[Transcriber's notes: This production is based on https://archive.org/details/sermonsofstpaul06unknuoft/page/n6

Many footnotes have additional citations indicated by "USCCB", based on the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Bible found at http://usccb.org/bible/books-of-the-bible. Most differences appear to be typographical errors not detected in proofreading or minor changes in verse numbering. Quotes from the book of Sirach were attributed to Ecclesiasticus.

End of Transcriber's notes.]

Sermons By The
Fathers Of The Congregation Of
St. Paul The Apostle,

New York
Volume VI.
New York:
The Catholic Publication House,
9 Warren Street.
Boston: Patrick Donahoe.
Baltimore: John Murphy & Co.
1871.

Entered, according to Act of Congress,
in the year 1871, by
Rev. I. T. Hecker,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress,
at Washington, D. C.

Preface.

The publication of another volume of Sermons by the Fathers of the Congregation of St. Paul the Apostle, is due to the encouragement already given by the extensive sale of the former ones; and to the frequent solicitations for the continuance of their publication kindly made by many of the Reverend Clergy, at home and abroad.

St. Paul's, Fifty-ninth Street, New York,
Feast of St. John of the Cross, 1871.

Contents.

Sermon I.
Remembrance Of Mercies.

Isaiah lxiii. 7.
"I will remember the tender mercies of the Lord,
the praise of the Lord for all the things
that the Lord hath bestowed upon us."
[Page 15]

Sermon II.
The Three Gifts Of The Magi.

St. Matt. ii. 11.
"And going into the house,
they found the child with Mary His mother:
and falling down, they adored Him:
and opening their treasures,
they offered to Him gifts;
gold, frankincense, and myrrh."
[Page 32]

Sermon III.
How To Pass A Good Lent.

2 Cor. vi. 2.
"Behold, now is the acceptable time;
behold, now is the day of salvation,"
[Page 42]

Sermon IV.
Pretended and Real Christians.

2 Cor. vi. 1.
"And we do exhort you that you receive
not the grace of God in vain,"
[Page 56]

Sermon V.
The Sins And Miseries Of The Dram-seller.

Habacuc ii. 15.
"Woe to him that giveth drink to his friend,
and presenteth his gall, and maketh him drunk."
[Page 69]

Sermon VI.
Communion With Jesus.

St. John vi. 57.
[USCCB: John vi. 56.]
"He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood
abideth in Me, and I in him."
[Page 89]

Sermon VII.
The Holy Ghost, The Comforter.

St. John XIV. 16.
"I will ask the Father,
and He will give you another Comforter,
that He may abide with you for ever."
[Page 104]

Sermon VIII.
The Duty Of Upholding
The Pope's Temporal Sovereignty.

Zach. vi. 13.
"He shall bear the glory,
and shall sit and rule upon his throne;
and he shall be a Priest upon his throne,"
[Page 122]

Sermon IX.
The Living God.

Jer. x. 10.
"The Lord is the true God:
He is the living God."
[Page 141]

Sermon X.
The Real Presence.

St. Matt. i. 23.
"They shall call His name Emmanuel,
which, being interpreted, is God with us."
[Page 158]

Sermon XI.
St. Paul, The Divine Orator.

2 Cor. xii. 9.
"Gladly, therefore, will I glory in my infirmities,
that the power of Christ may dwell in me."
[Page 169]

Sermon XII.
The Value Of Faith.

I Cor. xvi. 13.
"Watch ye; stand fast in the faith;
do manfully, and be strengthened."
[Page 183]

Sermon XIII
The Supremacy Of St. Peter.

St. Matt. xvi. 18.
"And I say to thee: That thou art Peter;
and upon this Rock I will build My Church."
[Page 195]

Sermon XIV.
The Roman Pontiffs
The Successors Of St. Peter.

St. Matt. xvi. 18.
"And I say to thee: That thou art Peter;
and upon this Rock I will build My Church,"
[Page 214]

Sermon XV
The Thought Of Heaven.

Heb. iv. 9.
"There remaineth therefore
a rest for the people of God."
[Page 230]

Sermon XVI.
The Clergy
The Teachers Of The People.

St. Matt. vii. 15.
"Beware of false prophets,
who come to you in sheep's clothing,
but inwardly they are ravening wolves."
[Page 244]

Sermon XVII.
Humility In Prayer.

St. Luke xviii. 13.
"O God, be merciful to me, a sinner,"
[Page 255]

Sermon XVIII.
Preparation For A Good Death.

Isaiah xxxviii. 1.
"Put thy house in order,
for thou shalt die, and not live."
[Page 269]

Sermon XIX.
The King's Marriage Feast.

St. Matt. xxii. 14.
"For many are called,
but few are chosen."
[Page 283]

Sermon XX.
Good Use Of Sickness.

Ecclesiasticus xxxviii. 9.
[USCCB: Sirach xxxviii. 9.]
"My son, in thy sickness neglect not thy self,
but pray to the Lord, and He shall heal thee."
[Page 292]

Sermon XXI.
Thoughts For Advent.

Philippians iv. 8.
"For the rest, brethren,
whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are modest,
whatsoever things are just,
whatsoever things are holy,
whatsoever things are amiable,
whatsoever things are of good repute;
if there be any virtue,
if there be any praise of discipline,
think on these things."
[Page 306]

Sermon XXII.
Fraternal Charity.

I Epistle St. John ii. 10.
"He that loveth his brother
abideth in the light,
and there is no scandal in him."
[Page 322]

Sermon I.
Remembrance Of Mercies.
(For New Year's Day.)

Isaiah lxiii. 7.
"I will remember the tender mercies of the Lord,
the praise of the Lord for all the things that
the Lord hath bestowed upon us."

In the midst of our mutual congratulations at a time like this, whilst we are wishing a happy future year to those we love, we cannot wholly forget the year that is past, and all that it brought to us for good or evil. I would not, my dear brethren, cast a shadow upon the bright pathway of our hopes; I would not dampen in the least the ardor with which we joyfully set out upon another year's journey of life. May it be as happy in its realization as we could wish it to be! But I fear for the future happiness of him who forgets the happiness of the past. The anticipated joy of life yet to be lived is linked with those other joys that are past—joys over blessings whose richest fruit should be the lessons of experience they have taught us. Would we like to enter upon a new year wholly ignorant of the past one? I think not. We have learned many things while it has been passing—lessons of wisdom upon which we rely to make the future better and happier. Much there may have been to regret. Alas! how much for some of us; but the remembrance of even that shall be good for us. There are many of the same stones lying in the roadway ahead of us that we stumbled upon last year. Now we shall not come upon them unawares. There are many of the same beautiful but poisonous flowers growing in the valleys of repose where we shall stop to linger for a while, as we did in days gone by. We shall recognize them, and the beauty that deceived us before shall not deceive us again.

Blessed is the man who remembers. But there is so much good to remember! And in that remembrance so much to make the heart thoughtful, cheerful, and hopeful. It is this thought which I wish you, my brethren, this morning to reflect upon: the duty and pleasure of remembering the mercies of God--His tender mercies, as the prophet so aptly calls them.

It has always been a wonder to me how soon we forget benefits conferred upon us. It is too true. The joy we had when the gifts were new wasted itself away as quickly as music melts upon the air. The keen sense of grateful love toward the giver grows dull, and passes into indifference, before the treasure is spent or the beauty of the gem is tarnished. Drink to the health of your friend and praise his bounty, if you will, but have a care— ingratitude and forgetfulness are the last drops which lie at the bottom of the cup. And we treat God no better, if as well as we treat men. His gifts are such as man could never give, and given with a depth of love as unfathomable as the mystery of His own being and divine life. And yet we can forget! Oh! why is it? Did He who made the human heart make it ungrateful? Did He who so loves us make those He loves selfish? Did He who has said, "Son, give me thy heart," ask for a corrupt and treacherous heart? Such a thought may become that gloomy religion which thinks to exalt God by debasing His creatures; but it is not so that we have learned Him. No, this cannot be. It cannot be that the heart of man is naturally ungrateful, or is unmindful of good for which it is debtor; that by virtue of its very nature it is selfish toward man, and treacherous to God. He who made us has not made us to be of necessity the very opposite of what He wishes us to be. What explains this cold forgetfulness, this heartless indifference, that steals over us so soon? There is but one explanation. Love and gratitude must have a test. The words of thankfulness, the pressure of the hand, the look of the eyes and the aspirations of the heart which are forced from us in the first flush of happiness when the gifts are showered at our feet, are all good and just testimonies—but they are not enough. Gratitude and love must have the true test of merit, and that is endurance. There must be freedom to forget, that the false be distinguished from the true. That we claim this enduring memory at the hands of others, and are disappointed if it is otherwise, is a proof not only that such a test is naturally called for, but that we at the same time deem it possible. How many gifts pass from hand to hand during this season of rejoicing, with the words—Remember me! God Himself bestows His most Precious Gift to man with the same request, "Do this in remembrance of Me." Yes, now we understand it. The true heart will remember; the false one will forget. The faithful soul delights in cherishing a lively remembrance of benefits received; and the further back in the past the moment lies that saw our brows crowned with the tokens of love, the sweeter and more tender become the memories of them. Judge by this test, my brethren, if you have a true heart to God. Oh! the deep meaning of the prophet's words, "I will remember the tender mercies of the Lord." Time is a refiner of the thoughts. The love of the gift itself, the mere sensual complacency in its enjoyment is mixed up in the beginning with the thankfulness we feel for its bestowal. But time will wear off that dross, and only the pure gold of the heart's gratitude will be left. It is not the love of the gift that need last. We do not care for that, neither does God. But we and God want the love of the giver to remain, and the giving of our gift, that act by which we tried to prove our love, not to be forgotten.

Look back, my brethren, look back. What does your memory tell you of His gifts whose mercy has followed you all the days of your life, whose hands have been stretched forth full of new blessings every morning? Here it might become me to enumerate some of these gifts, but where would I begin, or where could I end? Besides, it is you who ought to remember, and remember well. You must have a cold heart if you can forget.

You see, my brethren, what I desire by these words. I wish you to know whether you are grateful to God or not, to that God who has so loved us and crowned us with mercy and loving kindness. At a time like this, when you are asking others to remember you, and when you are thinking of all the dear old friends you have had in bygone years, and of the sweet mementos that came from their hands or were spoken by their lips, I would compel you to see if you have remembered the oldest, the best Friend of all. Alas! if you must say—He has been the last and the least in my thoughts. That would be sad to hear, and, above all, from the lips of those who, by their very faith, with all its blessed consolations, live so near to God.

If there be any by whom God wishes to be remembered, and His mercies brought to mind, it is by us who are His chosen people. I know God loves all men, and more than we can imagine; but there can be little doubt that those whom He has so honored as to make them the brethren of His Only Son, Jesus Christ, upon whom He has bestowed the inestimable gift of the Catholic faith, are the objects of His special affection.

Oh! it is a great thing to be one of the household of faith! That is one of those tender mercies the very thought of which should make our heart bound in our bosom. Sweet and ever present, dear Catholic brethren, should be the memory of the day of your baptism, the day when you crossed the threshold of God's own home, the Church, and there became His child. You know well what light has beamed upon your pathway in life ever since. You know what fountains of refreshment have sprung up to satisfy your thirsty soul. When you contrast your own knowledge of religion, and peace in it, with the ignorance and restless distrust of the blinded world without, then you know how truly wise God has made you.

It is true for all who own the Catholic name, but what a tender mercy is that to be ever cherished in the heart of a convert!

