[Footnote 37: Apoc. iii., 1.]
What are the signs, my brethren, by which you would pronounce a man dead? Surely, that he has no longer the use of any of his senses; that he can neither see, hear, taste, touch nor smell. If nothing remained to him but faint breathing, and a fluttering, feeble pulse, you would already weep for him as lost to you, and consider it only as the matter of a few moments to draw the sheet over his face, and prepare his shroud.
Now this is just the deplorable state of a man in mortal sin.
Let me illustrate this. If you saw a person walking upon a railroad track, and the train came thundering along directly in front of him, and yet he proceeded on his way, totally unmindful of your shouts and warnings of danger, you would throw up your hands and exclaim: "Ah! God have mercy on him, poor man; he must be totally blind and deaf—he is as good as dead." And so he is in effect; for the train passes over him, and scatters his mangled body hither and thither. Of what use to him was his power of motion? He had the name of a living man, and is dead. So death is coming upon you, sinner, sudden and destructive. How many sermons have you not heard upon that awful subject? How many warnings have you not had in the deaths, ever unlocked for, alas! too often unprovided for, among your friends, acquaintances, and in the very bosom of your family. You hear not, you see not; no warning will turn you from your fatal track. You are as good as dead.
If you saw a young girl walking to the brink of one of those dreadful precipices formed by the lofty palisades on the North River, and, despite the cries of her friends, she continued her walk, gazing up at the sky, would you not say: "Ah! poor thing, she must be killed; she is as good as dead." Oh, young woman, you are walking upon the brink of a precipice, by your dangerous familiarities, your late hours, your improper company-keeping; and despite the cries of your father, your mother, the pleadings of your friends, and the warning voice of your confessor, your heedlessness in sin will destroy you, body and soul, and you must lose reputation, honor, salvation, eternity. Deaf to the voice of God, you are as good as dead.
Jesus daily prepares his divine banquet for you; but, alas! you have lost your spiritual taste for that heavenly food, and there is no life in you—you are dead; according to the words of the divine Saviour: "Amen, Amen. I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you." [Footnote 38]
[Footnote 38: St. John vi., 54.]
[Transcriber's note: The USCCB reference is: St. John vi., 53.]
The Lord strikes you with afflictions of various kinds: disease, loss of friends, misfortune in your business. He sends his angel of death to your very doors; but you are insensible to his chastisements: they affect you no more than if you were a statue of marble. Is not this to be indeed dead?