Sermons (Massillon)/Sermon 32
SERMON XXXII.
ON THE DISPOSITIONS FOR THE COMMUNION.
"Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight." — Luke iii. 4.
Behold what the church is continually repeating to us during this holy time, in order to prepare us for the birth of Jesus Christ: Prepare, says she to all her children, prepare the way of the Lord, who descends from heaven to visit and redeem his people; make his paths straight; let the hollows be filled up, and the mountains levelled; let the crooked ways become straight, and the rugged even. Or, to express the same meaning without metaphor, Prepare yourselves, says she to us, to gather the fruit of that grand mystery which we are going to celebrate, by humiliation of heart, meekness, and charity, rectitude of intention, uniformity of living, renunciation of your own wisdom and your own righteousness; mortifying the flesh and humbling the spirit.
Allow me to hold the same language to you, Christians, my brethren, who, on this solemn occasion, come to purify yourselves in the penitential tribunals, in order to give a new birth to Jesus Christ in your hearts, on receiving him at the sacred table, — prepare the way of the Lord. The deed you are going to perform is the most holy act of religion, and the source of the most special favours: undertake it not, therefore, without all the cares and all the precautions which it requires: do not expose yourselves, through your own fault, to lose the inestimable advantages which ought to accrue to you from it.
The communion ought to give birth to Jesus Christ in our hearts: but where would be the difference between the righteous man and the sinner, between the soul who discerns the body of the Lord, and him who treats it as common food, were he equally to have birth in the heart of all who receive him? Deceive not yourselves, then, my brethren; there is a way of receiving Jesus Christ, by which his presence is rendered useless to us; and would to God, that, in thus receiving him, we deprived ourselves only of those favours which follow a holy communion! Ah! my brethren, unless the communion gives birth to Jesus Christ in our hearts, it brings death to him there; if it does not render us participators of his Spirit and of his grace, it is the sentence of our condemnation: if it be not a fruit of life to our soul, it is a fruit of death. Terrible alternative, which ought to excite our fears, but which ought not entirely to keep us away from the sacred table. The bread which is there distributed is the true nourishment of our souls, the strength of the strong, the support of the weak, the consolation of the afflicted, the pledge of a blessed immortality. How dangerous would it then be to abstain from it? — but infinitely more so would it be to eat it without preparation. On that account I again repeat to you, my dearest brethren, with the church, " Prepare the way of the Lord t" let your preparations for receiving him be of long standing: banish from your hearts whatever may offend him: instruct yourselves in the dispositions which he exacts of those who receive him: use every effort to acquire them: there is no other mean of avoiding the risk of an unworthy communion, and of attracting Jesus Christ into your souls.
This is an important matter, which demands all your attention. On one side, there is question of making you shun the horrible crime of profaning the body and the adorable blood of Jesus Christ; on the other, of instructing you how to reap from the communion all the grace which it is capable of bringing forth in our hearts. What, then, are those preparations so essential toward a profitable and worthy communion? I reduce them to four, which shall be the subject and the division of this Discourse.
Reflection I. — The eucharist is a hidden manna: it is the food of the strong, a sensible and permanent testimony of the love of Jesus Christ, the continuation and the fulfilment of his sacrifice. Now, it is necessary to know how to discern this hidden manna from common food, lest it be taken unworthily: first preparation. It is the food of the strong: we ought, therefore, to examine ourselves before we venture to make use of it: second preparation. The testimony of the love of Jesus Christ; it can be received, therefore, only in remembrance of him, that is to say, in feeling aroused in his presence every tender and exquisite sensation which can be excited by the remembrance of a dear and beloved object: third preparation. It is the fulfilment of his sacrifice; every time, therefore, that we participate in it, we show his death, and we ought to bring there a spirit of the cross and of martyrdom: fourth preparation. A respectful faith which enables us to discern, a prudent faith which makes us examine, an ardent faith which enables us to love, an exalted faith which makes us to immolate. This is the summary of the apostles' doctrine, in relating to us the institution of the eucharist, and likewise that of all the saints with regard to the use of that adorable sacrament.
First preparation, — a respectful faith which makes us to discern. Think not, my brethren, that I mean here to speak of that faith which distinguishes us from unbelievers. Where is the merit of believing when the prejudices of childhood have accustomed reason to it, and when belief is, as it were born with us? Exertion would even be necessary to cast off its yoke; and, to pass from faith to error, a greater effort is perhaps required than to return from error to truth. I speak of that lively faith which pierces through the clouds which surround the throne of the Lamb; which sees him not mystically, and, as it were, through a glass, but face to face, if I may venture to say so, such as he is: of that faith which, in spite of the veil with which the true Moses covers himself on this holy mountain, fails not, however, to perceive all his glory, and to feel the inability of supporting his presence: of that faith which, without rashly examining into his majesty, is, nevertheless, overpowered with its lustre; which sees the celestial legions covering themselves with their wings, and the pillars of the firmament shaking before this King of terrible majesty; of that faith to which the senses could add nothing, and which is blessed, not because it believes without seeing, but because it almost sees in believing. I speak of that respectful faith which is seized with a religious trembling at the sole presence of the sanctuary, which approaches the altar as Moses did the burning bush, and the Israelites the thundering mountain; of that faith which feels the whole weight of God's presence, and, in fear, cries out, like Peter, " Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord." I speak of that faith of which the respect approaches almost to a dread, and which it is even necessary to comfort; which, from the farthest spot that it discovers Jesus Christ upon the altar, feels an eclat of majesty which strikes and agitates it, and overpowers it with the dread of having ventured to come there without his order.
Behold, my brethren, what that discernment of faith is which the apostle demands of you. Great God! but doth any faith like this still remain on the earth? Ah! in vain dost thou still manifest thy presence to the world; it knows thee no better than formerly: thy disciples themselves often know thee but according to the flesh; and, by being constantly with thee, their eyes become habituated, and almost no longer discern thee. When thou shalt show thyself in the heavens upon a bright cloud, men shall be consumed with terror, and the impious shall seek to hide themselves in the deepest caverns, and entreat the mountains to cover their heads: ah! art thou not the same in the sanctuary as upon a cloud of glory? Are the heavens not opened above thee? When the priest pronounces the awful words, do not the heavenly spirits come down from heaven to officiate as thy servants, and to surround thee with their homages? Dost thou not judge men upon that mysterious tribunal, and cast looks of discernment upon that multitude of worshippers which fills thy temples? Dost not thou separate the goats from the sheep? Dost thou not there pronounce sentences of life and death? In one hand dost thou not hold thy wrath, and in the other crowns? Dost thou not separate me there, and stamp, with an invisible hand, upon my forehead, the mark of my election or of my eternal reprobation? Alas! and, while thou art perhaps condemning me, I have the presumption to draw near; while thou art casting me off from before thee, I boldly present myself there; while thou perhaps layest open the abyss to mark out my place, I impudently come to take it at thy table; while thou perhaps art ranging me with the children of wrath, I come to seat myself among the children of thy love; thy body, which giveth life, to me is a body of death; the Lamb without stain, which breaks the seven seals of the book of death, is the last seal which fills up and closes that of mine iniquities; and thou, who shouldst be my Saviour, becomest my guilt.
