the guilt of parricide who should strike a knife to his father's
heart, and should miss his aim? So, the sinner is no less guilty
of the crime against the life of God because God cannot die. If
God could die or cease to be, mortal sin is that which would kill
Him. You have aimed a blow at the life of your best benefactor,
of your God. And this is what passes in the world for a light
thing. This is what men laugh at and boast of over their cups.
This is what the world excuses, and takes for a matter of course;
yes, this is what even boys and girls, as they grow up, desire
not to be ignorant of--that they may know how to offend God. This
is sin, so easily committed and so often committed, so quickly
committed and so soon forgotten. Such it is in the sight of God
and the holy angels. O sinner! when you smile, often when you are
rejoicing over your wicked pleasure, the heavens are black
overhead, and God is angry, and the angel of vengeance stands at
your side with a glittering spear, that he may plunge it in your
heart.
{232}
While you are careless, heaven and earth are groaning over your
guilt. "_Wonder, O ye heavens, and be in amazement_," says
God by the prophet. "_My people have done two evils. They have
left me, the fountain of living water, and have digged out
cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water." "Hear, O
heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord hath spoken. I have
brought up children and exalted them, but they have despised me.
The ox knoweth his owner and the ass his master's crib, but
Israel hath not known me, and my people hath not understood. Woe
to the sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked
seed, ungracious children: they have forsaken the Lord, they have
blasphemed the Holy one of Israel, they have gone away
backward_." [Footnote 18]
[Footnote 18: Isai. i. 2, 3, 4.]
But in the second place, mortal sin is the greatest of all evils
as regards the sinner himself. Let us consider what are its
effects. Ah, my brethren, some of these effects are obvious
enough. We have not to go far to seek them. We know them
ourselves. What is the cause of much of the sickness that affects
our race? What but sin? What is it that has ruined so many
reputations, that once were fair and unblemished? What is it that
has destroyed the peace of so many families? It is sin. What is
it that makes so many young persons prematurely old, which steals
the bloom from the cheek and the lustre from the eye, and
gladness from the heart, and strength from the voice, and
elasticity from the gait? Ah! it is sin. Yes! the effects of sin
are visible and obvious to all around us, and these external
effects of sin are dreadful enough, but they are not so dreadful
as the internal effects, on which I purpose particularly to
dwell. Well, my brethren, I just said that the nature of a mortal
sin is to turn away from God to the creature.
{233}
Now, its effect is to kill the soul. There is a twofold life of
the soul. One is a natural life, and this it can never lose, not
even in hell, since it can never cease to be; and the other is
the life of grace. You know, my brethren, that in the heart of a
good Christian there dwells a wonderful quality, the gift of the
Holy Ghost, which we call grace. It is given first in baptism,
and resides habitually in the soul unless it is lost by mortal
sin. This it is which makes the soul acceptable to God, and
capable of pleasing Him, and of meriting heaven. This grace was
purchased for us by the blood of Jesus Christ, and is the most
precious gift of God. It ennobles, beautifies, elevates,
strengthens, and enlightens the soul in which it dwells: in a
word, it is the life of the soul. This grace abides in the soul
of every faithful Christian, the little child, the virtuous young
man and young woman, the old man and the matron, the rich and the
poor. Everyone who is in the state of friendship with God is
possessed of this grace. He may be poor, sick, weak in body,
disgusting as Lazarus was, but if he is the friend of God, his
soul is endowed with the gift of grace. Now, the moment that one
commits a mortal sin, the moment that a baptized Christian turns
away from God to the creature, that moment his soul is stripped
of this divine grace. The moment that a mortal sin is committed,
in an instant, in the twinkling of an eye, that robe of grace
falls off from the soul and leaves it in its deformity and
weakness. It cannot be otherwise. "Can two walk together," says
Holy Scripture, "and not be agreed?" Can God remain united to the
soul which has cast Him off by an act of complete and formal
rebellion? Oh, no! God bears much with us, He retains His
friendship for us as long as He can, He restrains His displeasure
when we are weak and irresolute and tired in His service; yes,
when we a little turn our heads and hearts toward that world
which we have renounced, when we do things that, although wrong,
are not altogether so grievous as to amount to a renunciation of
His friendship: but once make a full choice between God and the
creature, and God's friendship is lost.
