Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THIED MEDITATION. Few Men live conformably to their End, working out their Salvation. FIRST SUBJECT.
All seek their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ’s. Phil. ii. 21. Whence it comes to pass that men drop into hell in crowds like the flakes of snow in winter, and that multitudes perish.
There are many, says St. Gregory,
who arrive at belief, there are few who attain to the heavenly kingdom. Most follow God with their mouth, while by their works they keep at a distance from Him. Jesus Christ Himself, who from all eternity knows the number of His elect, has said:
Many are called, but few are chosen. Matt. xxii. 14. Cast your eyes on the condition of the world in which we live: how sad it is !
The whole world lieth in wickedness. 1 John v. 19.
There is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land. By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committingadultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood. Hosea iv. 1, 2. Have pity on the many and the noble souls which are perishing, and do all that is in your power to gain them for Heaven; but above all labour at your own salvation, and apply yourself to the work with fear and trembling. If from among so large a number of people a single one, a hundred, a thousand, were certain to be lost, you would have to tremble for yourself; you would have to fear that this inevitable doom might fall upon you. How appalling then is it to reflect that the greater number of mankind are not saved! You have but one soul; and once lost that is lost for ever. SECOND SUBJECT. Let us recall to mind the insatiable zeal, the prodigious labours, by which the blessed confessors, the martyrs, the apostles, and Jesus Christ Himself, wrought out their title to Heaven. What earnest and salutar…