Ah! my brethren, God could not be seen in former times without instant death being the consequence. A whole people of Bethshemites was exterminated for having only too curiously examined the ark: the angel of the Lord covers Heliodorus with wounds, because he had dared to enter into the sanctuary of Jerusalem: the Israelites in the desert were not permitted even to approach the holy mountain from whence the Lord gave out his law; the thunders of heaven defended its access; terror and death every where preceded the face of the God of Abraham. What! because whirlwinds of fire no longer burst forth to punish the intruders and the profaners of our sanctuaries, respect and dread no longer accompany us there! Weak men, over whom the senses have such dominion, and who are never religious but when the God whom they worship is clothed in terror! for, say, were we to discern the body of the Lord, — did the faith of his presence make those grand impressions upon us, which it would undoubtedly do were we openly to see him, ah! would we tranquilly and almost unfeelingly come to seat ourselves at this table? Should a few moments employed in reciting, with a languid heart and an absent mind, some slight formula, prepare us for an action so awful? Should a communion be the business of an idle morning, perhaps gained from a customary slumber or the vain cares of dress? Ah! the thoughts of it should long previously occupy and affect us; time should even be necessary to strengthen us, if I may venture to say so, against our feelings of respect, and against the idea of his majesty: the days previous to this sacred festival should be days of retirement, of silence, of prayer, and of mortification: every day which brings us nearer to that blessed term, should witness the increase of our anxieties, our fears, our joy. The thoughts of it should be mingled with all our affairs, all our conversations, all our meals, all our relaxations, and even with our sleep itself: our mind, filled with faith, should feel its inability to pay attention to any thing else; we should no longer perceive but Jesus Christ: that image alone should fix all our attention. Behold what is meant by discerning the body of the Lord.
I know that a worldly soul experiences inward agitations at the approach of a solemnity in which decency, and perhaps the law, require his presence at the altar. But, O my God! thou who fathomest these troubled hearts, are such those religious terrors of faith which should accompany a humble creature to thy altar? Ah! it is a sadness which operates death; these are inquietudes which spring from the embarrassments of a conscience which requires to be cleared. They are gloomy and sad, like the young man of the Gospel whom thou orderedst to follow thee: they dread these blessed days as fatal days: they look upon as dark and gloomy mysteries, all the solemnities of Christians; the delights of thy feast become a fatigue to them; they only partake of it like the blind and the lame of the Gospel: that is to say, that the laws of thy church must drag these faithless souls, as if by force, from the public places, from the pleasures of the age, and from the highway of perdition, and bring them, in spite of themselves, into the hall of thy feast: they delay, as much as possible, this religious duty: the sole thought of it impoisons all their pleasures. Thou seest these unbelieving souls dragging on the load of a wavering conscience; long hesitating between their duties and their passions; softening at last, by the choice of an indulgent confessor, the bitterness of this step; appearing before thee, O God! who becomest their nourishment in this mystery of love, with as much reluctance as if they went to face an enemy; and, perhaps, in the course of a whole year, experiencing no other circumstance to grieve them than that of receiving a God who gives himself to them. Ah! Lord, therefore thou invisibly rejectest these guilty victims who oblige themselves to be dragged by force to the altar, thou who wiliest none but voluntary sacrifices: therefore thou reluctantly givest thyself to these ungrateful hearts who unwillingly receive thee; and, wert thou still capable of being troubled in the spirit, as thou permittedst to be visible over the tomb of Lazarus, ah! we should once more see thee groaning when thou enteredst those profane mouths which, in thy sight, are only open sepulchres, as they have long been troubled before they could prevail upon themselves to appear here to pay thee that homage.
Let us acknowledge, then, my dearest brethren, that the faith which makes us to discern the body of Jesus Christ is very rare. We believe, but with a superficial faith, which only skims the surface, as I may say, without entering into the efficacy and the mysteries of this sacrament: we believe, but with an indolent faith, which grounds its whole merit in submitting without opposition: we believe, but with an inconstant faith, which professes to believe, but denies it in works: we believe, but with a human faith, which is the gift rather of our fathers according to the flesh, than of the Father of Light: we believe, but with a popular faith, which leaves us only weak and puerile ideas: we believe, but with a superstitious faith, which tends to nothing but vain and external homages: we believe, but with a faith merely of custom, which feels nothing: we believe, but with an insipid faith, which no longer discerns: we believe, but with a convenient faith, which is never followed with any effects: we believe, but with an ignorant faith, which fails either in respect through familiarity, or in love through its backwardness: we believe, but with a faith which enchains the mind, and leaves the heart to wander: lastly, we believe, but with a tranquil and vulgar faith, in which there is nothing either animated, grand, sublime, or worthy of the God which it discovers to us. Ah! to discern thy body, Lord, through faith, it is to perfer this heavenly bread to all the luxuries of Egypt; it is to render it the only consolation of our exilement, the tenderest soother of our sufferings, the sacred remedy of all our evils, the continual desires of our souls; it is, through it, to find serenity under all the frowns of fortune, peace in all our troubles, and equanimity under all the stings of adversity; it is to find in it an asylum against our disgraces, a buckler to repel the flaming darts of Satan, a renovated ardour against the unavoidable lukewarmnesses of piety. To discern thy body, Lord, it is to devote more cares, more attention, and more circumspection toward worthily receiving thee, than to all the other actions of life. To discern thy body, Lord, it is to respect the temples in which thou art worshipped, the ministers who serve thee, and our bodies which receive thee. Let every man examine himself, let him thereupon listen to the testimony of his own conscience; and this is the second preparation, a prudent faith, which makes us to prove ourselves; — let a man examine himself.
Reflection II. — I know that we are unacquainted with our own heart; that the mind of man is not always informed of what takes place in man; that the passions seduce, examples harden, and prejudices drag us away; that our inclinations are always victorious over our lights; that the heart is never in the wrong; that, to examine one's self, is frequently only to harden one's self in error. Such is man, O my God! delivered up to his own understanding: he is continually deceived, and nothing appears to his eyes but under fictitious colours; he but imperfectly knows thee; he hardly knows himself; he comprehends nothing in all that surrounds him; he takes darkness for light; he wanders from error to error; he quits not his errors when he returns to himself: the lights alone of thy faith can direct his judgment, open the eyes of his soul, become the reason of his heart, teach him to know himself, lay open the folds of self-love, expose all the artifices of the passions, and exalt him to that spiritual man, who conceives and judges of all. By the rules of faith, then, my brethren, must we examine ourselves; all human doctrines, the compromises of custom, the examples of the multitude, our own understanding, all are deceitful guides;if ever it was of importance not to be deceived, it surely is in a conjuncture where sacrilege is the consequence of mistake.