{234}
You cannot reject it and retain it at the same time. God sees
things exactly as they are: as you act toward Him, He will act
toward you. By mortal sin you renounce Him, and therefore He must
renounce you. How can I describe to you the change that takes
place in that moment? It has more resemblance to the degradation
of a priest than any thing else. If a priest commits certain
great crimes, the Church prescribes that he be solemnly degraded
from the priesthood; and nothing is more dreadful than the
ceremonial. He stands before the bishop, clad in his sacred
vestments, with alb and cincture, and maniple and stole, and with
the chalice in which he has been wont to consecrate the blood of
the Lord in his hands. Then when the sentence of degradation has
been pronounced, the chalice is taken out of his hands--he shall
offer the sacrifice of the Lord's body no more; the golden
chasuble is taken off his back, no more shall he bear the glory
of the priesthood; the stole is seized from off his neck--he has
lost the stole of immortality; the white alb is torn from him--
he has lost the beauty of innocence; and last of all, his hands,
on which at his ordination the holy oil was poured, are
scraped--he has lost the unction of the Holy Ghost. So it is in
the moment that one commits a mortal sin. The Holy Scripture
calls every Christian a king and a priest, because in his soul he
is noble and united to God; and the soul of the meanest Christian
is far more beautiful in God's sight than the grandest monarch,
dressed in his richest robes, is to our sight. Well, now, as soon
as a mortal sin is committed, and God departs, then the
degradation of the soul takes place. The devil tears away the
garment of justice, the splendor of beauty, the whiteness of
innocence, the robe of immortality, which make the soul worthy of
the companionship of angels, and the friendship of God. All, all
are gone. Oh, how abject and wretched is such a soul!
{235}
Oh I how quickly will this awful change go on, and even the poor
soul herself thinks not of it! And do not think this horrible
history is of rare occurrence. No! it takes place in every case
of mortal sin. Look at that young man. See, his air and bearing
show you that he knows something of the world, and that life has
no secrets for him. Still there was once a time when that young
man was innocent. He was a good Catholic child, his soul
glistened with the brightness of baptismal grace. God looked down
from heaven and smiled with pleasure; his guardian angel followed
him in watchfulness indeed, but with joy and hope. He had his
little trials, but what was it all--what was poverty or sickness
or disappointment? Was he not a Christian? Was he not a friend of
God, was not his soul beautiful in God's sight? Such he was; but
a day came, a dark and dreadful day, when a voice, a seducing
voice, spoke in the paradise of that heart: "_Rejoice,
therefore, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer
thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thy heart,
and in the sight of thine eyes_." [Footnote 19]
[Footnote 19: Eccles. xi. 9.]
He listened to that voice and he fell: he was a changed being, he
had committed his first mortal sin. Oh! if he could have seen the
angry frown of God, the sad and downcast look of his guardian
angel. Oh! if he could have heard the shriek of triumph that came
up from the devils in hell. "Thou art also wounded as well as we,
thou art become like unto us. Thy pride is brought down to hell.
Thy carcass is fallen down. [Footnote 20]
[Footnote 20: Isai. xiv. 10, 11.]
But he hears nothing, he sees nothing, his brain is on fire, his
heart is burned by passion. The world opens to him her brilliant
pleasures, and he is perverted. His tastes and thoughts are all
corrupted. He does not like the sacraments any more, or Mass or
prayer; his delight is in haunts of dissipation, in drinking and
debauchery. He commits every mortal sin, and each deepens the
stains of his soul and increases his misery. Perhaps here and
there, for a while, he comes to confession, but he falls back.
{236}
He neglects his church, begins to curse and blaspheme holy
things, and then he is a wretched being, astray from God, with
God's curse upon him, the slave of the devil, the heir of hell,
fair indeed without; but look within--full of rottenness and
uncleanness. Oh, weep for him--"_Weep not for the dead,_"
says Holy Scripture, "_lament for him that goeth away, for he
shall not return again._" [Footnote 21]
[Footnote 21: Jer. xxii. 10.]
Weep for that young man who has wandered away from his God. Weep
for that young woman who has stained her soul with mortal sin.
Weep for that old man who has let years go by in sin, and whose
sins are counted by the thousand. Weep not for your child who
leaves you to go to a distant land, but weep for him who is on
his way to the land of eternal night, where everlasting horror
inhabiteth. Weep for him who is on his way to hell. Is it not a
story to make one weep? The ruin of a soul! "_How is the gold
become dim, the fairest color is changed, the noble sons of Sion,
and they that were clothed with the best of gold, how are they
esteemed as earthen vessels, and the iniquity of the daughter of
my people is made greater than the sin of Sodom._" [Footnote 22]
[Footnote 22: Lam. iv. 1, 2, 6.]