see if there is any one in the way before throwing down a stone or slate; but if the stone or slate falls of its own accord, or is blown down by the wind, then there is no one to look out or give warning, and it strikes whoever happens to be in the way. Death, my dear brethren, is a stone cut without hands, which falls by chance, unexpectedly, without warning, and at once crushes the greatest, bravest, and mightiest potentates of earth in a moment when they least await it.
Confirmed by examples. This is the hour in which Balthasar, who seemed so happy in the midst of his riches and pleasures, and who desired to be adored as a god this is the hour in which he read that terrible sentence that he was so far from expecting, which put an end to his life and kingdom. This is the hour in which the proud Aman, before he had time to look around, was hurled from the highest pinnacle of honor, and hanged on a gallows. This is the hour in which Holofernes was killed by a woman in his sleep on his own bed. This is the hour in which Sisara, also during his sleep, was slain by having a nail driven through his head. This is the hour in which Pharao was drowned in the Red Sea, Absalom pierced to the heart as he hung on a tree, Amnon murdered as he was carousing at table. This is the hour in which a multitude of disobedient Jews, while, as the Scripture says, “the flesh was between their teeth,”[1] atoned for their gluttony by a sudden death. This is the hour in which all the first-born of Egypt were slain in the middle of the night, experiencing the vengeance of the Lord while they slept, as they thought, in security and without the least apprehension of death. Remember how the pestilence that God sent to punish the pride of David in numbering his people swept off seventy thousand of them; not one of them till thought he would die in three days; there was no sign of plague in the air; no sickness to give warning of its approach; the towns were well provided with doctors and medicines, and yet in a very short time seventy thousand died who were up to that strong and healthy, and imagined they had a long life before them. Consider how a hundred and eighty-five thousand soldiers of Sennacherib’s army were slain in one night by an angel. They had not yet encountered the enemy; they were not afraid of a sudden attack; they were all strong and healthy, and not one of them thought of dying that night. Nevertheless, without any attack on the part of the enemy, without having
- ↑ Adhuc carnes erant in dentibus eorum.—Num. xi. 33.
