when you approach the holy table. " Be ye clean," exclaims the prophet, "that carry the vessels of the Lord." (Is. lii. 11.) How much greater reason have you to purify yourself, since you carry in your breast our Lord Himself!
TUESDAY
The Eucharist Compared to the Tree of Life.— I.
I. The tree of life, that grew in Paradise, restored the decaying forces of nature and preserved man, who was then immortal, in continual repair. In his Apocalypse, St. John says, that " the tree of life bore twelve fruits." (Apoc. xxii. 2.) The Eucharist is the bread of life, so called by Christ Himself, because by the grace which it gives, it renders us immortal; and because it yields twelve kinds of fruit, which are sovereign remedies against every infirmity to which man's nature is subject by sin.
II. Our first misery arises from the assaults of the devil, who, " as a roaring lion goeth about, seeking whom he may devour." (1 Pet. v. 8.) The holy Eucharist arms us against this misery by supplying us with strength to resist the devil and drive him away. To compare great things with small, it is like the heart of the fish of Tobias; which when burnt, "the smoke thereof driveth away all kinds of devils." (Tob. vi. 8.) The second evil to which man is subject, is the rebellion of concupiscence, of which the Apostle says, " I see another law in my members, fighting against the law of my mind." (Rom. vii. 23.) This law is the concupiscence of sin, in our members, such as the desire of wealth, the inclination to calumniate, and the love of pleasure. The heat of this concupiscence is allayed by the holy Eucharist.