O day of joy to remember!—proud, loving, humble joy like that which stirred the heart of Mary when the words broke forth in tumultuous rapture from her sacred lips, "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God, my Saviour. For He that is mighty hath done great things unto me, and holy is His name." O day of peace to remember!—peace like that which fills the soul of the wanderer upon whose longing sight breaks the vision of his native shore, when, with hands outstretched, as if to embrace the dear land, and in a voice choked with emotion, he murmurs—Home at last! O day of freedom to remember! Freed is the caged bird that beat its wings against bars more cruel than iron—freedom that says to the soul, Fly, for between thee and God no hand shall be found to stop thee. Cleave the skies with thy wings, and go sing at the gates of Paradise, and thou shalt hear the voices of angels responding to thy notes of happiness from within. And who has done all this? O kind God! it is Thou. It is Thou who hast regarded the humility of Thy servant. Let all generations call me too blessed from henceforth; for Thou, even Thou, hast also blessed me. Te Deum Laudamus!

But it behooves us to ask ourselves the questions—What it is to remember God's mercies, and who are they that do it.

He who does not prize the Christmas or the New Year's gift (however humble may be the offering) for the sake of the giver, has already forgotten it. Here is something that God has too good reason to complain of us. We do not make much of His gifts, as we ought. We receive them, perhaps after many prayers. Prosperity smiles upon us, temptations lose their power, our sins are forgiven, the impending calamity is averted, death departs from our doors, our wishes are granted a thousand times beyond our expectations, and now that the blessing has come, does it look much in our eyes? Does it seem to us, as it is, a great thing—a precious gift? We are proud to display the gifts of friends. Oh! who is proud of the gifts of God? We plume ourselves upon our success, and glorify creatures for their aid, but too often God complains of us, as He complained of His ungrateful people of old, "They were filled, and were made full; and they lifted up their heart, and have forgotten me." [Footnote 1]

[Footnote 1: Osec xiii. 6.]
[USCCB: Hosea xiii. 6.]

But He has not to complain of all. There are some who recognize the source of their blessings, who wonder, in their humble, grateful hearts, that One so high could stoop to one so low. "My friends tell me," said a recent convert, "that I never looked so bright and happy in my life. They think it is on account of a piece of good news I have heard; but it is not that. I am all the time thinking how good our dear Lord has been to me. After so many years, to be permitted to come to Him, seems almost too great happiness for me." There is a soul remembering the tender mercies of the Lord. "Too great happiness for me." Such ought to be the expression of all our hearts at the thought of the very least of God's gracious gifts. A bunch of withered flowers stood upon a table near the foot of the bed of a poor, dying woman. The flowers were many days faded and scentless, yet every morning fresh water was brought to fill the old cracked china vase (the best in the cottage) that held them. "I love to have them there," she would say, "where I can see them, for they were brought to me by him, and they shall be laid upon my breast when I am gone to God." "By him!" No need to tell the name. It was like the supplication of Mary Magdalen, "If thou hast taken Him away, tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will go and take Him away." He who brought those flowers in his hand brought her also the holy sacraments of the dying, and was often at her bedside during her long illness. She loved him with that tender, holy, and trusting love which so enchains the hearts of the Catholic poor to their "dear priest." And the gift had come from him. That, was enough. To her the dry, withered stems were daily strengthened by the freshly brought water, the shrivelled flowers looked bright, and shed their fragrance still around the poor chamber. Not to her senses. No; but to her soul. Why should they not? Other flowers might not: but these—"these were brought by him." Oh! when the heart remembers, how priceless becomes the gift, what shining beauty adorns it, what magic charms does it not possess!

Thus, beloved brethren, let our hearts remember God for His manifold mercies. They come from Him. They come from the Best, the Holiest, the Truest, the Everlasting Friend. But I speak in vain if you do not understand me. If the Giver is not all that and more to you, never will His gifts be in your eyes as precious and as dear as they should be, and not long will you remember them. It is the question of the Psalmist, "Who is wise, and will keep these things in mind, and will understand the mercies of the Lord?" [Footnote 2]

[Footnote 2: Ps. cvi. 43.]
[USCCB: Psalms cvii. 43.]

To remember the mercies of God is to make good use of them. To what end has he blessed us with the gift of faith? That it should simply distinguish us from those who do not possess it, and to lie idle and fruitless in our soul? Vain ornament, indeed, that honors neither the giver nor him who receives it. You are a Catholic in name, and you do not forget it. Is it enough to remember that? Oh! answer God to-day. Do you remember when Sunday morning comes, and the priest is ascending the altar, that you are a Catholic, and where a Catholic should be found then? Do you remember when the Church is calling her children to the confession of their sins, and to the Holy Communion at the joyful Easter time, that you are a Catholic, and what it behooves a Catholic to do then? Do you remember when obscene and blasphemous language is used in your presence that you are a Catholic, and think what part a Catholic should take in that? Tell me, can you lift your heart to Him to-day, and say in truth—My God, Thou knowest that I have not forgotten Thee? "I have chosen the way of truth: Thy judgments I have not forgotten." [Footnote 3]

[Footnote 3: Ps. cxviii. 30.]
[USCCB: Ps. cxix. 30; "The way of loyalty I have chosen; I have set your edicts before me.">[

You got over that illness. I know that you said, "If God spares my life, I will be a changed man—I will be an altered woman. No more will I be seen staggering in drunkenness. No longer will I keep a grog-shop, and stain my hands with the hard-earned and wickedly-squandered money of my neighbor—blood-money, cursed by the cries of the brutally treated wife and the moans of the naked, starved children. No longer will I be a nominal Catholic, a standing scandal to unbelievers, and damning my own soul by my criminal neglect of God and contempt of His Holy Church. I will give up all that spite and malice in my heart, and go and be reconciled with those who have injured me for the sake of Him who said, 'Forgive, and you shall be forgiven.'" Do you remember all that? Yes; but what avails such a heartless remembrance as yours has been? Even He has reminded you of your promise and of His mercy from time to time, as He now again reminds you by my mouth. Oh! mock Him not. Better, far better, would it be had you wholly forgotten both promise and mercy. It would not be generous, I allow; but now you are false and treacherous, for the mercy was granted, but the promise remains unfulfilled.

In the sorrow of your stricken spirit, and with the grievous burden of sin lying heavy upon you, your guardian angel took you one day, trembling, anxious, fearful, harassed by the stings of remorse, to the confessional. There you poured out your griefs, and told all the shameful guilt—griefs that seemed eternal, and guilt that no oceans might wash away. And yet, O tender mercy of God! down falls the veil of darkness, and your soul is bathed in light. You, who a moment ago were stumbling in despair at the portals of hell, are now standing before the gates of heaven. You, who had that in your soul which almost drove you to madness, now are in such peace that words fail you, and you weep for very joy. Yes, of a truth God has been very merciful, tenderly merciful to you. Ah! what would you not then do for God—what sacrifices would you not make—what life long resolutions were you not ready to form! Do you not remember? Ah, yes! now I remind you of it. But how long did you remember it to any profit to yourself or praise to God? And tell me, how now? What of your present remembrance? An East Indian having been shown all about the beautiful city of Paris, through its royal palaces, its galleries of art, its manufactories of wondrous scientific and mechanical instruments, manifested, it was observed, but little enthusiasm. The Indian was too proud to show any emotion at sight of the works of strangers. One day he was taken to the Jardin des Plantes, where are cultivated trees, shrubs, and flowers of every clime. Suddenly he stopped short before a tropical tree, fell upon his knees, clasped it lovingly and kissed it, and, as the tears flowed fast down his swarthy cheek, cried out, in his own language, "O tree of my own land! O tree of my own native land, so far away! Let us go back home again."

There are some of you, my brethren, to whom I have shown the picture of a mercy you cannot but remember well. How does the sight of it affect you? Are you moved with that deep emotion such a memory should awaken? Do you hug the memory of that hour of peace to your bosom, and does your heart cry out, "O tender mercy of my God! O sweet hour of peace now so far away! Let me go back to thee again!" Blessed remembrance, as happy for yourself as it is dear to God. You are wise because you keep these things in mind, and have understood the mercies of the Lord, and the praise of the Lord for all the things He hath bestowed upon you.

But can you look at it with indifference, seeing there nothing to stir the depths of your soul, nothing to call forth a grateful aspiration from your breast? Then I think of that uncivilized Indian, and must say: He loved his country better than you love God. He was quick to remember that; you have been quick to forget Him.

I am not asking too much, my brethren, am I? I am not forcing upon your notice a subject out of place at this joyous season, am I? When the absent one returns to the old homestead to spend the Christmas holidays, you who have been the kindest to him, the most lavish in your gifts—you who have been sending him time and again sweet tokens of your remembrance—you do not look for him to think the last about you. Oh! no. You are tempted to hide yourself in sport before he has seen you, that you may enjoy listening to his anxious and hurried questions about you, and his wondering where you are, and a thousand eager expressions, which show that he has been thinking about the pleasant meeting he would have with you all the way home, and that his joy is not full till he can run into your embrace. Oh! his every question almost drags you out from your hiding-place. But suppose you listen in vain for the mention of your name; that in the midst of his joyous congratulations and happy wishes he does not ask where you are, and evinces by no sign that in your absence anything is wanting to him. Oh! the ugly pain at your heart as you steal away to your chamber, unwilling now to be seen, hurt by his forgetfulness, and stung to the very quick by his silent ingratitude.

Brethren, I am speaking for God; for the best Friend, who of all must be the nearest and dearest, and the first in your thoughts. Looking down from His throne in heaven, he watches, to see who have been making preparations to meet Him; who are renewing at this time their grateful remembrances of Him. Ah! there are some who remember, and they have already gathered about His holy Table, and feasted at His heavenly banquet. Though no earthly friends may have been kind or thoughtful enough to send them a holiday present, they have still had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year's for all that. They have met the Friend of all friends with the kiss of peace and the embrace of welcome, and that has been more than enough.

But there are some who never said a word about Him, never thought of Him, never remembered all He had done for them. Nay, there are some who never came at all. Not that He forgot to invite them, not that He neglected to prepare His Christmas feast. No. He is the Friend who never forgets. What shall I say? Does God not feel that heartless coldness and neglect of theirs? Oh! the sad, tender, complaining reproaches of Good Friday are heard in heaven at Christmas. "My people, what have I done unto thee, or in what have I grieved thee? Answer me." "Put me in remembrance," as he said to his people of old, "and let us plead together. Tell me if thou hast anything to justify thyself." Yes, answer Him, you of whom He is speaking. Answer to that God who has never wearied of heaping blessing after blessing and mercy after mercy upon your head. Tell Him what He has done to you that you have forgotten Him. Too well you know, however, that in Him you shall find nothing to accuse.

So, then, let us rather turn to the exciting in our hearts a lively remembrance of His manifold mercies, and to make that memory to good purpose. Let us seek to know, if possible, why God has so blessed us; what object He had in view; what He expected of us; what promises we made when we received them, and now resolve that He shall be no longer disappointed in the fruits He looked for from them. It will help us to acquire that spirit of humble gratitude which so enlarges the heart, and helps us to do great and generous things for God. With the Psalmist, then, let us say, "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and never forget all that He hath done for thee. Who forgiveth all thine iniquities: who healeth all thy diseases. Who redeemeth thy life from destruction, and crowneth thee with mercy and compassion." [Footnote 4] So shall the New Year begin with praise and thanksgiving, to end with blessings new and better than the last.

[Footnote 4: Ps. cii. 2-4.]
[USCCB: Ps. ciii. 2-4.]

