sions upon the heart than the presence of Jesus Christ. But is it not, Lord, against those monsters of Christians that thy prophet, incensed, formerly said to thee, " Ah! Lord, let thy table become a snare before them; and that which should have been for their welfare, let it become a trap?"'
In the second place, to communicate in remembrance of Jesus Christ, is to wish to awaken, through the presence of this sacred pledge, every impression which his memory can make upon a heart which loves him. The firmest bonds are loosened by absence: Jesus Christ well foresaw, that, ascending up to heaven, his disciples would insensibly forget his kindnesses and his divine instructions. Alas! Moses remains only forty days upon the mountain, and already the Israelites cease to remember the miracles that he had wrought to deliver them from Egypt. We wot not, said they among themselves, what is become of this Moses, the man that brought us out of the land of Egypt; let us make gods who shall go before and defend us against our enemies. Jesus Christ, to guard against these inconstancies of the human heart, wished, in ascending to the heavenly Sion, to leave us a pledge of his presence: it is there that he wishes we should come to console ourselves for his sensible absence; it is there that we ought to find a more lively remembrance of his wonders, of his doctrine, of his kindnesses, of his divine person; it is there that, under mysterious signs, we come to see him born at Bethlehem, brought up at Nazareth, holding discourses with men, and traversing the cities of Judea, working signs and miracles which no one before him had ever done, calling as followers rude disciples, in order to make them masters of the world, confounding the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, announcing salvation to men, leaving marks every where of his power and goodness, entering in triumph into Jerusalem, led to Mount Calvary, expiring upon a cross, conqueror of death and of hell, leading with him into heaven those who were captives, as the trophies of his victory, and forming afterwards his church with the overflowing of his Spirit and the abundance of his gifts; in a word, we shall there find him in all his mysteries.
You envy, said St. Chrysostom, the lot of a woman who touches his garments, of a single one who bathes his feet with her tears, of the woman of Galilee who had the happiness to follow and to serve him in the course of his ministry, of his disciples with whom he familiarly conversed, of the people of those times who listened to the words of grace and of salvation which proceeded from his mouth; you call blessed those who saw him; many prophets and kings have vainly wished it; but you, my brethren, come to the altars, and you shall see him; you shall touch him, you shall give him a holy kiss, you shall bathe him with your tears, and your bowels shall bear him even like those of Mary. Alas! our fathers went into the holy land to worship the traces of his feet, and the places that he had consecrated with his presence. Here, they were told, he proposed the parable of the good shepherd and the lost sheep; here he reconciled an adulteress; here he comforted a sinful wo-
