THE VOICE SPEAKING TO THE CHRISTIAN PILGRIM. and I live by the father, so he that eateth me, the same also shall live by me. This is the bread that came down from heaven; not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead. He that eateth this bread shall live for ever." The manna to which our Lord here compares the Holy Eucharist, was a daily food; and there cannot be a stronger reason in favour of frequent, if not rather of daily communion, than this single circumstance. The writer of the book of Wisdom, speaks of the manna, thus:-" Instead of which things thou didst feed thy people with the food of angels, and gavest them bread from heaven, prepared without labour, having in it all that was delicious, and the sweetness of every taste. For thy sustenance showed thy sweetness to thy children, and serving every man's will, it was turned to what every man liked." (Wisd. xvi., 20.) So the Church sings: Vetustatem novitas, Umbram fugat veritas, Noctem lux eliminat. Here, for empty shadows, fled, Is reality instead; Here, instead of darkness, light. Ah! Christian pilgrim, on thy way to the heaven that is promised to thee, dost thou not hear a voice say THE FIGURE OF THE HEARTH CAKE BROUGHT TO ELIAS BY AN ANGel. ing to thee:-How is it that thou knowest so little of the good things which thy God has prepared for thee? How is it that thou art so rare a guest at the table that He has made ready for thee in the wilderness? How is it that when Wisdom hath made ready her table, hath mixed her wine, and hath sent her servants to the walls of the city, to say to the unwise: "Come, eat of my bread, and drink of the drink I have mingled for you," you refuse to come? Is it that you do not believe? Or are you among the unwise? Have you no fear for fainting with hunger in the wilderness? Or has, perchance, the prophet's cry been heard against you:-" Blind the heart of this people; make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I heal them." 'Through the grace of this holy sacrament," says the Catechism of the Council of Trent, "the faithful, during life, enjoy the greatest peace and tranquillity of conscience; and lastly, strengthened by its power, no otherwise than Elias, who, in the strength of the hearthcake brought to him by the angel, walked to Horeb the Mount of God, when the time comes for departing from this life, they ascend to eternal glory and beatitude. The Hearth Cake of the Prophet Elias. And he walked in the strength of that food unto the Mount of God. |