Sermon II.
The Three Gifts Of The Magi.
(For The Feast of The Epiphany.)

St. Matthew ii. 11.
"And going into the house, they found
the child with Mary his mother: and
falling down, they adored him: and
opening their treasures, they offered
to him gifts; gold, frankincense, and myrrh."

These wise men, who are supposed by many to have been kings, were led by the appearance of the miraculous star in the heavens, and the secret inspirations of the Holy Ghost, to Bethlehem, in order to find out and adore the Child who was born king of the Jews. After a long search, they found Him, lying in a manger, and, in spite of the poverty and the straw, they recognized in Him the King of souls, the Creator of heaven and earth. With a deep faith they adored Him, and, opening their treasures, offered to Him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

And we are all, in like manner, drawn to do the same thing. The light of faith directs us to the poor stable of Bethlehem, where we behold the Lord of Glory disguised in the form of an infant, and it becomes us also to offer Him our treasures of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

And, first, what is the pure gold which is acceptable to our God and Creator? By gold is understood charity or the love of our God. And by this charity is understood the pure intention of pleasing God by which we should be governed in all our works. The love of God does not essentially consist in a tender feeling of affection or in a sensible devotion of tears, which we are not always able to elicit, much as we might desire it, but in a good and pure intention. That this is so should be a great consolation and encouragement to us. We have no right to say, as many do, "I cannot love God," for this is an untruth. It lies in every one's power to love Him, if he only desires sincerely to do so. We might say with truth—My heart is cold, and I am grieved because I cannot experience that warm love of God which I desire so much; but I would reply to all such—Set your fears at rest; make a good intention to please and love God to the best of your ability, and you have, at once, the real, true, and solid love of Him which will bring you by the shortest route to the kingdom of heaven.

It is related that one of the old heathen kings had an avarice so great that he desired that all he touched might be turned into gold. His request being granted, he perished of hunger. Avarice for spiritual treasures has no such evil effect. On the contrary, our Lord says, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after justice, for they shall be filled." Now I wish that, in like manner, what ever you touch with your hearts—that is, what ever you long for or desire—might, by a good intention, be turned into the gold of the purest charity. Our Saviour has said, You cannot so much as give a cup of cold water in My Name—that is, with a good intention—without receiving a reward for it. The treasures of grace and merit lie in immense heaps all around us, and we can help ourselves. Whatever we do, then, let us do it in the name of the Lord, following out the injunction of St. Paul, "Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all things for the glory of God." [Footnote 5] I hope, then, you will all, on this blessed festival, determine to direct all your thoughts, words, and actions to the glory of God to the very best of your ability, and thus open your treasures, and offer to the Infant Jesus lying on the straw a great heap of pure, bright gold.

[Footnote 5: I Cor. x. 31.]

The wise men of the East offered not gold only, but also frankincense. What does this signify? It means devotion. You have often seen incense put into the censer at High Mass or Vespers, and the smoke from it immediately arise straight upwards. It is a figure of the prayers and burning wishes of the soul ascending up to heaven. The Scripture says: "And another angel came, and stood before the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given to him much incense, that he should offer of the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar, which is before the throne of God: and the smoke of the incense of the prayers of the saints ascended up before God, from the hand of the angel." [Footnote 6]

[Footnote 6: Apoc. viii. 3, 4.]
[USCCB: Revelation viii. 3, 4.]

The act of true prayer or adoration by which we acknowledge, with our whole heart the infinite mystery of God and His complete dominion over us, our own entire nothingness of ourselves without Him, and by which we declare and protest that we desire nothing else but that He should govern us and dispose of us and all our affairs as He pleases—this is the highest and noblest act of our own reason. For what could we do so real and true as this? How could we realize in a better way the simplest and at the same time the most sublime of all truths? Our prayers ought to go up from our hearts as from a censer which contains a fire that no created thing is able to put out. The smoke of it should continually arise, and all we do should be done in the way of a prayer and supplication to our Last End and Chief Good.

Alas! we have incense enough to offer to idols. We swing the censer to wealth, honors, and pleasures; we bow the knee, and worship houses, and lands, and cattle, and fine clothes, and sumptuous fare, and sell our very souls for a few pieces of gold; but we have but little incense for God—no pure and sincere homage for Him, the eternal, uncreated Source of all our good.

And when you offer the incense of your adoration to God, offer pure and clear incense. Do not mix with the frankincense resin or other foul-smelling drugs. And what are they? Those desires of the heart by which you cling to the creatures of earth with a passionate eagerness. Clear your heart of such desires, so that you may say, "My God and my all." "My God, if I possess Thee and lack all else, I am rich in deed." "If I have the whole world, and all it contains, and have not Thee, I am poor, and blind, and miserable, and naked." Then will your prayer arise as a sweet odor from the golden altar before the throne of God, and in numerable blessings descend upon you, not only for eternity, but even in this present life.

Offer frankincense, or you will have no gold to offer. When you open your treasures, if there is not plenty of incense—that is, prayer—you will find the chest, in which you thought there was much gold, to be empty. For without prayer there is no charity or love of God. Prayer is the food by which you nourish and keep charity alive and on the increase. Prayer is the capital in trade by which you are to make your fortune in the charity of God to enrich you for eternity.

And having offered your gold and frankincense, do not forget the myrrh. And what is signified by myrrh? It means self-denial, or, as it is more commonly called, mortification. I wish we all understood the value of self-denial better than we do, because nearly all the miseries which afflict the soul come from the fact that we do not deny ourselves as much as we ought. We give the reins to our natural desires and inclinations, and they run away with us. Just as if we were driving a span of spirited horses, and instead of putting a curb-bit upon them and holding them in, we should throw the reins down upon their necks and let them go without restraint. When they once begin to go fast, they break into a headlong race, and never stop until they have dashed everything in pieces. Thus we let our desires for amusement and pleasure run away with us, until we find our pious resolutions and the spirit of devotion entirely gone, and drowned in the sea of forgetfulness. How can we love God if we be absorbed in a love of good eating and drinking? Can God come and take up His abode in a soul which occupies itself and is taken up with the satisfaction of sumptuous fare, rich meats, and choice wines or liquors. Such souls are vividly described in Holy Scripture: "For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping) that they are enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction; whose God is their belly; and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things." [Footnote 7]

[Footnote 7: Philip., iii. 18, 19.]

How can God give Himself to the man who is absorbed in money-making and heaping up possessions? It is impossible for such a soul to enjoy the presence of God. Neither can He divide the empire of the soul with worldly honors, nor even with a passionate human love of wife or children. He is God, and they are creatures, the mere work of His hand. They shall pass away and be gone, and He shall remain. Such inordinate love is like disgusting vermin in the mansion of the soul, and all such vermin must be swept out. What ever we love must be loved on account of God, and in subordination to His love, or God will not come and take up His abode with us. This is the plain dictate of our reason.

We must deny ourselves, and that not merely in forbidden things, but in those which are lawful. If we go to the limit of what is lawful in self-indulgence, depend upon it we shall soon pass the limit. We shall fall into sin, and very likely into mortal sin. Many a one has fallen in this way. He has said to himself, I can do this thing, for it is not forbidden. Again, I can do that; it is not certain it comes within the letter of the law. I can indulge myself in this respect, for, even if sinful, it is a matter of small consequence. Thus he goes on in a downhill progress, until he becomes utterly selfish, and virtue has died out in his soul. Our Saviour has laid down the rule for a Christian; "He that will be My disciple, let him deny him self daily, and take up his cross and follow Me." Again, "He that loveth father or mother, wife or child, houses or lands, more than Me, is not worthy to be My disciple."

We must deny ourselves, and, if we would be great friends of God, we must deny ourselves a great deal. The fact is, in order to become possessed of God, we must deny ourselves in all things, at all times, and in all places. We must repress and bring into subjection our desires, so that they may not occupy and fill our hearts. The Scripture says, "Think not for the morrow what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, or wherewith ye shall be clothed; but think of the kingdom of God and his justice." Now, reflect on this: we cannot be thinking on both these things at the same time; one thought will crowd the other out; therefore you must drive out of your hearts those eager desires of the world, and temporal things, and anxiety about the future; you must deny yourselves these earthly desires, or you will never become spiritually-minded. Could we only banish all care and solicitude for these things, and discharge our duties and our business in life without anxiety, for God, and for the ends God has appointed them, we should be recompensed a thousandfold in this life, and we should be filled with gratitude to God for inspiring us with such sentiments. Offer myrrh, offer plenty of myrrh to God. Offer it with gold and frankincense—that is, with the intention of cleaning and sweeping out from your hearts all vain and useless love, that they may be ready and prepared for the Divine Love, and with many prayers and good wishes; and God will accept it. It will be most pleasing to Him. Without this, your self-denial will be in vain. Self-denial, without the right intention, is superstitious, and nourishes an empty pride; with it, the least act of self-denial renders you like to God, and more fit to receive the impressions of the Holy Ghost within your souls.

Begin, then, to offer myrrh with the gold and frankincense. Deny your eyes what they like to look upon, that the eyes of your souls may look on God more steadily. Deny your ears what they like to hear; news and gossip, not to speak of detraction and evil talk, that you may more readily hear the still, small voice of the Holy Ghost gently speaking within your hearts. Deny your sense of smell; the gratifications of perfumes and sweet odors. Deny your palates delicate and luxurious food, that you may relish better the plain and solid meat of the Gospel. Deny yourselves all around, whenever you can bring yourselves to do it cheerfully, for the sake of God, for He loves not the unwilling, but the cheerful, giver.

This is what the saints did, and it is what made them saints. Impelled by the strong desire to love God more, I dare to say that self-denial was the sweetest pleasure to them in this life. Having food and raiment, and wherewith to be clothed, they were content therewith; the superfluous and the unnecessary they abominated, for they knew they would only lead them away from Jesus Christ.

Present these gifts not only now, but every day of your lives. God will give them to you, and then you must give them back faithfully to Him, and in a short time He will give you a present which excels anything you ever thought of. He will give you Himself, and inundate your happy soul in an ocean of inconceivable joy and unspeakable happiness, never to be lost for all the ages of eternity.

Sermon III.
How To Pass A Good Lent.
(For Ash Wednesday.)

2 Cor. vi. 2.
"Behold, now is the acceptable time;
behold, now is the day of salvation."

This morning, my brethren, we knelt before this altar, and received from the Holy Church the ashes from which this day takes its name. Why did we do so? Was it merely because we had done so in past years? because it is a Catholic custom? because others did so, and we were expected to do the same? To receive them for such reasons would be better than not to receive them at all; but better still would it be to feel the meaning, and enter into the spirit of this sacred rite.

In the early ages of the Church, those whose sins were such as to require (in the severer judgment of those days) a public penance, received the ashes on this day from the bishop, and were then, after some other ceremonies, expelled from the Church, and not allowed to assist at Mass till Holy Thursday. As they were being driven out, the words. Memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris—"Remember, man, that thou art dust, and into dust thou shalt return"—which were repeated to each one of us as we received the ashes this morning, were said to them. Their exclusion from the Church, often during a much longer time than the few weeks of Lent, was by no means the only penance to which many of them were subjected, besides those which they voluntarily undertook; but it is enough to mention so much, that we may understand what are the feelings which we, who are to-day in the place of these public penitents, should have.

Receiving the ashes was for them a sign of the most profound humiliation and repentance. They were in disgrace, separated from the rest of the faithful as unworthy to partake with them in the sacred mysteries; and they expressed by their submission a firm purpose to amend their lives, and repair the scandal they had given. Now it is to us no disgrace to receive the ashes, but even the contrary; and we are not, perhaps, understood as expressing sorrow for our sins by the act, but humiliation and penance are really meant by it, and it is in this spirit that the Church wishes us to perform it.