But upon what shall we examine ourselves? Upon what! Upon the holiness of this sacrament, and upon our own corruption. It is the body of Jesus Christ, it is the bread of angels, it is the Lamb without stain, who admits none around his altar but those who either have not defiled their garments or who have purified them in the blood of penitence. And what art thou, forward soul, whom I see approaching with so much confidence? Bringest thou there thy modesty, thy innocence? Hast thou always possessed the vessel of thy body in honour and in holiness? Hath thy heart not been dragged through the filth of a thousand passions? In the sight of God, is not thy soul that blackened brand of which the prophet speaks, which impure flames had blasted and consumed from thine earliest years, and which is no longer but a shocking vestige of their fury? Art thou not totally covered with shameful wounds? Is there a spot upon thy body free from the mark of some crime? Where wilt thou place the body of the Lamb? What! it shall rest upon thy tongue; that pure and immaculate body upon a tomb which had never exhaled but infection and stench; that body immolated with so much gentleness upon the instrument of all thy vengeances and bitterness; that crucified body on the seat of all thy sensualities and debaucheries. What! he shall descend to thy heart? But will he therein find where to repose his head? Hast thou not changed that holy temple into a den of thieves? What! thou art going to place him among so many impure pleasures, profane attachments, ambitious projects, emotions of hatred, of jealousy, and of pride; it is amidst all these monsters that thou hast prepared his dwelling-place? Ah! thou deliverest up to his enemies, thou once more puttest him into the hands of his executioners.
You have examined yourselves, say you to me. Before drawing near, you have made your confession. Ah! my brethren, and, with the same mouth from which you have so lately vented all your iniquities, you go to receive Jesus Christ? And, the heart still reeking with a thousand ill-extinguished passions, and which tomorrow shall see in all their wonted vigour, you dare to approach the altar with your present, and to participate in the holy mysteries? And, the imagination still stained with the ideas of those recent excesses which you have just been recounting to the priest, you go to eat of the pure bread of the chosen? What! on your departure from the tribunal, the communion, in your eyes, supplies the place, and answers the purposes of penitence? From guilt you rush headlong to the altar? In place of dissolving in tears with the penitent, you come to rejoice with the righteous? In place of nourishing yourself with the bread of tribulation, you run to a delicious feast? In place of lingering at the gate of the temple, like the publican, you confidently draw near to the holy of holies? In former times, a penitent came not to the table of the Lord but after whole years of humiliation, of abstinence, of prayer, and of austerity, and they purified themselves in tears, in grief, and in the public exercises of a painful discipline; they became new men; a heartfelt regret was the only vestige of their former life; no traces of their past crimes were to be recognized but in the grace of penitence, and of the macerations which, at last, had expiated them; and the eucharist was that heavenly bread which no man, a sinner, then ate but with the sweat of his brow. And, at present, to have confessed crimes is believed to have already punished them; that an absolution, which is only given under the supposition of a humbled and contrite heart, actually creates and renders it so; that all the purity required of those who receive the body of Jesus Christ is, that they have laid open all the virulence and infection of their sores. Unworthy communicants, my brethren! you eat and you drink your damnation! In vain may we comfort you: can man justify when God condemns?
Besides, it is pure and without leaven; it requires to be exempted from leaven to eat of it. Now, have those worldly persons, whom the cirumstances of a solemnity determine to approach the holy table, quitted the old leaven in presenting themselves at the altar? Do they not bring along with them every passion still living in its roots? Judge thereof from the consequences. On their departure from thence they find themselves exactly the same; hatreds are not extinguished, the empire of voluptuousness is not weakened, animation in the pursuit of pleasures is not blunted, inclination for the world is not less violent; in a word, cupidity has lost nothing of its rights. We see no greater precautions than before against dangers already encountered; the society of the world again resumes its influence; conversations are renewed; the passions awaken; every thing resumes its former train, and, in addition to their former state, they have now to add the profanation of this awful mystery. How is this? It is that a simple confession is no examination of one's self.
Again, it is the food of the strong. A weak, sickly, and wavering soul, who turns with every wind; who gives way to the first obstacle; who founders upon the first rock; who escapes every moment from the guidance of grace; who has a long experience of his own fragility; who never brings to the altar but promises a hundred times violated, but momentary sensations of devotion, which the very first pleasure stifles; who, from his earliest years, has been in the alternate practice of weaknesses and holy things, and who has seen a constant succession of crimes to repentance, and of the sacrament to relapses: is a soul of this description a strong soul? Is it not its duty to examine itself, to increase, to strengthen, and to exercise itself in charity? Scarcely in a state to digest milk, ought it to load itself with solid food, and such as can serve the purposes of nourishment only to the perfect man?
It is written in the law, that, if the sin-offering be placed in an earthen vessel, the vessel shall immediately be broken; but if in a brazen vessel, it shall be both scoured and rinsed in water. Would these circumstances, so carefully and minutely marked, be worthy of the Holy Spirit, did they not contain instructions and mysteries? Doth not a weak soul, who receives the true victim, resemble that earthen vessel which falls in pieces, as I may say, being unable to endure the violence of this sacred fire? On the contrary, the firm soul, like the brass, is purified, loses in it all its stains, and comes out from it more beautiful and brilliant than before. What is the consequence, according to Jesus Christ, of putting new wine into old bottles; do they not burst, and allow the wine to be lost upon the ground? What is the application of this parable? You put the mystical wine, that wine whose strength operates a holy intoxication in pure souls, into a decayed and worn-out heart, which long-established passions have almost consumed. Ah! I am not surprised that it is unable to endure its strength, that the blood of Jesus Christ cannot tarry there, and that, on the first occasion, you shed and trample it under foot; it required to have gradually accustomed your heart to it, to have prepared it by retirement, by prayer, by daily conquests over yourself; and, through the means of these continued and salutary trials, to have strengthened and rendered it capable of receiving Jesus Christ.
It is the passover of Christians: now, Jesus Christ celebrates his passover with his disciples alone.
Now, what is it to be his disciples? It is to renounce one's self, to carry his cross, to follow him. Are you mortified in your desires, patient under your afflictions? Do you walk in the ways in which Jesus Christ hath walked before you? To be his disciples is mutually to love each other. And how often have you come to eat of this bread of union? How often have you made your appearance at this banquet of charity, your heart inwardly loaded with gall and bitterness against your brother? How often have you come to offer up your present at the altar, without having reconciled yourself with him?
