greater, than the office and power of a priest. In the order of divine actions it places the priest, in respect to the power of consecration, next to the Blessed Virgin, the living tabernacle of the Incarnate Word; and, in respect to the guardianship of the Blessed Sacrament, next to S. Joseph, the foster-father and guardian of the Son of God. What more can be bestowed upon the priest? What obligation to perfection can exceed the obligation of such a power, of such an office, and of such a living contact with the Word made flesh? S. John Chrysostom says the hand that consecrates ought to be purer than the solar light; and if the hand of the priest, what should be his eyes which gaze upon the Divine Presence, veiled but hardly hidden, and the lips which say, "This is My Body," and the ears that hear our own familiar voice uttering these words of the new creation of God? But if such should be the sanctity of the body, what should be the purity of the soul of the priest: in his intellect, with all its powers, faculties, memory, imagination; in his heart, with all its affections and desires; in his conscience, with all its discernment and sovereign commands; and in his will, with all its inflexible resolves and steadfast reign over his whole outward and inward life?