This meaning is also contained in the very ashes themselves. For what can more completely express humiliation than ashes, which are the mere remains of their former substance, without beauty, strength, or any of its qualities? And what can better represent repentance than the fine dust of which they are composed? For this reducing to dust or powder is the real meaning of contrition: the contrite heart is that which is not only broken, but even ground to dust with sorrow. The ashes, also, as we are reminded in receiving them, represent the dust of death to which we must sooner or later come, and in which all the distinctions upon which we pride ourselves so much now will be confounded, nothing being left of us in this world after a short time but a few handfuls of dust, and our souls having gone to another, where their claims to consideration will have been judged according to a very different standard from that which prevails in this life. The thought of death, then, which they suggest, ought to fill us with humiliation on account of the vanity of our worldly distinctions, and with repentance now while we have time, because after death repentance will be impossible.

But Ash Wednesday is not a day by itself. It is the beginning of a season in which the sentiments which it suggests are to be continued and even strengthened. It is of the right way of passing this penitential season of Lent that I wish to speak to you to-night. And, in the first place, let us try to have a firm purpose to pass it in the right way. With a good resolution, the battle is half won. It is well worth our while to spend a good Lent; heaven is, as it were, nearer now, and grace is more abundant. "Now is the acceptable time, now is the day of salvation." Yes, my brethren, the Church does not give us Lent merely as a penance, but to help us in saving our souls.

What, then, shall we do to spend Lent well?

The first thing to do is to cease from sin, and obey those commandments of God which are binding at all times as well as now. To one who will not resolve to quit mortal sin, nothing else that he can do will be of any use except so far as it helps him to make such a resolution. All who have lost grace know well enough what sins are ruining their souls; and these they must give up, or their Lent will have been of little or no use— perhaps even worse than useless, being another of those graces of the good God which they have thrown away and trampled under foot, and which He will reproach them with at the last day. Though He is always entreating us to give up sin, yet it is now specially that He urges us, as we are about to commemorate the bitter sufferings which He endured to redeem us from its power. And though we are always bound to give it up, yet are we specially now so bound, because everything reminds us so strongly how hateful it is to God. Leave off sin, then; that is the great thing. I do not say that nothing else must be done till this is; but this must be done sooner or later, and the sooner the better, for it is very dangerous to wait. This night, this very hour, may be the last that we shall have.

This naturally suggests a special precept that comes to us at this time. Whether we have sinned or not, we must make our Easter duty. At other times, our Lord invites us to come to Him; now, He commands us to come, under pain of a new and great sin if we refuse. Obey, then, this loving command as soon as possible; do not delay, especially if guilty of mortal sin; for, besides running a great risk, you will lose the merit of all you may do in this holy season as long as you remain unforgiven. It is not so hard as it seems; and the moment of absolution will be the happiest one of life.

Another positive precept at this time is, of course, the fast, as prescribed by the rules of the diocese. This we must keep as well as we can, not considering that we are exempted from it merely because it is difficult; but only allowing such reasons against it as make a strict observance really imprudent—remembering, of course, the exemptions given in the regulations, but trusting to the judgment of a confessor or physician, rather than our own, if there be any doubt about the matter. And let us not make the sacrifice unwillingly, merely because we are obliged to, but as cheerfully as we can, so that we may please God, as well as avoid offending Him. In this way we may gain more merit, perhaps, than by anything else we can do in the course of the year, on account of the difficulty of the work, and because at other times we should hardly be justified in imposing such a penance on ourselves. Besides, obedience is better than sacrifice; and fasting in Lent is an act of obedience. So, if we cannot fast, we lose the opportunity of doing something a little difficult, and which we know will please God; which should make us sorry rather than glad.

Now, to come to things not absolutely required, but which nevertheless ought to be attended to in Lent, and which must be done, if we wish really to pass it well. They may be classed under the three eminent good works, as they are called; namely—fasting, prayer, and alms.

It may seem as if the subject of fasting had been already disposed of. And so it has, perhaps, in the usual sense of the word; we are not required, nor would it probably be advisable, to keep a more rigorous fast than the Church prescribes, at least in point of quantity; but we may give up some things in the way of food, which are not forbidden, practising some voluntary mortification or self-denial, as far as the strength of our souls and bodies will allow. It rarely does us much harm to deny our taste something; to give up or limit ourselves in something which we like particularly, if we do not really need it, and there be plenty besides. And though abstaining from the sin of drunkenness is not probably a mortification, but a most severe obligation at all times, yet, as in this penitential season this vice seems to acquire new malignity, still greater precautions ought to be taken in those occasions which might lead to it.

But the word fasting really means more than abstaining from food and drink. It implies self-denial in other ways; and there are a great many ways in which we can deny ourselves besides eating and drinking. The tongue, for example, can be restrained in speaking, as well as in its sense of taste. We can talk a good deal less than we might without sin, as well as eat less, and yet be none the worse for it. Then we can restrain our curiosity for news, both public and private; we can refuse to gratify our sight, hearing, and other senses—in short, there are plenty of ways for one who has the will. But if we have no will for such voluntary mortification, we can at least take patiently what we have to suffer from cold, fatigue, or any pain of body or mind; and not complain of those grievances which come to us from the neglect or carelessness, or even from the bad will, of others, and of which it might seem that we have, in some sense, a right to complain. We may well consider that we have forfeited our rights by sin, and that though sometimes we are bound to claim them, yet often it will be better to give them up. But what are the motives for all this self-denial? There are many. One is to make up, in some degree, for having gone beyond what was allowable by now stopping somewhat short of it; that is, to atone for our sins. But besides this, it makes us love ourselves less, and God and our neighbor more; and it makes us a great deal more free really than if we were all the time having our own way, for it takes away a thousand cares and anxieties which are all the time distracting us, and keeping us from attaining the end for which we were created. Nor can we be happy without self-denial, strange as it may seem; for we cannot be happy unless we are contented; and the only way to become contented is to cease to care about the many things which we are always desiring but often cannot have; and the only way to do this thoroughly is sometimes to give them up when we can have them. Besides this, God is pleased and gives us grace when we deny our selves; for it shows our love for Him. And at this time He seems specially to ask these sacrifices from us. "Now is the acceptable time"; and if we do not make them now, there is not much chance that we will at any other season of the year.

Then we must make more prayer now than usual, employing in this way the time that we cut off from other things. Try to come to early Mass on week-days; of course, nothing can be better than to assist at this, the greatest act of Christian worship. Also, come to Vespers on Sunday, and say the beads at home, in common if possible, and as many other prayers as there is time for, especially such as are indulgenced, for these are, of course, more powerful in satisfying for sin. And in this time of special trial for the Church and the Holy Father, we will not forget to pray that the triumph of our Faith, which is sure to come sooner or later, may be speedy; that the plans of the persecutors of the Holy See may be utterly defeated; and that they may return as obedient children to their Mother and ours, the Holy Catholic and Roman Church.

But, besides these devotions, which we can practise at any time, there are also others peculiar to this season: those in the church on Wednesday and Friday nights, which will be the same as in previous years, and which will, no doubt, be attended as well as or even better than they have been heretofore. There will be a sermon every Wednesday, and the Stations on Friday. Next to repenting of sin and confessing it, one can hardly do anything more pleasing to God in the time of Lent than to assist at the Stations, and help to commemorate His bitter sufferings and those of His Blessed Mother. "He was wounded for our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed." Surely, the least we can do at this season, when the Church presents His Passion to our minds, is to come and go with Him over the way of sufferings by which we were redeemed. You will notice, also, by looking at the table of festivals at the door, that the Church commemorates, on every Friday during Lent, some one of the mysteries of the Passion. These mysteries we will do well to think of specially. Try to come every Wednesday and Friday, and not miss a single evening from this to Good Friday; and also persuade others to come who are not here to-night, or who have not been in the habit of coming; and come not for amusement, or even principally for instruction, but for the honor and glory of God and the good of your souls.

Much hardly needs to be said about alms, the last of the eminent good works. It is evident enough how pleasing it is to God, and what a rich reward it secures for us. In the office of next Sunday the Church reminds us specially of this, saying, in the words of Holy Scripture, "Break thy bread for the hungry, and bring the needy and wandering into thy house; then shall thy light shine forth as the morning, and thy justice shall go before thy face." And, during the following week, she repeats: "Give alms to the poor, and it shall pray for thee to the Lord; for as water quenches fire, so do alms extinguish sin." That is, if we have repented of our sins, almsgiving will satisfy for them; and if we have not, almsgiving will help us to have contrition to repent, and will move God to give us abundant grace; He will be obliged, as it were, by gratitude, to give it to us; for He has said, "As long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me." Almsgiving will not save us without repentance, but it will help us very much to have repentance; and, to impress us with its importance, our Lord seems, in His own description of the last judgment, to make our salvation depend upon the charitable works which we have done in this life. And if, by His grace, we have repented of sin and confessed it, almsgiving will give us a degree of merit and amount of reward which we may, in one sense, call unjust and excessive, so great is the mercy of God.

Fasting, prayer, and alms; self-denial, devotion, and charity; these are the principal good works at this and every time; but they are more urgent and necessary now than usual, if we wish to obtain the special fruit of this holy season. And, besides these, we must not put away the spirit of humiliation and penance expressed in receiving the ashes this morning. These are not for Ash-Wednesday alone, but for the whole of Lent. We must abandon, in spirit at least, the vain distinctions by which we are trying to raise ourselves above others, and follow, at a great distance, the example of our God and Saviour, who, being our Creator and absolute Master, became the servant of servants for our sake. And we have an immense number of sins which are not yet fully expiated; for these we must do penance sometime or other, before death or after it, in this world or in purgatory. We can do it better now than at any other time; first, because we are obliged to do some difficult things, which can be made to pay this temporal debt if they are done with the right spirit and intention; and, also, because penance is the spirit of the season, and we can come to the church oftener, and do of our own accord other things which are a little inconvenient and put us to some trouble, without any danger of attracting attention or of getting proud about it; for others will be doing the same.

Finally, my brethren, in the words of the Apostle, "We exhort you that you receive not the grace of God in vain." This may be our last Lent; it certainly will be for some of us; but, at any rate, we shall not feel sorry to have spent it as if it were so. God's love for us is immense; He is continually giving us fresh graces, which we are trampling under our feet; but there will come a time when I will not say His patience will be exhausted, but when, in the course of His providence, we must be taken from this world, and grace for us will be no more. Then, when we lie on our death-bed, we shall look back—if, indeed, we are able to collect our thoughts—upon the gifts of God which we have thrown away, and wish most earnestly for a day, or even an hour, of the time that we have wasted. Then, if we have spent this Lent badly, we shall remember it and the others that we have neglected, and bitterly repent our neglect when it is too late. Then we shall fear and tremble at the thought of the awful judgment of God, before whose face we are so soon to appear; or, if we have confidence that by His mercy the guilt of our sins has been taken away, we shall still feel how unfit we are, after a sinful life, to remain in His sight, and shall see the flames of purgatory prepared to expiate those offences for which this Lent and the others we have wasted might have atoned. Perhaps years of suffering will await us there instead of the few days of penance which we have refused in this life. And, even if we have spent this time well, we shall then see clearly how we might have spent it better; and every good work which we could properly have done, which we had the grace and opportunity for, and yet did not do, will give us more sorrow than its omission gave relief.

