Alphonsus Liguori

“ I desire to go to God, but I fear death. I am afraid of the assaults which I shall then experience from hell. I find that the saints have trembled at the hour of death; how much more ought I to tremble! I answer: It is true that hell does not cease to assail even the saints at death, but it is also true that God does not cease to assist his servants at that moment; and when the dangers are increased, he multiplies his helps. ”Ibi plus auxilii," says St. Ambrose, ”ubi plus periculi." ”

“ It is, then, a great error to imagine that death is a chastisement for those who love God. It is a mark of the love which God bears to them , because he shortens their life to put an end to sin, from which they cannot be exempt as long as they remain on this earth. ”For his soul pleased God: therefore he hastened to bring him out of the midst of iniquities." (Wis. iv. 14.)
Third Point. Death delivers us from the danger of falling into hell, and opens Paradise to us.
11. ”Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of the saints." ”

“ Even in the midst of the agony of death, he infuses into their souls a certain sweetness and a certain foretaste of that happiness which he will soon bestow upon them. As they who die in sin begin to experience from the bed of death a certain foretaste of hell certain extraordinary terrors, remorses, and fits of despair; so, on the other hand, the saints, by the fervent acts of divine love which they then make, and by the confidence and the desire which they feel of soon seeing God, taste, before death, that peace which they shall afterwards fully enjoy in heaven. ”

“ All the honours of this world he has justly esteemed as smoke and vanity. He is not afflicted at leaving his relatives, because he loved them only in God. In his last moments he recommends them to his heavenly Father, who loves them more than he does. And having a secure confidence of salvation, he hopes to be better able to assist his relatives from Paradise, than on this earth. In a word, what he frequently said during life, he continues to repeat with greater fervour at the hour of death”My God and my all. ”

“ The joy of the cup-bearer of Pharaoh, at hearing from Joseph that he should soon be released from prison, bears no comparison to that which a soul that loves God feels on hearing that she is to be liberated from the exile of this earth, and to be transported to the enjoyment of God in her true country. ”

“ Considered according to the senses, death excites fear and terror; but, viewed with the eye of faith, it is consoling and desirable. To the saints it is as amiable and as precious, as it appears terrible to sinners. ”

“ The mother of God will come to assist those who have been devoted to her. Jesus Christ shall come to defend from the assaults of hell the souls for which he died on a cross: he will give them confidence and strength to resist every attack. ”

“ St. Augustine says, that they who love God desire to see him speedily, and that, therefore, to them life is a cause of suffering, and death an occasion of joy. "Patienter vivit, delectabiliter moritur." ”

“ Denis the Areopagite says, that they joyfully meet death, as the end of their combats, and embrace it with gladness, because they hope to die a good death, and to be thus freed from all fear of ever again falling into sin. ”

“ Job said that our life, however short it may be, is full of miseries, of infirmities, of crosses, of persecutions, and fears. “Man born of a woman, living for a short time, is filled with many miseries." (Job xiv. 1.) What, says St. Augustine, do men who wish for a prolongation of life on this earth desire but a prolongation of suffering ?" ”

“ The greatest consolation which a soul that loves God experiences at the approach of death, arises from the thought of being delivered from so many temptations, from so many remorses of conscience, and from so many dangers of offending God. Ah! says St. Ambrose, as long as we live, "we walk among snares." We walk continually in the midst of the snares of our enemies, who lie in wait to deprive us of the life of grace. It was the fear of falling into sin that made St. ”

“ Death frees us from actual sins.
8. It is impossible to live in this world without committing at least some slight faults. ”A just man shall fall seven times: ” (Prov. xxiv. 16.) He who ceases to live, ceases to offend God. Hence St. Ambrose called death the burial of vices: by death they are buried, and never appear again. ”

“ Depart, Christian soul, from this world,") which is so appalling to sinners at the hour of death, does not alarm the saints. ”But the souls of the just are in the hands of God, and the torment of death shall not touch them." (Wis. iii. 1.) The saint is not afflicted, like worldlings, at the thought of being obliged to leave the goods of this earth, because he has kept the soul detached from them. During life, he always regarded God as the Lord of his heart and as the sole riches which he desired: ”What have I in heaven? ”

“ How can we desire this life, in which the longer we live, the greater shall be the load of our sins?
9. Hence the Lord praises the dead more than any man living: ”I praised the dead rather than the living. ”