Lastly. It is a God so pure, that the stars are dimmed in his presence: so holy, that, after the fall of the angel, heaven was rent and the abyss opened that he might place an eternal chaos between sin and him; so jealous, that a single wandering desire injures and offends him. Thus, my brethren, it is necessary that you examine yourselves upon your own inclinations. Are not those desires of the age of which the apostle speaks, still nourished within you? Render glory to God, and, in his presence, search your hearts to the bottom. I go to eat of the body of Jesus Christ, and to convert it into my own substance; but when he shall have entered into my soul, he who knows and discerns its intentions and most secret inclinations, will he find nothing there unworthy of the sanctity of his presence? He will immediately proceed to the spring and to the causes of my wanderings; he will examine whether their source be dried up, or their course only suspended; he will perceive what are still the dominant inclinations of my soul, and what is the weight which still turns the balance of my heart: alas! will he be enabled to say, as formerly when entering into the house of Zaccheus, " This day is salvation come to this house?" Have I sincerely cast off that passion so fatal to my innocence; that bitterness of heart, of which I have so lately expressed my detestation at the feet of the priest; that idolizing of riches, which leads me to grasp at even iniquitous profits; that madness of gaming, by which my health, my affairs, and my salvation are injured; that vexatious and variable temper, which the slightest contradiction inflames; that vanity which leads me to soar above the rank in which my ancestors had left me; that envy which, with malignant eyes, has always viewed the reputation and the prosperity of my equals; that proud and censorious air, which judges upon all, and never judges itself; that supreme influence over me of effeminacy and voluptuousness, which are, as it were, interwoven with the foundation and principle of my being? Has the avowal, which I come from making, of my weaknesses, to the minister of Jesus Christ, rooted them out from my heart? Am I a new creature? He alone who is regenerated can aspire to this heavenly bread which I am going to eat: in thine eyes am I so, O my God? Do I not bear the name of living, though still, in effect, dead? Will the Mighty, entering into my soul, possess it in peace, and will he not find there seven unclean spirits who shall chase him from it? Instruct me, Lord, and suffer not that thy Christ, that thy Holy, descend into corruption. Such, my brethren, is the way to examine ourselves. The Lord had formerly forbidden the Jews to offer up honey and leaven in the sacrifices: see if, in approaching the altar, you bring not with you the leaven of your crimes, and the honey of voluptuousness: that is to say, both that relish for the world and for pleasure, and that effeminate and sensual character, enemy of the cross, and incompatible with salvation. Approach not, if you do not feel yourself sufficiently pure: this holy body, says the prophet, would not purge your iniquity, it would only increase it; your religion would be vain, your heart idolatrous, your sacrifice a sacrilege.
Examine, therefore, yourself, and afterward eat of the heavenly bread. But we are not to stop at the simply discerning and examining. Hitherto, you have only removed the obstacles; but you have not settled the last preparations: you have lopped off whatever might repel Jesus Christ from your soul; but you have not acquired what might attract him to it: you have arranged so as not to receive him unworthily; but you have not so as to receive him with fruit. It is not sufficient to be free from guilt; it is necessary to be clothed with righteousness and sanctity: it is little not to betray him like Judas; it is necessary to love him with the other disciples: it is little, in a word, to be no longer profane, worldly, voluptuous, effeminate, proud, and revengeful; it is necessary to be sedate, meek, humble, firm, chaste, believing, Christian. " As oft as ye do this, do it in remembrance of me:" this is the third disposition to communicate in remembrance of Jesus Christ.
Reflection III. — What is it to communicate in remembrance of Jesus Christ? It is, in the first place, internally to describe all that passed in the heart of Jesus Christ in instituting this adorable sacrament. " With desire," said he to his disciples, " I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer," He sighed for that blessed moment; he never lost sight of it; in the remembrance of it he was comforted for all the bitterness of his passion. What did he thereby mean to teach us? Ah! that we ought to bring to this divine table a heart inflamed, penetrated, consumed; an eager, earnest, and impatient heart; a hunger and a thirst after Jesus Christ; an inclination roused by love: in a word, what I have termed a burning desire which impels us to love. This bread, said a father, requires a famished heart. Ah! Lord, says then the believing soul, with St. Augustine, who will give me that thou mayest enter into my heart to take possession of it; wholly to fill it; to reign there alone; to dwell there with me even to the consummation of ages; to be mine all; there to constitute my purest delights; to shed through it a thousand inward consolations; to satiate, to gladden it, to make me forget my miseries, mine anxieties, my vain pleasures, all mankind, the whole universe, and to leave me wholly to thee, to enjoy thy presence, thy conversation, and all the delights which thou preparest for those who love thee? Perhaps, Lord the tenement of my soul is not yet sufficiently embellished to receive thee; but come and be thyself all its ornament. Perhaps thou perceivest stains which repel thee from it; but thy divine touch will purify them all. Perhaps thou discoverest invincible enemies still there; but art not thou the Mighty? Thy sole presence will disperse them, and peace alone will reign there when once thou shalt be in possession of it. Perhaps it has wrinkles which render it forbidding; but thou wilt renew its youth like that of the eagle. Perhaps it is still stained with the blemishes of its former infidelities; but thy blood will wash them entirely out. Come, Lord, and tarry not; every blessing will attend me with thee: despised, persecuted, afflicted, despoiled, calumniated, I will consider as nothing my sorrows from the moment that thou shalt come to alleviate them: honoured, favoured, exalted, surrounded with abundance, these vain prosperities will cease to interest me, will appear as nothing from the moment thou shalt have made me to taste how sweet thou art. Such are the desires which ought to lead us to the altar.
