Food in Holy Scripture, type of Heavenly Food. 153

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that wine, which He would gift without the element, to not drink until He should see both. And not only so, 'drink it new' in His Fa- but receiving that Gift daily, ther's Kingdom; wherein their thoughts the more we gather the myrrh' of centred in what was their His Passion; wherein those daily Bread.' Soul and who love Him with deepest body were daily nourished devotion, who are His friends together; and so every exdoing what He command-pression which designates eth", are inebriated,' borne provision,' 'longing,' need, out of and above them- fulness, spoke to them of selves; and He, without that Gift which they received doubt, eateth and drinketh daily in figure and in subin us, Who saith that in us stance. And herein we must He is in prison 7. And feel that there is reality and through this feeling of the the most literal truth; for reality of these emblems, since the visible substances the Ancient Church seems are indeed there, an interto have been guided by a pretation which refers to the sort of spiritual tact or dis- actual mystical table is more cernment to recognize the exact and full than one which blessings of the Sacrament sees only spiritual gifts gewherever mention is made nerally, not to speak of that of the elements therein con- grovelling exposition which secrated, and, where men cannot rise above temporal are now wont to think of gifts. Thus, when in the the mere element without Communion Service, the the Gift, or of a spiritual Ancient Church 8 used the

S.

5 "There shalt thou 'gather the myrrh' of His Passion, i. e. the burial of Christ, that having been buried with Him by Baptism into death, as He arose from the dead, thou too mayest arise." Ambr. de Cain et Ab. i. 6. § 19. "I have gathered My myrrh, i. e. which I planted in thee; for I first underwent death for thee; so didst thou desire to die and be buried with Me, for thou wert buried with Me by Baptism into death, and mortifiedst thy members upon the earth."

6 John xv. 14, in connexion with the parable of the Vine. "They are His Friends who are perfected, who keep His Image undefaced."

Theod. ad loc.

7 S. Ambr. de myst. fin.

8 See also S. Cypr. Test. i. 22. S. Ambr. de myst. fin. de Virg. c. 16. § 99. S. Aug. in loc. and Ps. xcix. 8. Jul. Firm. Gaud. Brix. S. 2. Philastr. Hær. 83.

154 Taste, hunger, thirst, fulness, the Cup, all heavenly.

66

6

Psalm, 'O taste and see Word of God; where is the that the Lord is gracious,' oil of sanctification, where she gave the fullest and most is also the inebriating cup. accurate meaning to the Blessed inebriation of the word Dy, and the mind Saving Cup!' that Cup, feels a joy and delight, as wherein the Lord is our having a new sense opened portion 39 All satisfying in it, and acknowledges that fulness is of Him and so the word is thus the most speaks of Him. And so exhausted and fulfilled, and when God says, 'Open thy all its meaning completed. mouth wide, and I will fill In like way, the words it,' He tells us how we shall 'My soul is athirst for God,' be filled with Him, accordexpress not only a pining ing to the measure of our longing, whereby the soul capacities, Whose commuis dried up for God's Pre- nication of Himself is sence, but the way in which bounded only by the narHe gives Himself; to 'hun- rowness of the vessels, which ger and thirst after Right- should receive Him. The eousness is further to oil stayeth' only when the desire His Body and Blood vessel is full. Jesus,' says Who is 6 our Righteous- St. Ambrose 4, saith this ness. The Lord hath to man; for Christ is fulprepared a table for me ness. He who filleth all against them that trouble things filleth thy mouth.' me' is that Table1 which And since the Church and repelleth the snares of the the Gifts therein are an Enemy,' ,' that Table 2 where image and the earnest and is the Living Bread, i.e., the foretaste of Heaven, in her

99

9"This Bread of the inner man requireth hunger, whence He saith in another place, 'Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after Righteousness,' &c. But Righteousness to us, the Apostle Paul saith, is Christ, wherefore let him who hungereth for this Bread hunger after Righteousness, but that Righteousness which cometh down from Heaven, which God giveth, not which man maketh for himself." S. Aug. in Joh. 6. Tr. 26.

1 S. Ambr. de interp. Dav. ii. 9. add de El. et jej. c. 10. § 35. Apol. Dav. c. 12. fin.

2 S. Ambr. in Ps. xxxv. § 19.

3 Ps. xvi. 6. "What is the Cup but His Passion ?" Philastr. Hær. 44.

4 In Ps. cxviii. § 17. § 9.

gifts too is that in its mea- semblance may, in either sure fulfilled, They shall case, be the same. be satisfied out of the ful- "To the world, the Proness of Thy house, and phets seemed out of themThou shalt give them to selves from phrenzy7; St. drink of the river of Thy Peter and the rest, to the pleasures.' 'The house is multitude; Hannah even the Church; the fulness of to Eli, from strong drink. the house, the exuberance Of our Lord Himself it was of graces; the torrent of said, He hath a devil, and pleasure, the Holy Spirit.' is mad;'He is beside "And in this analogy of Himself.' St. Paul knew

bodily and spiritual nourish- not even of himself, whement, even the specific cha- ther he were in the body, racter of each is retained. or out of the body.' Holy Strength and joy are seve- Scripture contrasts (as havrally the annexed qualities ing, therefore, some points of our natural food, bread of resemblance) being and wine; strengthening drunken with wine' and and refreshing' our Church being filled with the selects as the chief gifts in Spirit.' We speak of being our spiritual. And thus intoxicated with joy,'' with words, as inebriating,' or success,' with pride.' This those of the like meaning, is being out of a person's which sound strangely in self in a spiritual way, our ears, who have, it is to though, in the latter, be feared, so little of the joy through an evil spirit. All of the Ancient Church, do are, in their several degrees, declare the highest mystery insensible, for the time, to of Christian joy. For man the outer world; they canmay be out of himself,' not hear it, attend to it, see either by being above or what others see. A trance below himself: and, in their is like sleep; those entranced highest degree, the outward are, so far, equally with one

