secrecies of consciences; you sustained the weak in faith; you spoke of wisdom among the instructed; and, under all that religion hath most august or most holy, you perhaps concealed whatever the earth has most execrable. You were an impostor, a man of sin, seated in the temple of God; you instructed others, and you taught not yourself; you inspired horror against idols, and your days were only numbered by your sacrileges. Ah! the mystery of iniquity shall then be revealed; and you shall at last be known for what you have always been, — the curse of heaven and the shame of the earth.
Behold, my brethren, all the confusion with which the criminal soul shall be overwhelmed. And it will not be a transitory confusion. In the world we have only the first shame of a fault to undergo: the noise of it gradually dies away; new adventures at last take place of ours; and the remembrance of our disgrace fades away, and disappears with the rumour which had published it. But, at the great day, shame shall eternally remain upon the criminal soul; there shall no longer be any fresh events to obliterate his crimes and his confusion; nothing shall more change: all shall be fixed and eternal: that which he shall have appeared before the tribunal of Jesus Christ, that will he for ever appear: even the nature of his torments shall incessantly publish the nature of his crimes; and his shame shall every day be renewed in his punishment. My brethren, reflections here are needless; and, if some remains of faith still exist within you, it is for you to sound your own consciences, and, from this moment to adopt such measures, as may enable you to sustain the manifestation of that great day.
But, after having shown to you the public confusion with which the sinner shall be covered, why may I not expose to you here what shall be the glory and the consolation of the truly just man, when the secrecies of his conscience shall be laid open to the universe; when the whole mystery of his heart shall be unfolded; of that heart, of which all the loveliness concealed from the eyes of men was known only to God; of that heart in which he had always supposed stains and defilements, and of which his humility had concealed from himself all the holiness and innocency: of that heart in which God alone had always dwelt, and which he had taken pleasure in adorning and enriching with his gifts and grace! What new wonders shall that divine sanctuary, hitherto so impenetrable, then offer to the eyes of the beholders, when the veil shall be removed from it! What fervent desires! What secret victories! What heroical sacrifices! What pure prayers! What tender lamentations! What faith! What grandeur! What elevation above all those vain objects which form all the desires and hopes of men! Then it shall indeed be seen, that nothing was so great, or so worthy of admiration in the world, as a truly just man; as those souls who were considered as useless, because they were so to our passions; and whose obscure and retired life was so much despised. It shall be seen that the heart of the faithful soul possessed more lustre and grandeur than all those great events which take place
