Oh, that i had time to repair the past!

One of the greatest causes of distress and anguish to the careless Christian at the hour of death is the remembrance of the bad use he made of the time he should have employed to acquire merits for Heaven, but which he used, alas, only to heap up punishment for himself in hell. Oh, that I had time to repair the past! Time shall be no longer!

I. Oh, that I had time to repair the past! Thus will the careless Christian speak. But when? When the oil in the lamp is consumed: when he is on the point of entering into eternity. One of the greatest causes of the distress and anguish of the careless Christian at the hour of death is the remembrance of the bad use he has made of the time he ought to have used to acquire merits for Heaven, but which he has used to damn his soul. Oh, that I had time! Do you seek for time? You have lost so many nights in gambling, and so many years in indulging the senses, without ever thinking of your soul, and now you seek for time! But now time shall be no longer (Apoc. x. 6). Were you not already admonished by preachers to be prepared for death? Were you not told that it would come upon you when you least expected it? Be you ready, says Jesus Christ, for at what hour you think not the Son of man will come (Luke xii. 40). You have despised My admonitions, and voluntarily squandered the time My goodness bestowed upon you in spite of your demerits; but now time is at an end! Listen to the words in which the priest that assists you will tell you to depart from this world: Go forth, Christian soul, from this world. And where will you go? To eternity! To eternity! Death respects neither subjects nor monarchs; when it comes, it does not wait even for a moment. Thou hast appointed his bounds, which cannot be passed (Job xiv. 5).

Oh, what terror will the dying man feel at hearing the assisting priest tell him to depart from this world! What dismay will he experience in saying to himself: "This morning I am living, and this evening I shall be dead! Today I am in this house; tomorrow I shall be in the grave; and where will my soul be found?" His terror will be increased when he sees the death-candle lighted, and when he hears the confessor order the relatives to withdraw from his chamber, and to return to it no more. It shall be still more increased when the confessor gives him the Crucifix, and tells him to embrace it, saying: "Take Jesus Christ to your heart, and think no more of this world." He takes the Crucifix, and kisses it; but, in kissing it, he trembles at the remembrance of the many injuries he has offered to Jesus Christ. He would now wish to repent sincerely of all his injuries to his Saviour, but he sees that his repentance is forced by the necessity of his approaching death. "He," says St. Augustine "who is abandoned by sin before he abandons it, gives it up not freely, but through necessity."

II. The common delusion of worldlings is that earthly things are great, and that the things of Heaven, as being distant and uncertain, appear to be of little value. They regard tribulations as insupportable, and grievous sins as unimportant. The miserable beings are as if they were shut up in a room filled with smoke, which hinders them from seeing the objects before their eyes. But at the hour of death this darkness will vanish, and the soul will begin to see things in their real colours. At that hour all temporal things appear to be what they really are — vanity, lies, deception; and the things of eternity will assume their true value. Oh! How important will Judgment, Hell, and Eternity, so much disregarded during life, appear at the time of death! According as they will begin to appear in their true colours, the fears of the dying man will increase. "The nearer the sentence of the Judge approaches, the more sensible the fear of condemnation becomes," says St. Gregory. Hence the sick man will say: "Oh, in what anguish do I die! Unhappy me! Oh, that I knew that so unhappy a death awaited me!" You did not know it, but you should have foreseen it; for you knew that a good death should not be expected after a wicked life.