have for it very little relish. How can it be, then, but that your soul must loathe this at length, as though it were very light food? Because, that is, thou tasteth not how sweet the Lord is in this heavenly food, which, although it contains all sweetness of taste, will satisfy none with its good things but the empty and the hungry soul.
We will, therefore, give some exercises proper to increase the hunger for this food, and also its fruit. They should be used as holy aspirations, not thoughtlessly and carelessly pronounced, but with earnestness of feeling, and in the heart rather than with the lips.
For the souls affection is the one thing with which every work of piety must be recommended and seasoned, or it will be distasteful and wholly insipid. These exercises, of which we have drawn merely the method and outline, it is free for every one to enlarge; though it is to be feared that these and similar exercises may be distasteful to some, as too diffuse to be used so frequently at Communion or Mass.
But it were to be wished that these persons would better consider the majesty of this Sacrifice and Sacrament, and would desire more earnestly to derive fruit and spiritual refreshment from their use. For nothing is hard to those who love; and therefore they who burn with the desire of heavenly grace find nothing disagreeable in any labour or pains.
But if there is not time always, still it will be useful very frequently to prepare in this manner for Holy Communion, or the Sacrifice of the Mass.
Although I do not see with what face we can complain of prolixity in this matter, when on other occasions we are too long and lavish of our time upon things that are trifling and frivolous.
How few there are who do not readily bestow the space of a whole hour, not to say hours, every day on tending and feeding the body t And shall it be irksome to give so much, nay, one quarter of an hour only, to the heavenly feast t Yet in the one it is only the mortal body that receives sustenance, in the other it is the immortal soul.
What! are our other personal and domestic affairs so carefully and diligently, so closely and attentively, performed; and is the business of the soul, and of salvation, the most important of all, to be so waveringly and precipitately dealt with?
EXERCISE
Before Mass or Communion.
The various points of this exercise may be comprised under three principal heads:
