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Love is strong as death.(1) Death separates the soul
of him who dies from the body, and from all the
things of the world; sacred love separates the soul
of the lover from his body and from all the things of
the world: nor is there any other difference, saving
that death does that in effect, which love ordinarily
does only in affection. I say ordinarily, Theotimus,
because holy love is sometimes so violent that it
even actually causes a separation between the body
and the soul; making the lovers die a most happy
death, better than a hundred lives.
As it is the special character of the reprobate
that they die in sin, so of the elect it is, that
they die in the love and grace of God. But still this
happens in different ways.
The just man never dies unprovidedly; for to have
persevered in Christian justice even to the end, is
to have well provided for death; but he does
sometimes die of unexpected or sudden death. For this
cause the all-wise Church does not make us pray in
her Litanies that we may simply be delivered from
sudden death, but from sudden and unprovided death.
It is no worse for being sudden, if it be not also
unprovided.
If weak and ordinary souls had seen the fire from
heaven fall upon the great S. Simeon Stylites's head
and kill him, what would they have thought but
thoughts of scandal? Yet ought we to have no other
thought than that this great saint, having most
perfectly immolated himself to God in his heart, and
being already wholly consumed with love, the fire
came from heaven to perfect the holocaust and
entirely consume it; for the Abbot Julian, being a
day's journey off, saw his soul ascend to heaven, and
thereupon caused incense to be offered in
thanksgiving to God. The Blessed Homobonus of Cremona,
on a certain day hearing Mass on his knees with
extreme devotion, rose not at the Gospel according to
custom, whence those that were about him, looked at
him, and perceived that he was dead.
There have been in our time men most famous for
virtue and learning, found dead, some in a
confessional, others while hearing a sermon: yea some
have been seen to fall down dead at their going out
of the pulpit, where they had preached with great
fervour; and all these deaths were sudden, yet not
unprovided. And how many good people do we see die in
apoplexy, in a lethargy, and a thousand other ways,
very suddenly? And others die in delirium and
madness, out of the use of reason; and all these,
together with children who are baptized, die in grace
and consequently in the love of God. But how could
they die in the love of God, since they did not even
think of God at the time of their departure?
Learned men, Theotimus, lose not their knowledge
while they are asleep; otherwise they would be
unlearned at their awaking, and have to return to
school. The like it is in all the habits of prudence,
temperance, faith, hope and charity; they are ever
within the just man's heart, though they are not
always in action.
While a man sleeps it seems that all his habits
sleep with him, and when he awakes awake with him; so
a just man dying suddenly, whether crushed by a house
falling upon him, or killed by thunder, or stifled by
an effusion on the lungs, or dying out of his senses
by the violence of a burning fever, dies not indeed
in the exercise of holy love, yet he dies in the
habit thereof. Whereupon the wise man says: The just
man, if he be prevented with death, shall be in
rest:(2) for to obtain eternal life it suffices to
die in the state and habit of love and charity.
Many saints, however, have departed this life not
only in charity and with the habit of heavenly love,
but even in the act and practice thereof. S.
Augustine died in the exercise of holy contrition,
which cannot be without love: S. Jerome exhorting his
dear children to the love of God, of their neighbour,
and of virtue : S. Ambrose in a rapture, sweetly
discoursing with his Saviour, immediately after he
had received the holy Sacrament of the altar: S.
Antony of Padua after he had recited a hymn to the
glorious Virgin-mother, and while talking joyously
with our Saviour: S. Thomas Aquinas joining his
hands, elevating his eyes towards heaven, raising his
voice very high, and pronouncing by way of
ejaculation with great fervour, these words of the
Canticles (the last which he had expounded): Come my
beloved, let us go forth into the field, let us abide
in the villages.(3)
All the Apostles and almost all the Martyrs died
in prayer. The Blessed and Venerable Bede having
foreknown by revelation the time of his departure,
went to Vespers (and it was Ascension day), and
standing upright, leaning only on the elbows of his
stall, without any disease at all, ended his life at
the same instant that he ended his singing of
Vespers, as it were directly to follow his Master
ascending unto heaven, there to enjoy the fair
morning of eternity, which has no Vesper.(4)
John Gerson, Chancellor of the University of
Paris, a man so learned and pious that, as Sixtus
Senensis says, one can hardly discern whether his
learning surpassed his piety, or his piety his
learning, having expounded the fifty properties of
divine love mentioned in the Canticle of Canticles,
three days afterwards, having a face and heart full
of life, expired pronouncing and repeating many
times, by way of ejaculatory prayer, these holy
words, drawn out of the same Canticles: O God! thy
love is strong as death.
S. Martin, as everyone knows, died so attentive to
the exercise of devotion, that more could not be. S.
Louis, that great king amongst saints, and great
saint amongst kings, being struck with the plague,
never ceased to pray; and then, having received the
divine Viaticum, spreading out his arms in form of a
cross, his eyes fixed upon heaven, yielded up the
ghost, ardently sighing out these words with a
perfect confidence of love: I will come into thy
house; I will worship towards thy holy temple and I
will give glory to thy name.(5)
S. Peter Celestine, being wholly steeped in cruel
afflictions which can scarce be described, having
reached the end of his days, began to sing, as a
sacred swan, the last of the psalms, and ended his
song and his life with these amorous words: Let every
spirit praise the Lord. The admirable S. Eusebia,
surnamed the stranger, died on her knees and in
fervent prayer, S. Peter Martyr, writing with his
finger and in his own blood the confession of the
faith for which he died, and uttering these words:
Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and the
great Apostle of the Japanese, S. Francis Xavier,
holding and kissing the image of the crucifix, and
repeating at every kiss these ejaculations of his
soul: "O Jesus! the God of my heart!"
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