Tell me, Beloved Brethren, if instead of preparing-for his approaching death, a person condemned to die were, on his way to the place of execution, to employ the few remaining moments of his life in admiring the beauty of the houses, as he passed along, in thinking of balls and comedies, in uttering immodest words, and detracting his neighbors, would you not say that the unhappy man had either lost his reason, or that he was abandoned by God? And are not you, on the way to death? Why then do you seek only the gratification of the senses? Why do you not think of preparing the accounts which you shall one day, and perhaps very soon, have to render at the tribunal of Jesus Christ? Souls that have faith leave to the fools of this world, the care of realizing a fortune on this Earth; Seek you to make a fortune for the next life, which shall be Eternal (∞). The present life must end, and end very soon.
--St. Alphonsus Liguori