But let us hope better things. There is no reason why this Lent should not be for us all that God meant it to be. That it may be so, the first thing to do, and the most agreeable of all, is to get into the grace and friendship of God, if we are now in sin; and then we have only to go on and do what we can, not in a grudging or weary spirit, but cheerfully and with our whole heart, to please our good God, who loves us each as much as if we were His only creature, and has done infinitely more for us already than we can ever do for Him. His Blessed Mother and the saints, especially St. Joseph, under whose patronage the greater part of Lent almost always comes, will help us, and we shall have joy enough in our souls to fully make up for all that is unpleasant or tiresome. And all the while we shall, by penance, be shortening the road that lies between us and our true home in heaven, where our Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier, the Blessed Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, is waiting to have us come and be happy with Him for all eternity.

Sermon IV.
Pretended and Real Christians.
(At Special Lenten Service.)

2 Cor. vi. 1.
"And we do exhort you
that you receive not the grace of God in vain."

What is the reason, my dear brethren, that you are all here to-night? I know very well what it is. There are very few who have not one and the same reason. You came because you wish, when you are removed out of this world, to reach the kingdom of heaven. You came because you would secure yourselves from the punishments denounced by God against the sinner. You came here to-night because you feel a strong interest in the salvation of your souls. It is the grace of God which stirs within your hearts and impels you to come. Now you are here, I say to you, with St. Paul, "Let not this grace of God be in vain." It is not enough to come within the church-walls and hear the voice of the preacher, unless you arc also willing and anxious to follow out his instructions.

I want to tell you what it is to be rightly and truly called a Christian, and to have a well-grounded hope of salvation. A vast number of absurd notions are afloat in the minds of many as to what it is to be a Christian. Where they came from, I cannot tell. It is not from the Church, for she never has taught them, and never can teach them. It is not from good sense and right reason, for they teach exactly the contrary. It must be from the devil, for he is said, in Scripture, to be a liar and the father of lies, and these lies are the very ones which are the most destructive of the soul. One of these lying notions is that outward communion with the Church of God renders a man a true Christian, and makes him sure of his salvation. The Pharisees had this idea. "Are we not children of Abraham?" they said. But what did St. John the Baptist say? "Say not to yourselves, We have Abraham for our father; for I say unto you that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. Bring forth, therefore, fruit worthy of penance." [Footnote 8]

[Footnote 8: St. Matthew iii. 9.]

And our Saviour said unto them, "If you be the children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham." If there are any Catholics foolish enough to build their hopes of salvation on the mere fact of being Catholics, without having the spirit and the works of the Catholic religion, let them consider the fearful denunciation of our Lord against them. Take the parable of the wheat and the tares. The kingdom of heaven is like to a man who sowed wheat in his field, and by-and-by, when it came up, a quantity of weeds, or tares, came up with it. The servants asked their lord, "Shall we not go out and pull up the tares?" "No," he replied; "lest, pulling out the tares, ye pull out the wheat with them. Suffer them to grow together until the harvest, and then the wheat shall be gathered into my barn, and the tares shall be bound up into bundles to be burned in the fire." The question is not—Am I growing in the field of the Church? but—Am I the wheat? or the tares, fit only for the burning? Our Lord never seems to grow tired of denouncing this doctrine. Listen to His description of the last judgment: "And when the master of the house shall be gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand without, and knock at the door, saying: Lord, open to us; and he answering, shall say to you: I know not whence you are. Then you shall begin to say: We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets. And he shall say to you: I know not whence you are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity." [Footnote 9]

[Footnote 9: St. Luke xiii. 25-27.]

You see, then, the plea of being familiar in the house of God, of eating and drinking in His presence, is of no avail. Others, who are not in the outward Church of God, though in it in heart and soul, may enter the kingdom of God, but all the wicked in the Church shall be thrust out.

"There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. When you shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and you shall be cast out. And they shall come from the east and from the west, and from the north and from the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God." It is no doubt of immense and incalculable benefit to be within the pale of the Church, and within reach of the Sacraments, but if you presume on this alone, instead of getting any benefit, you will only make them the occasion of your damnation. You have received this great grace, but remember that you are thereby rendered responsible for the right use of it. "Brethren, beware lest you receive this grace of God in vain."

Now, there is another false idea of what it is to be a Christian, and I am convinced that this prevails much more extensively, for, after all, few are foolish enough to build their hopes of salvation exclusively in the mere fact of being outward members of the Church of God.

This idea is, that, if a man belongs to the Church and does some good and religious acts, he can indulge himself to some extent in mortal sin, and still be a Christian and expect heaven. I know very well there are many sinners who know better. When they sin, they are aware of what they are about: they know well that they lose heaven, and that they renounce all pretensions to be true Christians, and this salutary knowledge drives them back to repentance and their duty; but are there not some who persuade, or half persuade, themselves to the contrary? They drink in sin like water, and make themselves out to be pretty good Christians notwithstanding. Do they not go to Mass? Do they not appear occasionally in the tribunal of penance? Do they not cry, Lord, Lord, and beat their breasts, and call to mind that there is such a being as God, and that they must do something now and then to please Him, or else He will get angry with them? And then they go off and sin as hard as they can, until they come to Mass again, and beat their breasts once more, and cry out, Lord, Lord, again.

The Chinese do very much the same thing. They set up a huge, ugly idol in their temples, and now and then go and prostrate themselves before it, and burn incense, and make some offering. This is the sum and substance of religion with them, and I fear it is the idea some Catholics, in their ignorance of their holy religion and through their evil disposition, have formed to themselves, too. Sin all the week, and try to appease the anger of the Almighty on the Sunday by some false and hypocritical acts of worship! Why, they must think God to be something like the idols of the heathen, instead of being, as He is, the God of in finite power, and wisdom, and goodness.

What is the story of such people in the confessional? Sin, mortal sin, is a matter of course with them. Have they undertaken to deny themselves anything they had a strong desire for, in order not to commit mortal sin? No indeed! They think it quite excuse enough that they were tempted. "I could not help it, I was tempted." "Are you determined not to commit this sin again?" "I do not know; I will not unless I am tempted." The power of God is held very cheap by such people. They stand ready to sell it for little or nothing at any time: for a filthy gratification, for a drunken debauch, for a dollar or two. Judas sold our Lord for thirty pieces of silver. They would sell Him for two or three. Such a person comes to confession after an interval of a year or so. What is his story? Guilty of frequent absence from Holy Mass without any excuse—guilty of repeated drunkenness—guilty of cursing, swearing, and indecent language—guilty of unchaste conduct. Such has been his life for many years past; and such, it is to be feared, will be his life until death closes it. His purposes of amendment are only on his lips, and not in his heart. They are made, not to be fulfilled, but to be broken. And yet such men persuade themselves that this kind of religion is acceptable to God, and that it is going to bring them to heaven.

Of what value are your prayers it you lead such a life? The prophet Isaias tells you: "Offer sacrifice no more in vain: incense is an abomination to me. The new moons, and the Sabbaths, and the other festivals, I will not abide; your assemblies are wicked. My soul hateth your new moons, and your solemnities; they are become troublesome to me: I am weary of bearing them. And when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you; and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear; for your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the evil of your devices from my eyes; cease to do perversely, learn to do well." [Footnote 10]

[Footnote 10: Isaias i. 13-17.]

Now, I have placed before your eyes the picture of a false and hypocritical religion, on the one hand; I will hold up before you, on the other, the idea of a real, true, genuine Christianity, which will certainly lead the soul to heaven—the idea of our Lord Himself in the holy Gospels. He invariably represents the true Christian as one thoroughly converted from the evil of his ways. He compares him to a tree— "A good tree," He says, "cannot bring forth bad fruit; neither can a bad tree bring forth good fruit." Why not? Because there is good sap in the good tree, which goes alike into all the fruit of the tree, and makes it all of a good quality, whilst the harsh and sour sap of the bad tree affects all its fruit, and makes it all bad.

A real Christian has a thoroughly good disposition. He fears God, and keeps His commandments. This principle of his affects all his actions. The whole tenor and course of his life is good. He no longer brings forth evil actions. He may have been bad once, but he has turned once for all and finally from the evil of his ways, and has become good. Once he had a bad disposition; he committed sin, and gratified his unlawful passions, in spite of God and His commandments, and his fruit or actions were corrupted by his bad dispositions. They were all worthless for eternal life. But he turned to God with his whole heart; he was grafted into Christ, and it is the sap and nourishment of Christ that flows through his soul, rendering him a new man, and his actions meritorious of an everlasting reward. To be a Christian is represented also under this very figure. St. Paul says: "But you have not so learned Christ, but you have been taught in Him to put off, according to the former conversation, the old man, who is corrupted according to the desire of error. And be renewed in the spirit of your mind: and put on the new man, who, according to God, is created in justice, and holiness of truth." [Footnote 11]

[Footnote 11: Eph. iv. 20-24.]

And then we have a beautiful summary of the practical uprightness and candor of the thus newly-created man, and of the excellent fruit of virtue which should proceed from him: "Wherefore putting away lying, speak ye the truth every one to his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be angry, and sin not; let not the sun go down upon your anger. Give not place to the devil. Let him that stole, steal no more; but rather let him labor, working with his hands that which is good. Let no evil speech proceed from your mouth. … Let all bitterness and anger, and indignation and clamor, and blasphemy be put away from you. … And be ye kind and merciful and forgiving, even as God has forgiven you in Christ." [Footnote 12]

[Footnote 12: Ibid. iv. 25-32.]

These are, indeed, golden words, which deserve to be read over time and again, and pondered in our hearts, and embodied, every one of them, in fervent prayers and ardent desires, arising like incense out of our hearts to God, that we may have the grace to realize in ourselves the pattern of the true Christian which they present to us.

Let us listen once more to the holy apostle, threatening us if we fail to conform to this measure and standard of the Christian life: "The night is past, and the day is at hand; let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. Let us walk honestly as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in contention and envy; but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh in its concupiscences." [Footnote 13]

[Footnote 13: Rom. xiii. 12-14.]

Again: "Know ye not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Be not deceived. Neither fornicators, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners, shall possess the kingdom of God; and such some of you were, but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God." [Footnote 14]

[Footnote 14: I Cor, vi. 9-11.]

You see that unless one puts away all these things he has no right to the hopes of a Christian. A Christian is a follower of Christ. Do we follow Christ when we go to places of drunkenness and debauchery? Do we follow Christ when we refuse to forgive our enemies? Do we follow Christ when we are covetous and hard hearted?

Look at the first Christians. They were Jews; but when they heard the news of the Gospel of Christ, they turned with their whole hearts to conform to it. They burned their bad books. They quit their evil ways. They confessed their sins. They were even willing to sell all their goods, and throw the proceeds into a common fund, because this religion appeared to them of more value than all the world besides. They were one in heart and soul. They were steadfast in prayer, and blameless in their lives. You might say of them, without hesitation, that they were of such as should be saved, and their names were written in the Book of Life.

Look at the martyrs. When it was a question of obeying God, they laid down their lives rather than disobey. They did not commit mortal sin, and say, "Oh! it is nothing. I will just swing the censer to that image, or offer that sacrifice, for the fire is too hot, or the sword is too keen, but I will still remain a Christian in my heart." No, indeed! They were not Christians of this sort; but they suffered by the fire, and by the sword, and from the wild beasts, and all kinds of cruel deaths, and thus manfully they earned the kingdom of heaven. These were Christians; and they teach us what that sacred name of Christian means. What kind of Christians are we? Let each one ask himself this question: Do I come up to the standard? Am I worthy of the name? Have I any real, well-grounded hope of salvation? Am I, this moment, in a state of salvation or of damnation? Have I the principle, the fixed, well-grounded principle, which ought to govern all the actions of a Christian? Have I considered this matter, and looked it steadily in the face?