But, alas! many bring there only a criminal disgust and repugnance: occasions are required to induce them to determine upon it; of themselves they would never have thought of it. But, what do I say, occasions? Thunders and anathemas are required. Good God! that the church should be reduced, through the lukewarmness of Christians, to make a law to them of participating in thy body and in thy blood! That penalties and threatenings should be required to lead them to thy altar, and to oblige them to seat themselves at thy table! That the Christian's only felicity on earth should be a painful precept to him! That the most glorious privilege with which men can be favoured by thee should be an irksome restraint to them! Others approach it with a heavy heart, a palled appetite, a soul wholly of ice: people who live in the commerce of pleasures and of the sacrament; who participate at the table of Satan and at that of Jesus Christ; who have stated days for the Lord, and days allotted for the age; people to whom a communion costs only a day of restraint and reservation; who, on that day, neither gamble, show themselves, see company, nor speak evil. But this exertion goes no farther; all devotion ceases with the solemnity; it is a deed of ceremony; after this short suspension they are at ease with themselves; they tranquilly return to their former ways, for that was a point agreed upon with themselves; they smoothly continue to live in this mixture of holy and of profane; the sacrament calms us upon pleasures; pleasures to be more tranquil on the side of the conscience lead us to the sacrament; and they are almost good in order to be worldly without scruple. Thus they bring to the altar a taste cloyed with the amusements and the delights of the age, with the embarrassments of affairs, with the tumult of the passions: they feel not the ineffable sweets of this heavenly food; they retrace, even at the foot of the throne of grace the images of those pleasures they have so lately left: interests which occupy us, projects which puzzle us, ideas which force us from the altar to drag us back to the world, make much deeper impressions 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 woman; here lie sanctified the marriage and the feast with his presence; here he multiplied the loaves to fill a famished multitude; here he checked his disciples who wanted to bring fire from heaven upon a criminal city; here he deigned to hold converse with a woman of Samaria; here he suffered the children around him, and rebuked those who wanted to drive them away; here he restored sight to the blind, made the lame to walk, delivered those possessed of devils, made the dumb to speak, and the deaf to hear. At these words our fathers felt themselves transported with a holy joy; they shed tears of tenderness and of religion upon that blessed land; this sight, these images, carried them back to the times, to the actions, to the mysteries of Jesus Christ, inspired them with fresh ardour, and consoled their faith; sinners found there a sweet trust, the weak a new force, and the righteous new desires.
Ah, Christians! it is not necessary that you cross the seas; salvation is at your hand; the word which we preach to you will be, if you wish it, upon your mouth and in your heart; open the eyes of faith, behold these altars; they are not places consecrated formerly with the presence, it is Jesus Christ himself: approach in remembrance of him; come to rekindle all that your heart hath ever felt of tender, affecting, and lively, for this divine Saviour. Let the remembrance of his meekness, which would not permit him to break the reed already bruised, nor to extinguish the yet glimmering lamp, quiet your transports and impatiencies: let the remembrance of his toils and of his troublesome life overwhelm you for your effeminacy; let the remembrance of his modesty and of his humility, which made him fly when they wanted to make him king, cure you of your vanities, of your schemes, of your frivolous pretensions: let the remembrance of his fast for forty days reproach you for your sensualities: let the remembrance of his zeal against the profaners of the temple teach you with what respect, and with what holy dread, you ought to enter there: let the remembrance of the simplicity and frugality of his manners condemn the vain superfluities and the excesses of yours: let the remembrance of his retirement and of his prayers warn you to fly the world, to retire sometimes into the secrecy of your house, to pass, at least, some portion of the day, in the indispensable practice of prayer; let the remembrance of his tender compassion for a famished people give you bowels of compassion for the unfortunate: let the remembrance of his holy discourses teach you to converse innocently, holily, and profitably with men: in a word, let the remembrance of all his virtues, there more lively, more present to the heart and to the mind, correct you of all your weaknesses. This is what is called to communicate in remembrance of him.
But, to bring continually to the altar the same weaknesses; to familiarize ourselves in such a manner with the body of Jesus Christ, that it no longer awakens in us a new sentiment, but leaves us always such as we are; to nourish ourselves with a divine food, yet not to increase; frequently to approach this burning furnace without any additional heat to your lukewarmness; to appear there with faults a hundred times detested, yet still dear, with habits of imperfection, which, though light in themselves, are no longer so, however, through the attachment and the bent which render them inevitable to us, and through the circumstance of the sacrament which there is the risk of profaning; to make profession of piety, of estrangement from the world, to be almost every day in the commerce of holy things, and to have determined, as it were, upon a limited point of virtue, beyond which never to rise, and, after ten years' exercise of piety, to be no farther advanced than at first; on the contrary, to have rather relaxed from the first fervour; to be continually applying to this divine remedy, yet to feel no alteration for the better in the disease; to heap sacrament upon sacrament, if I may dare to say so, yet never to empty the heart in order to make room for this heavenly food; to nourish envies, animosities, secret attachments, a fund of sensuality, of vain desires to please, to be courted, to be prosperous; to permit, in conversation, the habit of witticisms and every freedom of speech upon others, of endless nothings, of sentiments wholly profane, of quibbles which wound sincerity, of concealments by which falsehood becomes familiar, of hastiness and bursts of passion; to be jealous to an extreme wherever self is concerned; to rise indignant at the smallest appearance of neglect, and to be incapable of digesting a single disobliging gesture; and yet, with all this, to feed upon the bread of angels: O my God! how much less than this ought to make us tremble!
But, is it to eat of this bread unworthily, to eat it with so many imperfections and weaknesses? Who knows this, O Lord, but thee? All we know is, that it is not communicating in remembrance of thee; that many righteous shall appear in thy sight, at the great day, as a soiled cloth; that many, who had even prophesied in thy name, shall be rejected; and that every thing is to be dreaded in this state. Peter is not admitted to thy supper till after thou hast washed his feet; nevertheless thou assurest us that he was altogether pure. Magdalene is sent away, and thou sayest to her, "Woman, touch me not/' because a too sensible affection was the cause of her eagerness; and, nevertheless, her love had been great, and she had washed thy sacred feet and her own sins with her tears. And we, Lord, full of wants, empty of sincere fruits of penitence, made up wholly of effeminacy and sensualities, lukewarm, and without desire, fixed in a certain state of languishing and imperfect piety, more sustained by habitude and the engagements of a holy profession than by thy grace or by a lively and solid faith, alas! we make thy body our ordinary food. What inexplicable gulfs, Lord! What a train of crimes, perhaps, not known, unrepented of, multiplied to infinity, and which are as the shoot upon which a thousand new profanations are afterward grafted! What gulfs, once more! And what terrible secrets shall thy light make manifest to us at the great day! In thy sight, O my God, what am I! I can neither offend nor please thee by halves; my condition admits not of those middle states of virtue which hold, as it were a mid-way between innocence and guilt; if not a saint, I am a monster; if not a vessel of honour, I am a vessel of shame; if not an angel of light, there is no room to hesitate, I am an angel of darkness; and, if not a living temple of thy Spirit, I must be its profaner. Good God! what powerful motives for vigilance, for self-examination, for circumspection, for approaching thine altars with trembling; for humility, tears, and compunction, while waiting the manifestation of thine adorable judgments! But still, my brethren, it is not enough to communicate in remembrance of Jesus Christ; and in order to retrace his life, it is likewise necessary, and this is the last disposition, to renew the remembrance of his death, and to show him whenever we eat of his body and drink of his blood; and this is what I call a noble faith which leads us to sacrifice.
Reflection IV. — As oft as you shall eat of the body and drink of the blood of the Lord, you will show his death until the kingdom of God shall come. How is this? Literally speaking, his death is shown, because this mystery was a prelude to his passion; because Judas there determined to betray him; because Jesus Christ, eager to undergo that baptism of blood with which he was to be baptized, anticipated its fulfilment, and sacrificed himself beforehand by the mystical separation of his body and of his blood; because the eucharist is the permanent sacrifice of the church, the fruit and the fulness of that of the cross: lastly, because Jesus Christ is there as in a state of death; he hath a mouth, and speaks not; eyes, and uses them not; feet, and walks not. But, my brethren, in that sense the impious, equal with the just man, shows the death of the Lord as oft as he eats of his body: it is a mystery and not a merit; it is the nature of the sacrament, and not the privilege of him who receives it: it is a consequence of its institution, and not a disposition for approaching it. Now, the design of the apostle here is to prevent the abuses, to instruct believers how to eat worthily of the body of the Lord, to explain to them, in the mysteries contained in this sacrament, the dispositions which it requires. There is a way, therefore, of showing the death of the Lord, which should be wholly in our hearts, which disposes and prepares us, which fits the situation of our soul to the nature of this mystery, which makes us to bear upon our body the mortification of Jesus Christ, which immolates and crucifies us with him. Let us resume the reasons we have touched upon, and change the letter into spirit.
First. The death of the Lord is shown, because this mystery was a prelude to his passion. In former times the eucharist was a prelude to martyrdom. From the moment that the rage of the tyrant was declared, and the persecution began, all the believers ran to provide themselves with this bread of life; they carried this precious trust into their houses: death seemed less terrible to them when they had before their eye the beloved pledge of their immortality; they even desired it; and the ineffable consolations which the presence of Jesus Christ, hidden under mystical veils, already shed through their soul, made them to long for that torrent of delight with which he will overflow his chosen when they shall behold him face to face. Were they dragged to prison, and, like felons, loaded with irons, they of whom the world was unworthy? — they carefully concealed the divine eucharist in their bosom; they feasted upon it in the hope of martyrdom; they grew fat upon this heavenly food, like pure victims, that their sacrifice might be more pleasing to the Lord. Chaste virgins, fervent believers, holy ministers, partook altogether of the blessed bread; and what delight even in their chains! What serenity of mind in these dark and gloomy abodes! What songs of thanksgivings in these horrible places where the eye encountered nothing but the sad images of death and preparations for the most cruel tortures. How often did they say to Jesus Christ, present with them in this adorable sacrament, Ah! we fear no ill, Lord, since thou art with us: though hosts surround us, yet we will not be afraid: our enemies may destroy our bodies, but thou wilt restore them to us glorious and immortal; for who can destroy those whom the Father hath bestowed upon thee? Blessed chains which thou deignest to sustain! Holy prisons which thou consecratest with thy presence! Beloved dungeons in which thou fillest our souls with so many lights! Precious death which is to unite us with thee, and to withdraw the veil which conceals thee from our sight! Thence what fortitude under their tortures! Filled with the body of Jesus Christ, washed in his blood, they quitted their prisons, says a holy father, like lions out of their den, still raging and thirsting for death and carnage: they flew upon the scaffolds, and, with a holy pride, launched here and there looks of confidence and magnanimity which appalled the most ferocious tyrants, and even disarmed their executioners: they showed then the death of the Lord in preparing themselves for martyrdom by the communion.
The tranquillity of our ages and the religion of the Caesars, leave us no longer the same hope; death is no longer the reward of faith, and the eucharist makes no more martyrs: but have we not domestic persecutors? Has our faith only tyrants to dread? And is there not a martyrdom of love as well as of blood? In approaching the altars, then, my brethern, a believing soul sighs for the dissolution of this mortal body; for, could he love this life, and show the death of Jesus Christ, and renew, in these mystical signs, his quitting the world to go to his Father? He complains of the length of his exilement; he bears, to the foot of the sanctuary, a spirit of death and of martyrdom, " Ah! Lord, since thou art dead and crucified to the world, why detain me here? What can I find upon the earth worthy of my heart, seeing thou art no longer there? The mystery itself, which should console me through thy presence, recalls to me thy death; these covers which veil thee are an artifice of thy love; and thou half concealest thyself, only to inspire my heart with the desire of fully beholding thee. Vain things, what offer ye to me but an empty shadow of the God whom I seek! What answer do ye make when my softened heart bends toward you to soothe its anxieties? Return, say you, to him who hath made us; we groan in awaiting his coming to deliver us from this servitude, which makes us subservient to the passions and to the errors of men: seek him not among us; thou wilt not find him; he is risen; he is no longer here: if he appear, it is only to die again: recall the desires and the affections which thou meant to place upon us, and turn them toward heaven; the Bridegroom hath been carried away, the earth is no longer for a Christian now but a vale of mourning and tears. Such is what they answer to me. What, then, detains me here, Lord? What are the ties and the charms which can attach me to the world? Restless in pleasures, impatient in absence, tired of the conversations and the commerce of men; afraid of solitude; without relish for the world, without relish for virtue; doing the evil I would not, and leaving undone the good that I would, — what keeps me here? What delays the dissolution of this body of sin? What prevents me from soaring with the wings of the dove upon the holy mountain? I feel that I should then be happy; I could then feast at all times upon this delicious bread. I taste no real delight but at the feet of thy altars: these are, indeed, the happiest moments of my life: but they are so short, and I must so soon return to the insipidities and disgusts of the world; I am under the necessity of being so long absent from thee: no, Lord, there is no perfect happiness on the earth, and death is a gain to whoever knows to love thee.
Are these our sentiments, my brethren, when we draw near to the altars? Where are now the Christians, who, like the first believers, await the blessed hope, and hasten, by their sighs, the end of their banishment, and the coming of Jesus Christ? This is a refinement of piety of which they have no idea: it is merely a language of the speculatist: it is, however, the groundwork of religion, and the first step of faith. The necessity of dying is considered as a cruel punishment; the sole idea of death, with which our fathers were so comforted, makes us to shudder: the end of life is the term of our pleasures, in place of being that of our sufferings; the attention paid to the body are endless; our precautions extend even to absurdity; or, if it sometimes happen that this last moment is desired, it is in consequence of being wearied of life and its chagrins: it is a disgrace, a habitual infirmity preying upon us, a revolution in our worldly matters which leaves no more pleasures to be expected here below, the disappointment of an establishment, a death, an accident, or lastly, a disgust and a wish of self-love; we tire of being unfortunate, but we are not eager to go to be reunited with Jesus Christ; and, with all this, they come to eat of the Lord's Supper, to renew the remembrance of his passion and to show his death until he shall come: what an outrage!
