The Last Night

“This night thy soul shall be required of thee.” — Luke xii., 20.

MY text introduces us into a fine farm-house. The occupant has been wonderfully successful. He has not made his money by business dodges. He has never “cornered” any body in stocks. He never lent money on a mortgage with the understanding that it might lie quiet for several years, and then, as soon as the mortgage was recorded, went down to begin foreclosure. He never got up a bogus company, sold the shares, and then backed out in time to save himself, leaving the widows and orphans in the lurch, wondering why there were no dividends. As far as I can tell, he was an honest, industrious, enterprising man.# The crops were coming in. The mow and the granary were full, and the men and oxen tugged away at other loads. The matter was a great perplexity. After you have gone to the trouble to raise a crop, you want some place to put it. Enlarge¬ ment is the word. 1 see him calculating, by the light of a torch, how much extension of room is needed. So many loads of corn, so many of wheat. It must be so many feet front, and so many feet deep. He says, “When I get the new building done, I shall have every thing. Nothing then for me to do but to enjoy myself.” In anticipation of the barn enlarged, he folds his arms and says, “If any body in all the world is prosperous and happy, I am that man.” But his ear is stunned with the

words, “Thou fool!” “Where did the voice come from?” “Who dares say that to me, the first man in all this country It was the voice of God! “Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee!”

What was the malady that took him immediately away — whether apoplexy, or some mysterious disease that the doctors could not account for — I know not. But that night he expired. He never built the extension. Be¬ fore the remaining sheaves had been gathered he was himself reaped. They hauled in no loads of grain on the next day, but a long procession (for successful men always have big funerals) followed him out to burial. If the world expressed its sentiments in regard to him, it put over his grave, “Here lies interred a successful man, of great enterprise and influence, and he departs, mourn¬ ed by the whole neighborhood. Peace to his ashes!” God wrote over his grave, and on his barn-door, an epitaph of four letters — “Fool.” That the divine epitaph was correct, I infer from the fact that this man had lived so many years and made no preparation for the future, and because he was postponing every thing until he got larger barns. Additional barn-room could not make him happy. Show me the man made happy by worldly accumulation. Who are the men who have the most anxiety, and work the hardest? The millionaires. Men work harder after they get five hundred thousand dollars than before. They work less at a hundred thousand dollars; still less at fifty thousand; still less at forty; still less at thirty; still less at five thousand dollars; and least, of all when they have a salary to live on. The men who have the greatest freedom from care are those who live on their day’s wages. Prosperity is like salt water: the more you drink of it the thirstier you are. “Soul, take thine ease l” Ah! did a man ever give ease to his soul by such a process? The soul is a spirit. Can material things be expected to feed it? Can the- soul eat wheat, or corn, or hardware? What if a man going to San Francisco should make preparation for his comfort from here to Hoboken, and no further. Would you not call him a fool? But this man, about starting on an everlastingjourney, makes no preparation except for this life. The distance from here to the grave is smaller when compared with eternity, than the distance from here to Ho¬ boken is small compared with the thousands of miles between here and San Francisco. This man had thought only of the three or four yards of human life, and regarded not the millions of furlongs stretching out into the infinite.

I wish to make two or three remarks about this man’s exit from the world.

It wras in strong contrast with his life. His surroundings were as bright as bright could be. We know more about his barns than his house, but I judge of the style of his house from that of his barn. Men do not take better care of their horses and cattle than of themselves. The house was full of comforts and luxuries. When the table was spread, there w7as every thing on it to administer to his appetite. The wdnes w7ere of the best — so long confined that they opened with violent hiss and explosion. The country, not overrun with hunters, sent its best game to his table. The fishermen brought him the best product of the stream, for he could give any price. If he had a family (and I suppose he had, for most thrifty men have a reason at home why they succeed),

they lacked no luxury of wardrobe. When visitors came to that house, the master* no doubt, would take them out, and say, “There are twTenty acres of grain; ten acres of corn; fifteen acres of grove. See those sheep down in that valley. See those cattle on that hill. All mine! Come and look at those fig-trees. There are some figs ripe. Help yourself. Plenty of them. See how those grape-vines thrive — and these pomegranates!” Abundance of every thing. Plenty to eat, plenty to wear, and plenty to congratulate. Yet, amid all that, he dies! How impudent death is! It would not seem so bold if it went into that fisherman’s hut and took a life. But here it comes stumbling along, not stopping to look at the full barns, or to examine the olives, or to count the herds. It does, not even knock. It goes in as though it owned the whole place, and says, “Come, you must go with me!” Death is the roughest of all constables, and makes an ar¬ rest without any explanation. The man says, “Wait until I get that new barn done.” “Ho!” “Wait until I settle with my men.” “Ho!” “Wait until I can sell out, and get my estate into better trim.” “Ho!” “Wait until I make my will.” “Ho!” “Wait until I can get prepared.” “Ho!” Death says, “I wait for nothing. I shall touch you twice, and then you will be mine — once on the heart, and once on the lungs. There! the pulsation is quiet. There! the breath is gone.” “What shall we do with him?” ask the neighbors. “I don’t care what you do with him,” says Death; “I have done my work, now you can do yours.”

Dr. Johnson, having ridden around the park of his friend, said to him, “Ah! my friend, these are the things that make it so hard to die.”

What then! Is elegance of surrounding no defense? Can not a man hide in his full barns or in his rich wardrobe? No. They that trust in their wealth and boast themselves in the multitude of their riches — none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him, that he should live forever and not see corruption. Prince Albert breathes his last in Windsor Castle; and Charles Dickens falls back sense¬ less at the dinner-table on Gad’s Hill; and Albert Barnes expires in a Philadelphia parlor; and Willie Lincoln falls asleep in the White House; and the successful man of the text in the night-time has his soul required of him.

Again: The man of the text made sudden exit. There was no long lane leading up to this event. The only warning which he got was on the last night. It was not a gradual wasting away, but a shock — and all wras over. How startled were all the hands on his place to hear of it! The neighbors knew not what to make of it. But the most surprised one of all was the man himself. So removal from this world is always sudden. I have heard of rare cases where persons said, “Such a day of such a month will be my last,” and it was so. But the man of the text was not more amazed than most people. Even the most confirmed invalids expect to get well. They expect some new effect of medicines, or a new style of doctor, or a change of climate will help them. It is while men are calculating on long days that that decisive hour comes — while they are expecting an enlargement of business accommodations, or are getting in their crops, or are trying to draught a new barn — suddenly! And why not?; Hold that glass of exquisite ware, and let it drop on the pavement. How long does it take to

shiver it? Wonder not that the delicate bowl of life was broken at the fountain. Our life is of such delicate mechanism, so finely poised, so hair-strung, that the least collision is fatal. The wonder is that, with such exquisite machinery, the pivots do not oftener slip, and the spring break, and all the works instantly, crash. The vast majority of the race go out of this life without a physical pang. They flash away. You can not calculate the brevity of the time between when the arrow leaves the bow and wThen it strikes the target.

A minister of Scotland, at breakfast, asked for some¬ thing more to eat, and a child started to get it, but he cried out, “Hold! hold! my Master calleth me. I have breakfasted with you, and shall sup with my Lord Jesus to-night.” And as quick as that he was gone. The rail-train rushes along toward Norwalk bridge. The draw is off. Down the train plunges. In Wales, a miner, not awrare of the foul air of the mine, strikes a match. Instantly two hundred souls are in eternity.

It was night when the man of the text went. So it is night when most of the race depart. A vast majority of the race die between eleven and three o’clock at night. There seems something in the atmosphere at that time to loosen the grasp of body and soul. Nearly all of my friends have gone away in the night. The most of those who die by accident die in the night, because then the impediment on the track is not seen. Then it is that the flame gets headway befbre it is discovered. Then the burglar and the assassin are assisted by the darkness. The first-born of Egypt perished in the night. Senna’ cherib’s host fell in the night. Like the man of the text, the most of the race are called away in the night.