These are important questions, and now is the time to answer them. If you have been Christian in name heretofore, but heathen in life, do not let this Lent go by without a thorough change. Arise out of this miserable state, and put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Devote the whole of this Lent to this purpose. Say—I have a most important business to transact, and it must be done at once, before the Lent is over. Turn away from all sin with horror, and to God with your whole heart. Drop all foolish amusement. Drop all sinful company. Drop all excess in eating and drinking. Drop, as far as possible, all anxiety about business, or any worldly affairs, and give your attention to your poor soul. Think, oh! think of eternity, of death, of judgment, of the punishments denounced upon sinners. Do not let the thoughts of these things leave your minds. Force yourselves to think upon them—it is all-important to you. And pray: cry to God for mercy. The promise is sure: "Ask, and ye shall receive; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you." Make such a use of this season of penance as God and the Church wish you to, and you will find it the best, the most profitable, the most joyful of your whole life.

You will exclaim—I was poor, wretched, blind, now I see, now I am rich in grace, now I am indeed happy, for God has spoken the word of peace to my soul. Never, never more will I be so ungrateful as to offend Him again.

Sermon V.
The Sins And Miseries Of The Dram-seller.

Habacuc II. 15.
"Woe to him that giveth drink to his friend,
and presenteth his gall, and maketh him drunk."

I once made a journey to a strange country; and so utterly at variance did all the social customs and personal lives of its inhabitants seem to be with the ordinary habits of people of this world, that I thought for a moment I must have stumbled upon beings who had been transplanted from some other planet.

Among other remarkable features in their character, I noticed that, instead of being as ambitious of obtaining a high reputation amongst their neighbors as men generally are, the inhabitants of that country were striving, as it appeared to me, during every leisure hour they could spare from their daily labor, to lower themselves in the estimation of others and become degraded. Instead of riches, they sought poverty; instead of learning, ignorance; instead of health, disease; and a premature death rather than a long life.

The means to which they resorted to bring this about seemed equally strange. By a sort of general consent, a certain number of them were chosen to absorb all the respectability, property, and comfort of the rest. These individuals distributed themselves about in different quarters of the towns, and you could easily have recognized their habitations from the rest for being the finer buildings, which increased in size as the surrounding dwellings of their neighbors became the more squalid, desolate, and uninhabitable. They, with their wives and children, also added the more to their comfort and luxury as the families about them became the nakeder and the hungrier. So far was all this carried, that, I observed, not a few, after having given up all their own, would often go and steal from others, and carry not only money, but even articles of furniture and clothing, to these men, who seemed also to be very popular persons and great favorites, if I might judge of the number of their clients and the pleasure apparently derived from long visits to them, to the loss of the company of their friends and families, and of their natural rest after wearisome days of toil.

I wondered greatly at all this, and asked my guide to explain it to me. "Do you not see," said he, "that these rich and powerful persons are in possession of a wonderful elixir? It is said to produce happiness for those who may obtain a little of it, and these people are so anxious to be happy that they eagerly give up all they have, and all they hope for in this world and the next, in order to get some of it." "I do not see," I said, "that it makes those who use it happy; on the contrary, they seem to me to be really bartering all their means of happiness away, and getting nothing but misery in exchange." "You need only look around you upon those comfortless homes and diseased men and women, and glance at their daily lives, to confirm the truth of your observation," he replied. "Then these poor, misguided souls are only grasping at shadows of happiness, and losing the reality in the meanwhile?" "You have spoken the truth," said he; "and you need not be surprised at it, for the country you are in is called the Land of the Shadow of Happiness." "I will tarry no longer here," said I, "for the sight sickens me. I will return quickly to my own country." "So you may," said my guide; "but the seller of the shadow of happiness lives and thrives with you also." "Does he?" I asked. "And what may he be called?"

"The Dram-seller."

I awoke from my reverie, and found myself standing, not in a strange land, but in the streets of my own city, before a fine brick building, ornamented with cut stone, proudly rearing its showy front, and looking down with contempt upon the humble homes of the poor that surrounded it; and glittering in the sunshine shone the gilded sign-board over its doors, "IMPORTED WINES AND LIQUORS."

Yes, the dram-seller lives and thrives with us, too—the vender of the shadow of happiness, and dealer in ignorance, disease, degradation, poverty, ruined reputations, strifes, jealousies, insanity, delirium tremens, and dishonored and early graves. The drunkards whom he makes are wretched enough, and commit, through their intemperance, the most grievous of crimes; but I know not if the sins and miseries of the dram-seller be not worse and far more hopeless of reparation than theirs. For in one it is often the result of weak and uneducated minds, unable to use God's gifts in moderation, or to bear up against the trials and temptations of this life; but the other must be a cold, heartless, calculating, money-worshipping soul, who can thus fatten himself upon the sinful appetites of others, and from year to year defraud his neighbor by the sale of his vile, adulterated trash, and take the hard-earned dollars of his customers in exchange for it without a blush.

The dram-seller and his traffic is a well-known and prominent rock of scandal in the community, whether it be the secret sale from one barrel of beer or liquor in the earth-floored shanty, or the flourishing business of a well-stocked and gilded saloon.

What are the sins of the dram-seller? He sins against justice and against charity.

He sins against justice. To all who have examined the matter, it is a well-established fact that in every case this business is necessarily connected with the sale of false, adulterated articles, and with an unreasonable, unrighteous, and usurious profit. And the only excuse any one connected with it has ever been able to offer is, that they are obliged, if they sell at all, to keep cheap liquors for poor people, or that, if the article is adulterated, it is none of their business, for they sell it, either just as they purchase it from large dealers, or, at the worst, only add a certain modicum of water, as they say the raw spirit might do the poor people harm!

But they know the fact as well as I know it, that scarcely one drop is dealt out by them that is not more or less adulterated; that their so-called wines never saw the juice of the grape; that their brandies, and rums, and cordials are all composed of proof spirit, coloring matter, drugs of the most poisonous character and deadly strength, and water. I am in possession of a document circulated privately among these manufacturers of "imported wines and liquors," which purports to give recipes for making any kind of wine, liquor, or cordial you can name, with the address of certain houses where the drugs I have alluded to may be obtained.

A friend was invited by a dram-seller to visit his vaults. Taking out the bung of a large hogshead, he drew up from the liquor by a cord a gauze bag of very small dimensions, and, with a peculiar wink of his eye, remarked, "You see, that's the way we manage it." "Oh! that's the way you manage it, is it?" the friend replied. "I am very glad to know it."

The cheap materials from which the drink ordinarily sold is manufactured, and the large adulteration with water made on their own premises by the retailers, enables them to make the most exorbitant, usurious profits. The popular wonder is, how so many can carry on the business and make money by it. That is the reason.

If the character of the drink sold, or the adulteration of it, were always harmless to the consumer, there might be a semblance of palliation to this iniquity, though no just excuse even then; for in such a case the consumer does not get either what he supposes or the worth of his money. But when we see the dreadful effects produced by these liquors, the morbid cravings which they engender in those who partake of them, the extra-ordinary prostration of mind and body caused by a fit of intoxication on them, the physical and moral degradation resulting from their constant use, there can be no excuse for the dispensing of such noxious articles, and he who practises it is guilty of a fraud—a fraud of the basest and most criminal character upon the people, and makes himself a fit object for the scorn and righteous indignation of a just community.

Am I not right in saying that the dram-seller sins against justice?

2. The dram-seller sins against charity. He sins against himself, his spiritual and temporal good, and that of his family.

The business is a proximate occasion of sin, and good morals can never allow one to remain in that state. In the first place, it is a proximate occasion of the sin of drunkenness for himself and for the members of his household. The necessity of pleasing and attracting his customers obliges him often to treat and be treated during the day. The effect of this constant tippling is very visible in the persons of those who have been some time in the business, and the number of those who fall into the sin of drunkenness from the proximity of the occasion furnished by the sale is very great. It is not an unfrequent occurrence for them to take the pledge, in order to prevent themselves from drinking with their customers. Their wives, children, and clerks are exposed to the same occasion of sin. The language and character of the frequenters of the dram-shop are demoralizing to the last degree, not only to the man, but to the wife and children, and pave the way to every conceivable crime.

How many a young man has engaged in this vile traffic, who commenced it sober and virtuous, but who, by the occasions it presented, soon became a degraded and irreclaimable sot! And when he first thought of going into it, how his conscience reproved him, how often he reflected that this was not a fit thing for a good Catholic and practical Christian. When he met the priest in the street the day or so after the opening of his store or saloon, how he reddened up to the eyes, and was glad if he perchance passed him without observing him his pastor, whose nod, and smile, and shake of the hand, and cheery "God bless you!" he used to be so anxious and happy to have from the hour of childhood. But now his uneasy conscience keeps him away altogether from the Sacraments, and often from Mass. If people enquire what has become of him lately, or wonder that he is seen no longer at the altar, the answer that he "has opened a liquor store" is deemed a sufficient one. And knowing the wrongs from it, I thank God that there is such a sense of Christian propriety and rectitude in the public conscience left amongst us, that will deem such, a response a sufficient one.

I know that, as time goes on, and the greed of gain takes possession of them, the conscience gets less clamorous: but it is scarcely ever completely blunted. They are always rather ashamed of the business, and never mention the fact of their being engaged in it in an open, frank manner. A person, whom I did not know, called upon me once to consult me upon an affair, and I had occasion to ask him his profession. He replied, evasively, "I am a member of the ---- Convention." "But your business is--" "Oh!--ah! (hesitating) a grocery and liquor store."

But the sin which adds the last and most grievous stain upon the dram-seller and his traffic is the heinous breach of Christian charity against his neighbor. He wrongs his neighbor in his property, his person, his soul, his family, and in all his social relations. He makes bad husbands, bad wives, immoral children. And all good citizens and practical Catholics will bear me out in the assertion that the dram-shop is the gulf which swallows the hard earnings of the laboring classes; the health, property, happiness, life, and well-being of thousands of the community; and is the responsible first cause of the increase of pauperism, and crime, and the consequent burden of taxation upon the State. Recent statistics show that, in the cities of New York and Boston, there is a dram-shop for every one hundred inhabitants; and that, in Boston alone, the arrests for public drunkenness in one year were equal to one in ten of the entire population. This is a horrible state of things. As a contrast, I remember preaching a mission in a certain town where, by the exertions of the parish priest, all Catholics, save one, had given up the traffic. We found the sin of drunkenness in that place comparatively rare. No one who has examined the matter will pretend to dispute the fact that drunkenness increases in the same ratio with the multiplication of the dram shop. It is therefore a public nuisance, a crying scandal amongst us, a proximate occasion of sin, an iniquitous trade in which no good Christian can engage without putting the salvation of his soul in peril.

