examination of the heart 540 with doctors; many who end the last moment of their life on the battlefield. But who can know the manner of his death? Whether this thief is going to come unexpected or foreseen; whether by day or by night; would your life be snatched away from you slowly or violently; in a natural way, through torments or in an accident? Wherefore you do not want to put off your improvement till tomorrow; you do not want to ever omit any occasion to gain merit; you do not want to promise yourself a long life, remembering the heavenly Teacher’s parable: [f.177r] “But if that wicked servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed,’ and begins to beat his fellow servants, and eats and drinks with the drunken, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will punish him, and put him with the hypocrites; there men will weep and gnash their teeth” (Mt 24:48-51). 3. TUESDAY MORNING On the capture of Christ the Lord, His indictment, being struck, imprisonment, and mockery. 1. Recall with profound attention this: as Christ the Lord became aware of Judas the traitor’s coming, together with the servants, his helpers in the impious action, He woke up His disciples from sleep and came out to meet him. When they stood face to face, He received a kiss from this most treacherous traitor; a kiss, always a very gentle token of peace, that was then, in fact, the deceitful sign of wicked betrayal (cf. Mt 26:45-50; Mk 14:42-45; Lk 22:47-48). And finally, after the thrice-repeated mob’s retreat and their triple fall to the ground,272 He let them seize Him with these words: “[T]his is your hour, and the power of darkness” (Lk 22:53). 272 St. John the Evangelist only speaks of one fall to the ground. Cf. Jn 18:4-8.
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