And the consideration of this great work, which must be done with all our might, and completed before the grave, whither we go, presents itself to our minds with especial force at the commencement of a new year. This is so plain, that nothing need be said in order to convince us that it is true. Thus they witness against themselves.
Death puts an end absolutely and irrevocably to all our plans and works, and it is inevitable.
No man can deliver his brother, nor make agreement unto God for him. Difficult as we may find it to bring it home to ourselves, to realize it, yet as surely as we are here assembled together, so surely will every one of us, sooner or later, one by one, be stretched on the bed of death. But all this is nothing compared with the consequences implied in it. In the words used familiarly in speaking of the dead, they are no more. And all their virtues and pleasing qualities which endeared them to their friends are, as far as this world is concerned, vanished.