Such or such a man and his family whom you could name were happy enough before he got enticed into the dram-shop. It was a sight to make the angels smile to witness the clean, bright home that man found on his return from business. Every thing was there to cheer him. The wife welcomed him with an unclouded brow. The children dropped their playthings to run and embrace him. If he had not luxury about him, he had plenty and comfort. Plenty of furniture, plenty of clothes for his work, and a new suit for the Sunday morning. The table wanted nothing but the blessing upon the food whenever the meal time came. The doctor's bill never came so very heavy, and, if one of the family happened to be ill a little longer than common, he felt a worthy pride in being able to go and pay the doctor at his office, and exchange thanks. His name was good in the bank whenever he wanted money; and, as year by year rolled by, he was getting up in the world. Men talked of his "good luck," as they called it. Friends whispered, about election times, that he would make a capital fellow for this or that vacant office in his township. No family stood higher in respect, if they did in wealth, at the parish church than his. Happy and beloved at home in the bosom of his family; honored and respected abroad; at peace with God and man; what fiend will dare bring his foul presence within the circle of so much joy? Alas! for the dark day that he was bidden by the dram-seller to "be neighborly and come in and take a friendly glass." Alas! for the fatal hour when the tempter invited him to "come round of an evening, and be sociable, and not to be such a man-baby tied to his wife's apron-strings." Now it begins the oft-told, woeful tale. A hurried supper, and out for the evening. Later and later he returns, with the signs of liquor on him. He used to try to hide it at first by washing his mouth with water and taking a smart walk. But he takes too much now to care for Appearances; nor is he able for the walk.

In order to smooth over matters, he takes an opportunity on his wife's birthday, and brings out the bottle and proposes her health, and makes her drink with him; and then a little taste of the sugared drops at the bottom of the glass for the children. It is brought out every day now; and when the night comes, the wife sits up late, goes often to the window, watching his return, and there's a heavy weight at her heart that forces from her eyes many a bitter tear. The plague marches fast. He is drunk every Saturday night, and seldom goes to Mass. Work or business is neglected, and the time spent at the bar-room. The money leaks away extraordinarily fast. Articles of furniture are pawned—first for food, soon for drink. The wife helps on destruction by trying to drown her sorrow in a glass of liquor now and then. The best Sunday suit and the new bonnet and shawl are no longer in the wardrobe. The children's bare feet peep out of old shoes, and a strange sadness and silence has come over the once merry little group. They seem to be getting old-fashioned in their ways, and less like children. Is that the reason, I wonder, why there are no new toys and presents now at Christmas or at Easter, as in the days gone by? Soon comes debt. He had to go in debt to procure the necessaries of life, but spared a little of the borrowed money to get his daily drams at the grog-shop. But debt must be paid, and, as he has nothing to discharge it with, a few days of delay, and there is a sheriff's execution in the house. All the furniture swept, away! From bad to worse, from one step to an other: down goes the family to beggary and vice. Frequent quarrels, blows, and curses pass between husband and wife, the children and their parents. He gets an odd job to do now and then, for he is turned out of his regular situation, and drinks a part of the wages, not at his old friend's, but at a low beer-shop; for one night, after the sale of his house and lot, he demanded trust for liquor; but, as he had spent his last dollar, his friend, the dram-seller, told him, "he kept a decent place, and wouldn't have any drunkards around him," and kicked him out of doors, bidding him go home and take care of his wife and family! The wife begs around for broken victuals, with a downcast face, and her old hood pulled far over her forehead to hide a black eye and her untidy hair.

The boy, his eldest boy, that was to be sent to college, was sent up last week to prison for shoplifting; and the girl—where is she gone? Answer me, dram-shop, where is the girl gone? And now I have more to ask of you, O mouth of hell! Where is the house and lot gone to? Where is the furniture gone to? Where now are the good husband, the happy father, the thrifty wife, the faithful mother, the innocent children, the food on the table, the fire on the hearth, the comfort and joy and good name and trust and neighborly confidence, and the good Christians, the pious Catholics, that used to be at Mass every Sunday morning in their places? Answer me. Do you not hear a righteous God, your judge, demanding in tones of wrath, "Dram-shop, where are my children? You—you have robbed me of my beautiful flock!" O cruel dram-seller! O dram-shop! scandal of our times, look upon the ruin you have wrought! See the black cloud which hangs over your dwelling. It is a threatening mass of darkness and woe, made up of heavy curses, of sighs from broken hearts, the gloom of grievous bitterness of spirit; and that cloud is pregnant with hidden lightnings and thunders of the wrath of God descending upon you. "Woe to him that giveth drink to his friend, and presenteth his gall, and maketh him drunk, that he may behold him stripped and naked. Thou art filled with shame instead of glory; drink thou also, and fall fast asleep; the cup of the right hand of the Lord shall compass thee, and shameful vomiting shall be on thy glory." [Footnote 15]

[Footnote 15: Habac. ii. 15, 16.]

Your sin is the sin of Ephraim, whom the prophet reproved. You make to yourself an idol of gain. "And Ephraim said, But yet I am become rich. I have found me an idol: all my labors shall not find me the iniquity that I have committed." [Footnote 16] To that idol you have sacrificed men, women, and children, and brought upon many a wretched soul temporal and eternal ruin—robbing heaven of saints, and filling up the caverns of hell.

[Footnote 16: Osec xii. 8.]
[USCCB: Hosea xii. 9.]

Hear what God answers to Ephraim: "I will meet them as a bear that is robbed of her whelps; I will rend the inner parts of their bodies, and I will devour them as a lion; the beast of the field shall tear them." [Footnote 17]

[Footnote 17: Osec xiii. 8.]
[USCCB: Hosea xiii. 8.]

Your very daily walks must be misery to you, one would suppose. For how can you put on those fine clothes, and see your children clad in warm coats and caps and shoes, and your wife parading that beautiful new silk dress and expensive jewelry, when you know that they were bought with money that ought to have been used to clothe a family that goes about our streets in destitution and nakedness so pitiable that it makes the heart ache? How can you sit down and ask God's blessing upon your plentifully supplied table, if you ever do it now, when the hand that gave you the money to purchase all these luxuries snatched the piece of bread from the mouths of his starving, hungry children? How can you dare go to sleep in your soft, warm bed, listening to that cutting winter's blast as it goes howling past your windows down the street, and forces its way in the open crevices of the drunkard's shanty, freezing the half-clad forms of his neglected little ones, huddled in the corner upon a filthy wisp of straw? Have you a human heart yet left beating in your bosom? Do you know anything of a husband's affection or of a father's love? Oh! then you must be a miserable man. How do your neighbors speak of you? "Oh! he's a rum-seller." And the tone in which it is spoken is a plain index of the contempt they attach to the name. Your wife is designated as "a rum-seller's wife," and of your children it is remarked, "Their father sells liquor." And it is a common reply of many of the most degraded drunkards, that "although they have drunk pretty hard, they thank God they never sold liquor."

Can I ask you to quit it? Yes, I can demand of you to quit it. You admit, and the common sense of the entire community admits, that those low groggeries, in which drunken bacchanalian orgies are of daily and nightly occurrence, ought to be stopped, and that no man who keeps such a place is fit for absolution—that is, none such can claim the right to the sacraments of the Church, living or dying; in a word, cannot save his soul if he be not ready to abandon it. But you tell me that your establishment is not of such a character; you keep a decent house. I would like you to bring me one single liquor-seller who does not say the very same. The business is notoriously vicious and hurtful, and success in it is dependent upon an increase of sin and misery among the people. It is a stumbling-block in the way of the salvation of men addicted to drink, and woe be to that man who dares assume the responsibility for the loss of a soul!

I have a right, then, in the name of the general well-being of the community, in the name of Christian charity, by virtue of the warning of our Lord Jesus Christ, that it were "better for a man to have a mill-stone hanged about his neck, and he be cast into the depth of the sea, rather than scandalize one of the children of God," [Footnote 18] to demand of every man who aids, abets, or by his own act takes part in this abominable scandal, to quit it on peril of damnation.

[Footnote 18: St. Matt, xviii. 6.]

I tell you, moreover, that the holy Catholic Church, which some of you pretend to belong to and to obey, has solemnly declared, in the twenty-second canon of the Third Council of Lateran, that all priests are absolutely forbidden to give absolution to those who remain in any employment, profession, or business which they cannot pursue without sin, because they remain in the occasions of sin. But you insist that such is your business, bad as it is, and you have been brought up to that. Yes, I know it is a bad business, and will be your destruction. And I wish to know if a man must remain a thief because he has been brought up a thief, and never learned an honest trade?

"But the loss, father; I cannot afford it." Do you not hear the words of Jesus Christ thundering in your ears: "If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out. If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off. For it were better for thee to enter lame and blind into life everlasting, than, having two hands or two eyes, to be cast into hell-fire"? [Footnote 19] Where is your Christian faith and trust in God? "Seek first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all these things will be added unto you." [Footnote 20]

[Footnote 19: St. Matt. v. 29.]
[Footnote 20: St. Matt. vi. 33.]

No, no, there is not a single excuse which will avail you. I wish I could find one. Many and many a time I have wished I could frame an excuse for it, when the fact has been thrown into my face that so many of our people are engaged in this diabolical, unchristian traffic, and, as a consequence, have propagated amongst us the vice and miseries of drunkenness.

Do you love your good name as a citizen? Have you any manly pride left? Do you love your religion? Would you shrink from being the instrument of damnation to your neighbor's soul, or of tying the hands of the priest and preventing the spread of the true faith in our country? Do you love your own immortal soul? Do you hope for heaven? Would you like to hear the approval of your Divine Lord and Master on the Last Great Day of Account? Oh! rise up to the dignity of the Christian vocation to which you are called. Stir up within your hearts that fire of generosity which is never totally extinguished in the Catholic breast, and learn to sacrifice something for the love of God and for the salvation of your neighbor's soul.

Believe me, brethren, I have drawn no exaggerated picture of this evil, nor deduced any unwarrantable conclusions. So lamentably true is it all, that, were I to preach this sermon in almost any town or city in the country, there would be found among my hearers some who might imagine I was describing the character and life of their own brother or father, near relation or intimate acquaintance.

I appeal to you, therefore, loyal Catholics, to set your faces against the traffic; to aid the priesthood, in company with all who love God and have the social advancement of our people at heart, in denouncing and laboring to extirpate this scandal from our midst.

To you who have hitherto been engaged in it, from whatsoever motive, I appeal; and beseech of you, with all the fatherly affection of a Christian priest, and with the supplicating tears and sighs of many a broken heart, for God's sake, for the Church's sake, for your soul's sake, to resolve now, and make that resolution good, that hence forth no man shall point the finger of scorn at you and say: "Woe to him that giveth drink to his friend, and presenteth his gall, and maketh him drunk."

Sermon VI.
Communion With Jesus.
(For Holy Thursday.)

St. John vi. 57.
[USCCB: John vi. 56.]
"He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood
abideth in Me, and I in him."

It is right, my dear brethren, that, on this Holy Night we should meditate upon and speak of the solemn and wonderful scene which is commemorated by the Holy Church, the sad farewell which our dear suffering Master took of his disciples before giving Himself up to be crucified, and the institution of the sacred memorial Sacrifice, through which He intended to remain with us always, to be an ever-present Lover and Friend, the Divine Victim for our altars, and the Supreme Offering of thanksgiving for the whole world. Kind Lord, I would I had the tongue of angels to tell the story of all Thou didst on this night for me and all who truly believe in Thee, for human speech is feeble where Thou, my God and my Saviour, art the theme. Help me by Thy grace. Help these Thy people, whose hearts are yearning to hear what Thou hast done; help them, that they may know and understand it better than I can tell them!

The Gospel tells us that our Lord made an appointment with His disciples to meet them, and to eat the Paschal Supper alone with them. "And when the hour was come, He sat down, and the twelve disciples with Him." They met in a large upper chamber, far from tumult and noise. Look in, my dear brethren, upon that group. Jesus you cannot fail to choose from among them all. There is a strange beauty about that face, a beauty which at once attracts and awes the beholder, and, what is more, the countenance tells of the hidden beauty of his soul. There is revealed at one glance the beauty of Holiness itself, the most spotless of all innocent lives, the supreme perfection of all virtue, the mirror of all truth. What kindness beams from out [of] those gentle eyes! What a sweet expression plays about the half-parted lips, as a harbinger of some holy words soon to be spoken! What a calm majesty rests upon that broad, pale forehead, needing no crown of gold to tell its royalty!

