Martyrs in the heavenly court. From the consecration to the Communion we are as truly and more consciously with Him than Cleophas and his companion in the way to Emmaus. And though our eyes are holden our understanding is not. We see Him in another shape; but we know Him while we see Him. And we speak to Him as our Lord, our Master, our Friend; and by an inward speech He answers us in words which it is not in man to utter. His abiding is for a short interval of time, but that brief time encloses an abyss of light and peace. We say Mass morning by morning all our life, but we never reach the end of this mystery of His personal nearness. There is no fixed horizon to the multitude of His sweetness,[1] which expands on every side like the illimitable sea. And yet all its sweetness is hid in the Blessed Sacrament for those who seek Him in holy fear. And before He departs from us for a season, to come again to-morrow, He takes and gives to us His precious Body and Blood as in the guest-chamber, on that last night of farewell, and as at Emmaus, when He vanished out of their sight. He is gone, but in a little while He is to be found again in the midst of His disciples; as the Council says again that "Jesus, having loved His own while
- ↑ Ps. xxx. 20.
