that is the least of all holy measures, less than their determination we cannot go and be innocent. But if we will make judgment concerning our love and our desires, we must frequent these holy mysteries by the measures and suggestion of something that is within: if it be love, it will have no measures but itself; and nothing can give it limits but the circumstances of things themselves, and the possibilities of our persons and affairs. 2. Besides this coming upon necessity, our desires are very much to be suspected, if compliance and custom or reputation be the ingredients, and prevail above any better motive that can be observed. As force makes hypocrites, so favour and secular advantages make flatterers in religion; and when a prince or ruler, a master of a family, or any one that hath power to oblige, is heartily religious, religion will quickly be in fashion. Those persons which come upon such inducements, are, by our blessed Saviour, signified by the parable of the corn, that fell by the highway; they presently receive it with joy; and it springs quickly if the sun shines but when persecution comes, they hang the head, and slack their pace, and appear seldom, and show that they had no depth of root. These men serve God, when religion is rich and prosperous; they come to Christ for the loaves, but care but little for the mystery. As long as the religion stays at this port, it is good for nothing; and the very entry itself is suspicious. Fear is better than this; but if it pass on to create an effective and material love, it will be well at last. 3. They that are easily diverted from communicating, and apt to be excused from the solemnity,—these men have just cause to suspect their desires to be too cold to kindle the fires upon this altar, and to consume this sacrifice; they have not love, and come against their will. Some men are hindered by every thing; if a stranger come to the house,if they be indisposed with a little headach,—if they have an affair of the world,-if a neighbour be angry with them,— if a merry meeting be appointed the day before;-this is a suspicious indifferency and lukewarmness. They that are not desirous to use all opportunities and to take all advantages, and long for all the benefits,-want very much of that hunger and thirst after the righteousness' of God, which is 6 fulfilled in those mysteries, and to which Christ hath promised such ample satisfaction. I do not say, that every man is bound to communicate every time that he can have it,—and that it is lukewarmness not to desire it so often as it is in our power;-but he that refuses it, when it is in his opportunity, when his circumstances are fitted, when, by the measures of piety and religion, it is decent and useful to him to do it (of which I shall afterwards give an account),—that man is guilty of a criminal indifference; and when he does come, may fear that he hath not spiritual hunger enough for so divine a banquet. 4. They that, in their preparation, take the least measures that are practised or allowed, and rest there and increase not, have neither value for the sacrament, nor desires of the blessing, nor expectations of any fruit; and, therefore, cannot have this holy appetite in due proportion, because they see no sufficient moving cause, and they look for little, and find less, and, therefore, can never be true desirers.For he that thinks there is no great matter in it, will have no great stomach for it; and he that will do no great matter for it, certainly expects no great excellency in it; and such are all they that take the least measures of preparation; who, therefore, shall find the least measures of blessing, and, in spiritual things, that which is called positively the least, is just none at all; he that shall be called least in the kingdom,' shall be quite shut out. This is an indifferency, both in the cause and in the effect; they feel no great blessings consequent to their reception; and, therefore, their affections are cold and because they are so, they shall for ever be without the blessing. 5. They only can be confident, that their desires are right, who feel sharpnesses and zeal in their acts of love. For, in spiritual things, every abatement is by the mixture of the contrary, and, therefore, when things are indifferent, we cannot tell which shall be accepted or accounted of. And when there is as much evil as good, the evil is only abated, but the good destroyed, and is not accepted; and, therefore, till the victory be clear and evident, we cannot have much comfort; but the strong desire is only certain and comfortable to the spirit. Great desires are a great pain: and the spouse, in the Canticles, complains that she is sick of love,' and then calls upon Christ to comfort her with flagons' of wine. Less desires than the greatest, if they be real and effective of the work, are fit for such persons as are not the greatest in religion. But in all spiritual progressions we are sure that our desires shall never cease growing, till they be full of God, and are swelled up to immensity; and till they come to some greatness, that they are like hunger and thirst, or like the breasts of a fruitful nurse, full and in pain till they be eased, we cannot be so confident that things are well with us in this particular. Are we in trouble, till we converse with our Lord in all the ways of spiritual intercourse? Do we rejoice, when a communion-day comes? And is our joy fixed upon consideration of that holy necessity of doing good works at that time especially, and receiving the aids of grace, and the helps of the sacrament liberally. When it is thus, it is well; that we can be sure of: all measures of desire which are so little, that we can compare them to no natural similitude of earnestness and appetite, we can only say that they are yet very uncomfortable; and if we come often and pray that we may have lively relish and appetite to the mysteries, be well in time; but as yet we cannot be sure that it it may is so. There is only in this case one help to our examination and our confidence :—he that comes because God commands him, in a direct and certain obedience to the words of Christ, or in a deep sorrow for his sins, coming either in hopes of remedy, or in a great apprehension of his infirmity, addressing himself either for support and strength; this man, although he feels no sensual punctures and natural sharpnesses of desire, yet he comes well, and upon a right principle. For St. Austin, reckoning what predisposition is necessary by way of preparation to the holy sacrament, reckons "hunger and the sense of our sins and our infirmities;" but if he wants the pleasure of these passionate indications, he must be careful that he be sure in the intellectual and religious choice; for that is the thing which is intended to be signified by all the exterior passions. But when he hath no sign, he must be the more careful he have the thing signified, and then all is right again. But happy is that soul, which comes to these springs of salvation, as the hart to the water-brooks,' panting and thirsty, longing and passionate, weary of sin, and hating vanity, and reaching out the heart and hands to Christ. And this we are taught by the same mystery represented under other sacraments; the waters of the spiritual rock of which our fathers drank in the wilderness; the rock was Christ, and those waters were his blood in the sacrament: and with the same appetite they drank those sacramental waters withal, we are to receive these divine mysteries evangelical. Now let us, by the aids of memory and fancy, consider the children of Israel in the wilderness, in a barren and dry land where no water was, marching in dust and fire, not wet with the dew of heaven, wholly without moisture, save only what dropped from their own brows: the air was fire, and the vermin was fire: the flying serpents were of the same cognation with the firmament,-their sting was a flame, their venom was a fever, and the fever a calenture: and their whole state of abode and travel was a little image of the day of judgment, when the elements shall melt with fervent heat. These men, like salamanders, walking in fire, dry with heat, and scorched with thirst, and made yet more thirsty by calling upon God for water; suppose, I say, these thirsty souls hearing Moses to promise that he will smite the rock, and that a river should break forth from thence, observe how presently they ran to the foot of the springing stone, thrusting forth their heads and tongues to meet the water, impatient of delay, crying out that the water did not move like light, all at once :'-and then suppose the pleasure of their drink, the unsatiableness of their desire, the immensity of their appetite ; they took in as much as they could, and they desired much more. This was their sacrament of the same mystery, and this was their manner of receiving it; and this teaches us to come to the same Christ with the same desires. For if that water was a type of our sacrament, or a sacrament of the same secret blessing, then that thirst is a signification of our duty, that we come to receive Christ in all the ways of reception with longing appetites, preferring him before all the interests. of the world; as birds do corn above jewels,-or hungry men, meat before long orations. For it is worth observing, that, there being in the Old Testament thirteen types and umbrages of this holy sacrament, eleven of them are of meat and drink: such are, 1. The tree of life in the midst of Paradise; 2. The bread and wine of Melchisedec; 3. The fine meal that Sarah kneaded for the angels' entertainment; 4. The manna; 5. The roasted paschal lamb b; 6. The springing rock; 7. The bread of proposition to be eaten by the priests; 8. The barley-cake in the host of Midian; 9. Samson's father's oblation upon the rock; 10. The honey-comb that opened the eyes of Jonathan; 11. And the bread which the angel brought to Elijah, in the strength of which he was to live forty days. All this is to show, that the sacrament is the life of the spiritual man, and the food of his soul, the light of his eyes, and the strength of his heart; and not only all this, and very much more of this nature, but to represent our duty also, and the great principle of preparation: meat is the object, and hunger is the address. The wine is the wine of angels; but if you desire it not, what should you do with it? for the wine that is not to satisfy your need, can do nothing but first minister to vanity, and then to vice; first to wantonness, and then to drunkenness. St. Austin, expressing the affections of his mother Monicha, to the blessed sacrament, says, "That her soul was, by the ligatures of faith, united so firmly to the sacrifice, which is dispensed in the Lord's Supper, that a lion or a dragon could not drag her away from thence;" and it was said of St. Catharine, "That she went to the sacraments as a sucking infant to his mother's breasts;" and this similitude St. Chrysostom * expresses elegantly; "See you not with what pretty earnestness and alacrity infants snatch their nurse's breast? How they thrust their lips into the flesh, like the sting of a bee. Let us approach to this table with no less desire, and, with no less, suck the nipple of the holy chalice; yet with greater desire let us suck the grace of the Holy Spirit." And it is reported that our blessed Lord taught St. Mechtildis, "When you are to receive the holy communion, desire and wish to the praise of my name to have all desire and all love, that ever was kindled in any heart b Sint desiderii post escas pocula magni; Assa caro nobis facit ora magis sitibunda Quam teneræ carnes, quas mollis decoquit unda.-Petrus Blesens. |