I know not what had been the character of the last day that this man of the text had lived — whether it was sunshine or rainy, interesting or dull; but I know about the night. It was a great night. It was a thrilling night. It was a tremendous night. As the text comes rushing through the darkness, lie drops his pen. He for¬ gets his big barn and his unsheltered crops. “This night thy soul shall be required of thee.”

But the most remarkable thing about the exit wTas that he was unprepared for it. It was not a lack of brain that kept him in. unpreparedness. A man who could make money as fast as he could was not lacking in sharpness. He knew what to plant, and how to culture what he had planted. He was not one of the dead-andalive men who make no progress. His barns were large enough before, but they are too small now, with crops all the time growing. He was what Americans wTould call “smart,” and what the English wTould call “clever.” How a man wdio knows enough to do business, knows enough to save his soul. All of the idiots will be saved at last. He was not an idiot. But, alas! how many men are wise for time, and foolish for eternity! They know enough, when they sell a thing, to get the worth of it, but they barter away an immortal soul for nothing. They have every thing insured but their souls. They are careful to have all their titles good except that for heaven. They are prompt in ‘their engagements with banks and brokers, but fail in their obligations to God. They pull down their barns and build greater, to hold the increasing crops, but have no shelter for their souls so good as a barn. If a man should come at them with a sly game, and try to cheat them out of a hundred dollars, they would say, “No you don’t! I see what you are driving at!” But they allow Satan to swindle them out of all the riches of heaven.

Neither was it lack of time that ushered the man of the text into the last hour unarmed. I suppose he was very busy. Early up and late to bed, overseeing the workmen. From the way things went on about that place, I know he looked after his own business, and had plenty to do. But might he not rather have had fifty bushels of wheat less than be caught in the last hour in such a miserable predicament? Yes, he had time enough, as every man has, to prepare himself for the future. Men talk as though, in order to get prepared for eternity, they must have a month or a year to go and sit down, and read and pray. Why, my hearers, a prayer to God is just as acceptable while on your way to F ulton Ferry to-morrow morning as in your house on your knees. A thought about God on Wall Street is just as elevating as in church on Sunday. Heaven is not a cloud that touches only the top of some high mountain: it touches earth all over. And that man who has time to eat, or sleep, or think, has time to be saved. Yet that man died unprepared. He fell; not as a man who trips and stumbles on a road, but as men falling from some Alpine cliff have been watched by the peasantry as they go don — a thousand feet, whirling in the air — dashed on the rocks. So this man, from the tip-top of worldly prosperity, slipped and fell.

Eighteen centuries have passed since that catastrophe. The body of that rich farmer has so thoroughly gone to dust that no one suspects where it is. But his soul still lives — lives more actively than yours or mine. And he remembers, as though it were only an hour ago, the stupendous impression of that moment when, in desperate unpreparedness, there came crashing into his ears, “This night thy soul shall be required of thee.”

If, between this and five or six o’clock to-morrow morning, the same voice should accost our souls, would it find us likewise disconcerted? No, I can say for many of you. You are not so well dressed for church as you are for heaven. That dress you have on will wear 6ut — get out of fashion; but the robe of Christ’s righteousness will never wear out, for the latest ages of heaven wear the same pattern as the earliest. I do not mean to say that you are sinless; but Christ has made it all right, lie has made a transfer of your sins and pollution, so that you ought to think of leaving this world only as you think of going to a wedding. It is a wedding — the marriage of the King’s Son.

How much does death hurt a good man? Not so much as the tip of his little finger. They who, in letting you down into your last resting-place, shall be scratched in the hand with a brier, shall be more damaged than you by death. The grandest place on earth to sleep, the softest pillow and coverlets, are in the Christian’s grave. Jesus took his death-robe and folded it up. As he came out of the grave, he would have cast off his shroud and thrown it into the corner of the tomb if it were never to be used again. But he knew that you and I would want to sleep there after a while, and so he took his death-garments and folded them up, so that the covering might be ready for us. It shall not be eagles’-down that we rest on, but something softer and warmer than that. It is what David calls the “feathers of the Almighty.”