5 Ps. xxxvi. 8.

6 S. Ambr. ad loc.

7 2 Kings ix. 11. you "maddened," i. e. "acted upon from

within to madness."

8"There is another ebriety through the infusion of the Holy Spirit. They lastly who in the Acts spake in divers tongues seemed to the hearers full of new wine." S. Amb. in Ps. xxxv. 19.

156 Joy of Joseph's brethren, image of joy in Christ's Supper.

most

overcome by wine, over- have used words, of which, powered, insensible, as one from their very strength, we dead; only the one is with have been afraid, but which the Angels, the other with the Fathers understood of the beasts that perish. In it. Thus, when Joseph's like way, common words, eleven brethren, the very ' ecstacy,' 'transport,' imply number of the true Apostles, that persons are carried out were admitted to feast with of themselves, and are, so him whom they knew not, far, not themselves,' which and he who was so eminent is, again, a term of the like a type of our Lord, and was kind. The Gift vouchsafed' sent to preserve life,' disin the Holy Communion tributed to them their pormust be altogether of tion, their joyousness is another kind, because it is related in a word, at first not the stirring up of the sight startling, as human spirit, but the union naturally and elsewhere deof the Divine, the Presence noting intoxication; they? of the Redeemer within the drank and were inebriated soul, when the soul is silent, [] with him.' And not acting upon itself, but on that very account, one caught up,' present with must feel assured that it its Lord, because one with stands there with an object, Him,' penetrated with Him and that the joy which they and His Divinity, when, in had in his presence to whose solemn words which have favour they had been rebeen used, the soul is stored, was, by God's pur'transfigured' by His Holy pose, conveyed by a word Presence in it. Now corre- which should express a sponding to this mystery, it higher joy, when the is strangely coincident that Apostles were filled with Holy Scripture should, in a kind of fearful admiration typical history or devotion, at the heaven which they

9 Gen. xliii. 34. E. V. "were merry" gives the spiritual meaning, taking the word not of largeness of drinking, but of joyousness. It is not said (as neither in Cant. v. 1)" they ate and drank with him," but " they drank and." The bodily act of drinking had been already expressed. Hence it is more natural to take it of some mental condition, than as a repeated statement of the outward act.

1 Hooker, v. 67. 4 ed. Keeble.

Noah's inebriation a type.—The Canticles. 157

saw in themselves, and had inebriated. And with this a sea of comfort and joy to direct authority for the term wade in.' And this, too, is, in Holy Scripture, it is doubtless, a spiritual mean- further remarkable how the ing of the vineyard which Versions used by the Church 'Noah planted, and whereof have been, one must think, he drank. After a type of guided to express this

Holy Baptism, there fol- quality, even when the Helowed a type of the Holy brew in itself implies only Eucharist; as first 'the feet fulness, largeness of drinkof Joseph's brethren were ing. This, too, must have washed3, and then were a spiritual meaning, since they satisfied with the bread largeness of drinking, except and wine.' When, then, in of spiritual things, were the song of spiritual love, itself excess. The meaning this same word is used in is the same, only the chathe same way, as something racter of the highest spiritual over and above ordinary joy has thereby been the drinking, drink and be more impressed upon the inebriated, loving and be- Church, and the word 'inloved,' one cannot doubt ebriated' became a received that it, too, has its proper term. Thus when, in a force, and that it designates Sacramental Psalm, there some gift peculiar to those are mentioned together the in Christ's Church, who table prepared by God, the share the myrrh of His hallowing oil, the overflowPassion, and eat and drink ing Cup; the word * still at His Table in His King- expresses how the soul is dom;' and that, in propor- immersed, flooded, inuntion to their love, so are dated, drowned, so to speak, they not refreshed only, but in the Divine love. It is

"So doth the Cup of the Lord inebriate, as in Genesis, Noe drinking wine was inebriated." S. Cypr. Ep. 69. ad Cæcil. See S. Ambr. de Joseph. c. ii. init. S. Jer. ad Amos. c. 9. fin. 3 S. Cyril Glaph. in Gen. 1. vi. ad loc. p. 204.

4 7 Comp. Ps. xlv. 11; Is. lv. 10, where it is used of abundant rain. Is. xxxiv. 5; Jer. xlxi. 10. It (the sword) shall be inebriated with blood." In its Syriac use o; meant inebriated. It is used of intense love, Prov. v. 19; and in a bad sense, vii. 18; of drinking to the full in combination with satiety of food (y), Jer. xxxi. 25; Lam, iii. 15.