Yesterday for me, today for thee

Who can tell whether it will be either in a year, or within a month, or within a week, or even whether you will be alive tomorrow? "Yesterday for me, today for thee." O my Jesus, give me light and pardon me.

I. It is appointed. It is certain, then, that we are all condemned to death. We are born, says St. Cyprian, with the halter round the neck, and every step we make brings us nearer to death. As your name was one day inserted in the Register of Baptisms, so it shall be one day written in the records of the dead. As in speaking of those who have already departed you say: God be merciful to my father, to my uncle, to my brother, — so others shall say the same of you. As you have heard the death-bell toll for many, so others shall hear it toll for you.

But what would you say if you saw a man on his way to the place of execution, jesting, laughing, gazing about in every direction, and thinking only of comedies, festivities and amusements? And are not you now on your way to death? What are the objects of your thoughts? Behold in that grave your friends and relatives on whom justice has been already executed. How great is the terror and dismay of a man condemned to die, when he beholds his companions hanging dead on the gibbet! Look, then, at these dead bodies. Each of them says to you: Yesterday for me; today for thee (Ecclus. xxxiii. 23). The same is said to you by the portraits of your deceased relatives, by the memorandum books, the houses, the beds, the garments which they have left. Yesterday for me! Today for thee!

My beloved Redeemer, I would not dare to appear before Thee, did I not see Thee hanging on the Cross lacerated, despised, and lifeless, for the love of me. My ingratitude has been great; but Thy mercy is still greater. My sins have been very grievous; but Thy merits exceed their enormity. Thy Wounds, Thy Blood, and Thy Death, are my hope. I deserve hell by my first sin; to that sin I have added so many other offences. And Thou hast not only preserved my life, but Thou hast also invited me to pardon, and hast offered me peace with so much mercy and so much love. How can I fear that Thou wilt cast me away now that I love Thee and desire nothing but Thy grace? Yes, my dear Lord, I love Thee with my whole heart, and I desire only to love Thee. I love Thee, and am sorry for having despised Thee, not so much because I have deserved hell, as because I have offended Thee, my God, Who hast loved me so tenderly.

II. To know that you must die — that after death you shall enjoy eternal glory, or suffer eternal torments — that on death depends your eternal happiness or eternal misery — and, with all this before your eyes, not to think of settling your accounts, and of adopting every means of securing a happy death, is surely the extreme of folly. We pity those who meet with a sudden and unprovided death; why, then, do we ourselves not endeavour to be always prepared? We, too, may die suddenly and without preparation. Indeed sooner or later, with or without warning, whether we think or think not of it, we shall die and every hour, every moment, brings us nearer to our end, which shall be the infirmity that will send us out of this world.

In every age, houses, streets and cities are filled with new people; the former inhabitants have been borne away to the grave. As the days of life have ended for them, so a time will come when neither you nor I, nor anyone alive, shall live any longer on this earth. Days shall be formed and no one in them (Ps. cxxxviii. 16). We shall all then be in eternity, which shall be for us either an eternal day of delights, or an eternal night of torments. There is no middle way. It is certain and of Faith that one or the other will be our lot.

O my Jesus, open to me the bosom of Thy goodness; add mercies to mercies. Grant that I may be no longer ungrateful to Thee; change my whole heart. Grant that my heart, which once despised Thy love and exchanged it for the miserable delights of this earth, may now be entirely Thine, and may burn with continual flames of love for Thee. I hope to gain Paradise, that I may always love Thee. I cannot enjoy in that kingdom a place among the innocent — I must remain among the penitents; but though among these I wish to love Thee more than the innocent. For the glory of Thy mercy make all Heaven behold so great a sinner inflamed with an ardent love. I resolve henceforth to be all Thine and to think only of loving Thee. Assist me with Thy light and grace to execute this desire, which Thou in Thy goodness hast inspired. O Mary, thou who art the mother of perseverance, obtain for me the grace to be faithful to my promise.