If there is any one on earth that is to be envied, it is the man who dies well. Among the eight persons who stood around my father’s death-bed, not one was as well off as he. For eighty-four years he had served God as few serve him. What had he to fear? I do not think he had been so glad sixty-two years before — on his marriage-day — as he was that night, as he was about to go to rejoin her with whom he had companioned for fiftyfivf years. God said to him, “This night thy soul shall be required of thee,” and his answer was, “I feel well — very well. All is well. Peace! Peace!”

But not that way do all men make their departure. Men ought to have their worldly affairs settled, so that the executors and administrators will not be confounded, and so that what they have honestly earned be not scattered among those who have no right to it. If the sudden announcement should be made to you to-night, what would be the state of your families? Have you done all that you can to fit them for heaven? Could you feel — “Whatever I, as father or mother, could do, I have done. They will remember how I prayed for them and talked with them; and when they look at my picture, they will say, 4 That was a Christian parent.’ I want to go in the same way, and gain the same heaven?” The keys of this organ are twelve feet from the organ-pipes, but every time those keys are touched the pipes respond; so these parents are now exercising influences which will respond far on in the eternity of their children. If they play an anthem now, it will be an anthem then. If they play a dirge now, it will be a dirge forever.

But, most of all, I want to know what is to become of you personally. This may be your last sermon. The concluding song of to-night; may be your last song. This night may be your last night. Then, “This night thy soul shall be required of thee.” What then? Into what scenes would you be introduced? Would you go where your children, and kindred, and friends have gone, or where the man of the text wTent? They who die without Christ are so thoroughly ruined that they never get over it. The man of the text is to-night just where he was eighteen hundred years ago. Thousands of Gospel calls have been uttered since then. He has not heard one of them. He has been gathering in his crops ever since, but it is a harvest of everlasting wretchedness. God called him a fool in his last hour, and he who dies a fool is a fool forever.

Perhaps, like the man of the text, you are- about to build larger barns. You are planning for worldly accumulation. Do not forget to project a plan for eternity. You acknowledge yourself immortal; where, then, will. you be a hundred years from now? You say that perhaps, by some great exception, you might be alive a hundred years from now. Then where will you be at the end of a thousand years? Where will you be a mil¬ lion of years from now? A billion of years? A trillion of years? A quadrillion of years? A quintillion of years? But a hundred years are nothing; a million of years are nothing; a billion of years are nothing; a tril¬ lion of years are nothing; a quadrillion of years are nothing; a quintillion of years are nothing — compared with Eternity.

So I ask you, Where will you spend eternity?

Oh, prepare for it. Leave it not until the last hour. Leave it not until you get sick: you may never be sick. 1ST

Leave it not until you get more time: you may never get more time. Leave it not until you get old: you may never get old. Leave it not until the spirit strives more powerfully: it may never strive again. Leave it not until to-morrow. This night — this night, thy soul may be required of thee. And suppose, in that moment, you should say, “Wait until I can kneel down and say my prayers.” Death wTould respond, “No time now to say your prayers.” “Wait until I get my friends together, and bid them good-by.” Death would say, “You can not stop to bid them good-by.” “But I can not go into eternity with all these sins about me. Give me time to repent.” Death would say, “Too late to repent! This 7iight thy soul is required. Yea, this hour! Yea, this minute! Yea, this second /”

Oh, by the Cross of Christ, get ready. Bepent. This moment, bow your head on the back of the pew in front of you, or kneel in the aisle, and say, “Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me!”

In Christ you are safe. Out of him, you perish. “O Israel! how shall I give thee up V

By what argument shall I address you? By what impassionate appeal may I move you?

I can do nothing more. I leave you in the hands of that Savior who died to redeem you. I leave you to that God before whom you must at last appear, and answer for this night’s acceptance or rejection of mercy.

Lord God Almighty! I have done my best to call them in. Into thy hands I commit their immortal spirits.