Nor would any one mistake who is Master here. One is the object upon whose word, look, or movements the eyes of all the others wait. They call Him Master. Well they may. He is truly Master of all hearts. They call Him Teacher. Well they may. He is the source of all Truth, the Eternal Wisdom, the Word of God. They call Him Lord. Well they may. He is Lord of lords, and King of heaven and earth. It is Jesus. Seated there, only a few know Him yet as He is. But the world will soon know Him, and curse its ignorance and blindness on that day. Around Him are a few disciples, of whom living men, in ignorance of their worth, despise, but when they are dead their tombs will govern the world.

No sooner are they assembled than they know that Jesus has brought them together to bid them farewell. "With desire I have desired to eat this pasch with you before I suffer." Yes, on the morrow He was to be betrayed into the hands of wicked men, and to die in expiation of the sins of the world.

But why this desire? The events will show. It was the time of the great feast of the Passover, which the Jews kept every year to commemorate the miracle which took place when that whole nation was in bondage in Egypt—a miracle which brought about their deliverance. Their Egyptian masters refused to set them free, in spite of many warning plagues which God sent upon them; and at last, one terrible night, the angel of God passed through that doomed land, and in the morning the first-born in every Egyptian house lay dead. The Israelites had been commanded by Almighty God, through Moses, to prepare for this, and what they did became, as God intended, a ceremony typical of the greatest mystery the world has ever known—the death of Jesus Christ on the Cross, the deliverance of the world from the slavery of sin and hell by that death, and the institution of a sacrifice which, should be an ever-present, continual, and lively memorial of that act. This is what they did: They killed a lamb without spot or blemish; ate it with unleavened bread; and sprinkled the door-posts of their houses with its blood. "I am the Lord. The blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be, and I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you, and the plague shall not be on you to destroy you when I shall strike the land of Egypt." [Footnote 21]

[Footnote 21: Exod. xii. 13.]

The performance of this solemn commemorative ceremony was obligatory upon every Jewish family, and this was the occasion which brought our Lord and His disciples together, and you see how exactly the sacrificial death of the Paschal Lamb, the sprinkling of its blood on the door posts, typified the death of Jesus, the Immaculate Lamb of God, whose blood was sprinkled on the wood of the cross. But there is something else for us to note. A part of the lamb was to be eaten, and with unleavened bread. What was that a type of? Was Jesus, the Lamb of God, slain for our sins, to be eaten, and with unleavened bread? Listen to what He said some time before this night: "I am the living bread, which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread which I will give is my flesh for the life of the world." [Footnote 22]

[Footnote 22: St. John vi. 52.]
[USCCB: St. John vi. 51.]

Now, after the Paschal Supper was finished, Jesus took the unleavened bread, and gave thanks, and brake, and gave to them, saying—"This is My body which is given for you. Do this for a commemoration of Me. In like manner the chalice, saying, This is the chalice, the New Testament in My blood, which shall be shed for you." Here then, is a perfect fulfilment of the Old Testament. Here is the real Paschal Sacrifice of the New Testament. The supper-table becomes an altar; Jesus becomes, under the forms of unleavened bread and wine, the victim, and He is at the same time the priest. What He did Himself, he tells His disciples to do. "Do this for a commemoration of Me." Then and there He ordains and consecrates them to be priests, and gives them the awful power of sacrificing His body and blood under the forms of bread and wine.

From that supper-room they go forth to do His words, and to receive the fulfilment of His promise: "I dispose to you, as My Father hath disposed to Me, a kingdom: that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom: and may sit upon thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." [Footnote 23]

[Footnote 23: St. Luke xxii. 29, 30.]

What was all that for? Why this sacrifice of the body and blood of Jesus Christ? Why should this be repeated all over the world? Listen once more: "He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood abideth in Me, and I in him." The reason was that his disciples and all others who should partake of that sacrifice might be united to Him in the closest manner possible—"should abide in Him, and He in them." We call that sacred act Communion—communion with Jesus. That is what it is, brethren. Our souls and bodies are united in a mysterious manner to the Divine Person of our dear Lord and Saviour, who became man and died on the cross for our salvation. He calls us to this communion, and gives Himself to us as the sweetest pledge of His Divine Love, as the most precious means of our sanctification, as a comforting food, as a holy offering by which we may praise and give thanks to God, as a feast of joy and the kiss of peace to the forgiven sinner.

If the Cross be, as it is, the measure of sin by which we offend Jesus, Communion is the measure of the love with which Jesus loves us. Love is measured by sacrifice. One loves another only a little if he is content to give up only a little in the other's favor. His love is perfect if he willingly gives up all. This is what our Lord does in Holy Communion. He sacrifices all for us, because He sacrifices Himself. What do I mean by this sacrifice?

He makes Himself so utterly nothing for us, that He does not keep even His appearance. He hides His divinity, His blessed and beautiful Person, under the veils of bread and wine, and in that state He abandons Himself so utterly to our power that we can do what we will with Him. The life of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament is a life of total self-abnegation. He does not even protect Himself from ill-treatment, from the contempt and scoffing sneer of the unbeliever, from the mockery of silly children, nor from the horrible sacrileges committed against Him by bad Catholics. He can suffer all that, and does so without a murmur, in order that He may approach us, and that we may receive Him in such a manner as shall be the best for our comfort, for our joy, for our soul's peace. We know by experience, I hope, what a good, happy communion is. Is it not the moment of supreme happiness, and of such happiness that nothing else is like it in the world? Then we cry Lord, now that Thou art mine and I am Thine, I am all blessed. There is no chord in the heart that does not vibrate with thrills of love at the presence of Jesus. He makes us feel then, more than we can express, how much He loves us; and cold must be the heart that does not respond with some emotion to the sweetness of His loving embrace.

The love of our dear Saviour for men is more ardent, more constant, more, shall I say, anxious than our love can ever be; and the reason is, because His love is wholly unselfish. The life of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament proves it. He does nothing there apparently for Himself, nor takes any thought of Himself that we can divine. It is for us that He lives so. For our love He has given up all.

You may say that it was by dying for us that He proved His love the best, as He Himself said, "Greater love hath no man than that he should lay down his life for his friend." Yes; but do you not see that it is just in the Blessed Sacrament that He brings that proof home to us? It is a memorial of His passion and death. He has linked the two together, so that they make only one act. The sacrifice of the Mass, in which the bread and wine are consecrated into His body and blood, and the sacrifice of Calvary, are one essential act.

It was in the night in which He was betrayed that He instituted it. On this night. What did He say? "This is My body which is given for you. This is My blood which shall be shed for you. Do this for a commemoration of Me"—of Me, upon whom the shadows of death are already falling—of Me, who even now begin to be sorrowful and sad at heart, knowing that My hour is come—of Me, who to-morrow will be spit upon, and scourged, and crowned with thorns, and nailed to a cruel cross, and suffer the bitter agonies of a horrible death for you, My beloved—you for whom I came into the world—you for whom I live—you for whom I die. "A little while I leave you, and a little while I come unto you. Remember that, when we shall meet again. When I come to you in Holy Communion, then you will receive One who you know loved you to the end. I will come to you, and be the surest pledge of what I have done for you, and how much I have loved you."

Holy Communion is one of the most powerful means of sanctification granted to us. What shall the presence of the All-Holy be unable to do? What other light and grace could we desire both to detect and shun all evil, and to delight in what is pure and true? Oh! when Jesus comes to the willing heart, and finds a welcome there, all is easy. No tempest of passion or of doubt is to be feared when the Master is with us. My dear brethren, this world is very foolish when it sneers at the sanctification of the soul, or bids us follow its guidance in getting rid of the power or shame of sin, and in our strivings after higher and better things. Little it knows about the true progress of the soul. Jesus, the Eternal Wisdom, is the sole teacher. A fervent communion with Him will do what the world cannot do. It will make us holy. It will make our souls sacred to God—more sacred to Him than the altar before which we bow, or the precious vessels upon it that hold His Body and Blood. If you would confirm that sanctity, come often to the source of sanctity. Come so often that He may be said to abide with you; then will you surely live and die a saint.

In the next place, Communion is an act which possesses a peculiar significance for the forgiven sinner. It should have. It was sin that made Him die, and Communion is a memorial of His death. But why is it that a contrite sinner, burdened with the memory of the many outrages he has committed against Jesus Christ by his bad life, by his cursing, his profanation of the Holy Name, his drunkenness and debaucheries, his lies and thefts, his dark crimes, it may be, that make even his brother men shun him as they would a poisonous reptile—why is it, I ask, that even such an one, coming, heartily sorry, to Confession, ready and eager to amend his life and do better, and so receives absolution, should have such a strange longing, as all forgiven sinners do have, to get Communion, and that as soon as possible? One would think they would rather fear to approach Him, and dread to be confronted with the awful memorial of their crucified and so cruelly offended Lord. Not so. Their hearts are Christian after all; and He draws them to Him closer and closer by the strong cords of love the moment they turn to Him. True, He appoints His priest to forgive them in His name. But that does not satisfy the desire with which He desires to be reconciled with them in person. "Come to Me," He cries from the altar; "come to Me now. My poor lost one. Come, get My kiss of peace. Come, we have been separated too long. I have been watching you. I have heard you praying. I saw you go into the confessional. I heard you tell your sins. I saw the tears course down your cheeks. I felt every throb of your heart. My hand, too, gave you absolution and full forgiveness for all. You went there one of the devil's own. Now you are Mine. Come, now, take Me to your heart. We will be friends again, and I shall have only one reproach to make you; Oh! why have you stayed so long away?" The forgiven sinner knows Jesus is saying all this. Do you wonder that he goes home from confession a happy man; that he counts the hours until he can come back, and thinks the time long until he can go up to the Holy Table, and there clasp his long-forgotten and neglected Lord to his bosom? Oh! the earnest, upturned face, radiant with joy, which makes the priest's hand tremble with sympathetic emotion as he gives him the Holy Sacrament. You have seen friends long separated and divided come together and make up. You know what a touching scene it is. There are smiles upon your lips and sparkling tears in your eyes at the same moment. So it is often here when Jesus meets and makes up with old hardened sinners. Blessed, a million times blessed, be the kind and loving heart of Jesus, which, once laid open by the spear, is never shut to any one who will enter in and abide there.

Holy Communion is a Feast of Thanksgiving. That is the meaning of the word Eucharist—thanksgiving. It is one of the names of the Blessed Sacrament. You remember that when Jesus first broke the bread on this night He gave thanks. He meant that we also should use it as a worthy and precious thank-offering for all He has done for us; for having created us; for having redeemed us; for having died for us; for His great love in this Holy Sacrament; for all the benefits with which He has crowned our lives. Who is there that can approach here without crying out with the Psalmist, "What shall I render to the Lord for all that He has rendered to me? I will take the chalice of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord." [Footnote 24]

[Footnote 24: Ps. cxv. 3, 4.]
[USCCB: Ps. cxv. 12, 13.]

No word of thanks at your Communion—not a grateful thought in your heart? Oh! how is this? Have you really come back to make up with Him, or have you come—O horrible thought!—only like Judas to betray Him? Does He say to you as He said to that lost disciple, "Friend, dost thou betray the Son of Man with a kiss?"