Secondly. His death is shown in this mystery, because Judas there finally determined upon delivering him up. Now, what does this remembrance exact of us? Ah! my brethren, an ardent desire of repairing, by our homages, the impiety of so many shocking communions which crucify Jesus Christ afresh. So many impure, revengeful, worldly, and extortioning sinners, of every people and of every nation, receive him into profane mouths: we ought to feel the insults which Jesus Christ thereby suffers; to humble ourselves before him, seeing that his most signal blessing is become the occasion of the greatest crimes; to tremble for ourselves; to admire his goodness, which, for the profit of a small number of chosen, hath graciously been willing to submit to the indignities of that endless number of sinners, of all ages and of all times, who have, and still continue to dishonour him; to avert, by the tears of our heart and a thousand inward lamentations, the scourges which unworthy communions never fail to draw down upon the earth. For, if the apostle formerly lamented that general plagues, epidemical diseases, and sudden deaths, were only a consequence of the profanation of the sacrament; ah! thy finger has long been upon us, Lord; the cup of thy wrath is poured out upon our cities and provinces: thou armest kings against kings, and nations against nations; nothing is now spoken of but battles and the rumours of war; our fields are stricken with sterility; our families are consumed by the sword of the enemy, and the father is deprived of the only prop and consolation of his old age: we groan under burdens, which, though keeping the enemy of the state from our walls, yet leave us a prey to famine and want; the arts are now almost of no avail to the people; commerce languishes, and industry can hardly supply the common necessaries of life; yet what are even the public calamities, when compared with the private miseries known to thee alone? We have seen our citizens mowed down by hunger and death, and our cities turned into frightful deserts; the enemy of thy name takes advantage of our dissensions, and usurps thine inheritance.
Whence proceed these scourges, great God! so continued and so terrible? Where are formed those clouds of wrath and indignation which have so long been pouring out their torrents upon us? Is it not to punish the sacrilegious that thou art armed? Do not the outrages which are every day committed against thy body, at the feet of the altars, draw down upon us these marks of thy wrath? O strike us then, Lord, and avenge thy glory; stop not the arm of thy angel who hovers over us; let the houses where the traces of a profane blood are still imprinted not be spared: thine anger is just. But no; give us not the water of gall because we have sinned against thee: give peace in our days; listen to the cries of the righteous who entreat it of thee: "Lord," say they with the prophet, " we looked for peace, but no good came; and for a time of health, and behold trouble." Terminate the profanations which are ever the attendants of war; cease to punish sacrileges by multiplying them on the earth; once more restore majesty to so many temples profaned, worship and dignity to so many churches despoiled, peace to our cities, abundance to our families, consolation and gladness of heart to Israel; let the child be restored to his father and the husband to the desolate wife; and, if our evils touch thee not, O pay attention to the miseries of thy church.
Thirdly. The death of the Lord is shown in this mystery, for Jesus Christ sacrifices himself in it, by the mystical separation of his body and of his blood. What follows from thence? That we must be at the foot of the altar as if we were at the foot of the cross: that we must enter into the dispositions of the disciples and of the women of Jerusalem who received the dying sigh of Jesus, and were present at the consummation of his sacrifice. Now, what hatred had they not against a world which had crucified their Master? What measures did they think it necessary to keep with his murderers? Were they afraid of declaring themselves the disciples of him who had so openly declared himself their Saviour, and that at the price of his blood? Did they not say to the heavenly Father, Ah! strike us, Lord, who are the guilty, and spare the innocent. What horror at their past faults, which had attached so good a Master to the cross! What a lively impression in their heart of his sufferings! Thus, my brethren, still to keep measures with the age, to be afraid of declaring openly for piety, to be ashamed of the cross of Jesus Christ, to calculate your works of devotion in such a way that an air and a savour of the world may still pervade the whole: not boldly to confess Jesus Christ; to be afraid of abstaining from a theatre where he is insulted, from an assembly where he is offended, from a proceeding by which innocence must suffer, from I know not what train of life which the world makes a necessity to you, from certain maxims which wound the Gospel, and which custom has established as laws; to pretend to keep up all those conciliatory measures with the world, and yet to come to eat the passover with the disciples of Jesus Christ; to preserve a correspondence with his enemies, and yet to seat yourselves at his table; to esteem the maxims which crucify him, and yet to wish to be the spectators and the faithful companions of his cross; — ah! it is a contradiction.
He hath overcome the world; he hath fixed it to his cross: along with himself he hath given death to its maxims and errors: consequently, to show his death in the communion is to renew the memory of his victory. And, if the world lives and still reigns in your heart, my brother, do you not annihilate the fruit of his death? Do you not contest with Jesus Christ the honour of his triumph? And, in place of showing his death, do you not come to renew it with his enemies.
Besides, in the fourth place, his death is shown in this mystery, for it is the consummation of the sacrifice of the cross, and he applies the fruit of it to us. Now, what gives us a right to the fruit of the cross, and, consequently, to the communion? Sufferance, mortification, and a penitent and inward life. For, say, living in delights, shall you dare to nourish a body, like yours, enervated by pleasures, flattered, caressed; shall you dare, I say, to nourish it with a crucified body? Shall you dare to incorporate Jesus Christ, dying and crowned with thorns, with delicate and sensual members? Would this connexion not be horrible? Will you dare, by converting his body into your own substance, to transform it into an effeminate and voluptuous body? Ah! it would be the perfection of iniquity. To be nourished with the body of Jesus Christ, your members must become his members, his body must take the figure of your body. Now, his body is a crucified body; his members are suffering members; and, if you live without suffering; if you bear not upon your body the mortification of Jesus Christ; if, perhaps, you have never practised a single instance of selfdenial; if your days are passed in a tranquil effeminacy; if afflictions excite impatience; if you feel hurt at every thing which opposes your humour; if you prescribe to yourself no works of mortification; if those sent to you by heaven are unwillingly and unthankfully received; how will you that you unite your body to that of Jesus Christ? This is never reflected upon, my brethren, and nevertheless, a soft and sensual life can be a presage only of an unworthy communion.
