This page needs to be proofread.

monthly. But no soul of saint or seminarian is more precious before God than mine, and to me its salvation is infinitely important. Therefore I will rehearse my death-scene often that I may acquire the art of dying well. I will occasionally imagine myself in my last agony, with a bandage round my fevered brow, with the crucifix in my hand, the clammy death chill creeping over my body, the silence broken only by my labored breathing, the sobs of my friends, and the priest's voice saying: " Depart out of this world, O Christian soul." From that position on my deathbed I will glance back over my life repeating: " As one lives so shall he die." Ah, then will appear in their true colors the blindness and folly of mankind, the vanity of riches and pleasures, and all earthly happiness. Then will I realize that for me my soul is the one created good, sin the only evil, my last, the all-important moment of my life. Then will I see which of my present doings I would be likely to regret at the last. Then will I begin to correct the evil of my ways — begin to live a good life that I may die a good death. If in all my works I remember my last end, I will never sin. Grant, O God, that the lives of all here may henceforth be so ordered as to gain for them the grace of a happy death. Grant, O God, that falling gently asleep in death we may awake in eternity to hear not the thundering anathema of God's justice: "Depart from Me, ye wicked," but rather the sweet summons of His infinite mercy: "Arise, My beloved, and come."