FIFTY-FIRST LESSON
On Death.
"Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord."—Apoc. xiv. 13.
My dear children, all that is born must die; such is the law of nature. The loftiest trees, those under which your forefathers have perhaps sat down, and which seem still so strong and healthy, will some day droop and wither away. In the morning we admire flowers which at night are faded, and their beauty does not last more than one day: insects live through a season only, the strongest of animals but a few years. Man dies also, my children; but he had been created to be immortal, and God had destined him to an existence of eternal happiness.
Adam lost this divine privilege through his disobedience; and as a punishment for the sin of our first parent, all mankind was condemned to die. God's mercy has, however, softened the severity of this sentence; only our body dies; and even that not for ever.
Death, my children, is the separation of the soul from the body it animated during life: this mortal part of our self becomes cold and insensible; it is buried in the earth, where it soon becomes corrupted; and nothing remains but a little dust. Meanwhile the soul, created after the image and likeness of God, the soul by means of which we think, we remember and we love, never ceases to live. Disengaged from the bonds which retained it in captivity in this earthly body, it flies directly to God, to, receive from Him its chastisement or its reward. When the world will end, our bodies, raised from the dead by divine omnipotence, will be once more united to our souls, never more to be separated from them.
Man knows that he cannot escape death; but he remains in entire ignorance of the moment at which it will overtake him. God is the master of life and death: our destiny is in His hands. We cannot, alas I rely upon either health or youth: and if some men leave this earth only when full of years, it often happens also that the Lord calls to him quite little children, to increase the number of his Angels.
"Blessed," says Jesus Christ, "blessed is that servant, whom when his Lord shall come, he will find watching!"—Yes, my children, no doubt that man will be blessed, who behaves every day as if he were to die in the night. As a reward for his virtuous life, God will grant him that most precious of all blessings, a holy death.
A true Christian, a good and pious child, sees nothing dreadful in death. It is the beginning of a life of happiness; it is the entrance into the land of promise, after a long journey. The only real sad trial in death is the parting from those we love. Towards the latter end of autumn, when the trees lose their foliage, and the beginning of winter is felt, we see the swallows fly off together towards a milder climate If, like them, my children, we could thus collect together all our friends, our family, and not be obliged to leave them, when the time comes, and we must quit this world for another, which of us would then regret to die?
Unfortunately, alas! we leave this life one by one, and this last, this long parting, causes us a very cruel pang. But in those days of sadness and of mourning, religion comes to the assistance of the one who departs, and of the bereaved who remain. Religion has a balm for all our wounds; gives us the consoling thought that we shall one day meet again, and that, in heaven, we shall be able to love each other still. Christians then must not grieve like those who have no hope. This is the advice of St. Paul.
This advice had been followed by a poor mother, who reaped therefrom deep consolation after the loss of a much loved one. You will no doubt be as affected as I was myself by what she told me about it. While travelling, I met this woman near a village, at which I stayed. Her clothes bespoke her poverty; she came near me to beg. I questioned her about her wants: "Have you then a large family to provide for?" "I have five children, Ma'am," she answered; "four are with me: here they are." Then raising her eyes to heaven, with a sweet smile of pious resignation she added: "The fifth is the happiest: he is with God and the Angels!"
This poor bereaved mother wept bitterly no doubt when her son died; but she believed him absent and not lost; he was still reckoned as one of the family, and the thought of the happiness of this beloved child, the hope of seeing him hereafter, had partly consoled her.
You see, then, the necessity of being prepared for death, if we hope to attain eternal happiness. "Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching."
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