Lastly. The death of the Lord is shown in this mystery, for he is there himself as in a state of death. He hath a mouth and speaketh not; eyes, and useth them not; feet, and walketh not. View then, my brother, and act according to this model; behold how you ought to show his death in partaking of his body: you must bring there eyes instructed to be closed for the earth; a tongue accustomed to silence, or to sayings of God, as St. Paul says; feet and hands immoveable for the works of sin; senses either extinguished or mortified: in a word, to bring there a universal death over your body. The state of Jesus Christ in the eucharist is the state of the Christian on earth; a state of retreat, of silence, of patience, of humiliation, of divorce from the senses. For, what is Jesus Christ in the eucharist? He is in the world as if not there: he is in the midst of men, but invisible; he hears their vain discourses, their chimerical plans, their frivolous expectations, but he enters not into them; he sees their solicitudes, their agitations, and their enterprises, and he allows them to act; divine honours are paid to him, and he is insulted; and, ever the same, he seems insensible alike to the insults as to the homages: he looks on while families, empires, and ages are renewed; manners are changed; the taste of men and of ages are incessantly fluctuating; he sees customs sink into decay and then revive; the figure of this world in an eternal revolution; his inheritance divided; wars, seditions, and unexpected revolutions; the whole universe shaken; and he is tranquil upon its ruins; and nothing withdraws him from his close and ineffable study of his Father; and nothing interrupts the divine quiet of his sanctuary, where he is always living for the purpose of interceding for us. Once more, consider and act according to this model: let us bring to the sacred table eyes long since closed upon every thing which may hurt our soul; a tongue surrounded with a guard of circumspection and of modesty; eats chaste and impenetrable to the hissings of the serpent, and to the luxury of those sounds and voices so calculated to soften the heart; a soul alike insensible to scorn or to praise; a soul beyond the reach of the things of this earth, and proof against all the revolutions of life; the same in good or in bad fortune; viewing, with indifferent eyes, every occurrence here below, esteeming the good or the evil which occur to him as a matter that does not regard him; and, through all the agitations of the earth, the tumult of the senses, the contradiction of tongues, the vain enterprises of men, always watchful to guard over his peace of heart, to move continually with a steady pace toward eternity, never to lose sight of his God, and to have his conversations always in heaven.
Not that I would exclude from the altar all those who have not yet attained to this state of death: alas! it is the business of a whole life; and the body of Jesus Christ is an aid established to fortify and to assist us in this undertaking. But our inclination ought to bend to it, lest we approach the altar unworthily; we must be at open war with the senses, with our own corruption, with our own weaknesses, and be continually gaining the advantage in some article; Christian self-denial must be practised; the daily victories, which the impressions of the world and of the senses gain over us must be expiated by retirement, by silence, by tears, and by prayer; we must rise with fresh vigour from every backsliding. But I mean you to understand that a communion is not the concern of a day, or of a solemnity; that our whole life ought to be a preparation for the eucharist; that all our actions should be as steps which lead us up to the altar; that the life of too many in the world, even of those who are not in debauchery, who restrict themselves upon nothing, who live according to the senses, who are warm only on the interests of the earth, is a life which shows not the death of the Lord, and which, consequently, excludes you from this mystery. I mean you to comprehend, that the eucharist is a festival, if I dare to say so, of mourning and death; that delights, pleasures, and vain decorations disfigure this sacred table, and occasion your being rejected equally as him who appears there without the wedding garment; that the meats of the earth and the bread of heaven cannot be eaten at the same time; and that, on the morrow after the Israelites had eaten of the old corn of the Land of Canaan, the manna ceased, neither had they any more of that heavenly food. I mean you to comprehend, that this sacrament is the fruit and not the mark of penitence; that those communions, determined by a solemnity, gave rise to more profaners than true worshippers; that the body of Jesus Christ cannot be eaten without living by his spirit; that the plenitude of the Holy Spirit must even rest upon a soul, as upon Mary, before Jesus Christ can enter into it, as it were, to assume once more the human nature. I mean you to comprehend, that the reading of the holy books, and the salutary rigours of penitence, should prepare an abode in our hearts for Jesus Christ, to the end that we might be like holy arks, and that this heavenly manna may rest there amidst the tables of the law, and the rod of Aaron. I mean you to understand, that nothing should alarm you more, you who live in the dangers of the age and who love them, than all the communions of which you have partaken without preparation. I mean you to understand, that the bread of life becomes a poison to the majority of believers; that the altars witness almost more crimes than the theatre; that Jesus Christ is more insulted in his sanctuary than in the assemblies of sinners; and that the solemnities are no longer but mysteries of mourning for him, and days set apart to dishonour him. I mean you, in a word to understand that, in order to approach it worthily, a respectful faith is required which enables us to discern; a prudent faith, which leads us to examine ourselves; a lively faith, which causes us to love; a noble faith which induces us to sacrifice ourselves: without these, it is rendering one's self guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord; it is eating and drinking their own condemnation.
Ah, Lord! how little have I hitherto known the innocence and the extreme purity which thou requirest of those who come to eat of this heavenly food! The Centurion, that man of so fervent, so humble, and so enlightened a faith; that man so rich in good works, who loved thy people, who raised up edifices to thy name, and appropriated them to public prayers, and to the interpretation of thy Scriptures; that man does not think himself worthy even to receive thee in his house. Even the purest of virgins, when informed by the angel that thou wert to descend into her womb, is terrified at it; she contemplates her own nothingness; and, if the power of speech still remains to her, it is to ask, How can this be? And who am I, Lord, to dare to seat myself at thy table with so little precaution; — I, who come to appear empty before thee; who have nothing to offer to thee but the refuse of a heart so long engrossed by the world; who bring to thine altars only feeble aspirations after holiness and unsubdued attachments to the world, but unavailing lights, but sentiments which evaporate in vain wishes?
Ah, Lord! the fruits of a holy communion are so abundant, so sensible; the soul quits it so overflowed with thy blessings and thy grace, that, when I had no other proof of the unworthiness of my communions than their inefficacy, I ought to tremble and be humbled. When thy body is eaten worthily, we abide in thee, and thou abidest in us; that is to say, that thy precious blood, which still flows in our veins, leaves us thy inclinations, thy traits, thy resemblance, and that we are another thee; noble and heavenly inclinatious should alone be seen in us, and sentiments worthy of the blood we have received: and, nevertheless, I still find my affections drawn to the earth. When thy body is eaten worthily, thou tellest us that we live for thee, and eternally: and I have still continued to cherish worldly pursuits and schemes of ambition. What then must I do, Lord? Must I retire from thy table? What! this fruit of life should be forbidden me? What! the bread of consolation should no longer be broken for me? No, Lord, thou dost not mean to exclude me from it, but only that I be prepared for it; thou refusest me not the bread of children, but thou wouldst that my unworthiness force thee not to give me a serpent in place of it. Prepare, then, thyself in mine heart an abode worthy of thee; make the rough and crooked ways of it smooth, and let the heights be levelled; purify my desires; correct my inclinations, or rather create within me new ones. Thou alone canst be thy precursor, and prepare the way for thee in souls. Fill us, then Lord, with thy spirit, to the end that we may eat of thy body worthily, and live eternally for thee.
Now, to God, &c.
THE END.