serve to be rewarded. Let us pray, during these days of mercy, with persevering confidence. The daughter of this Canaanite woman was troubled by a devil, that is, her body was possessed by an evil spirit. How many are there, every where in the Church, whose souls are a prey to Satan, by their being in the state of mortal sin! Are they conscious of their misery? Do they beg of our Lord to have mercy on them, and deliver them? And if, at first, he defer their pardon, do they humble themselves like this woman of our Gospel, who confesses that she quite deserves this contempt wherewith Jesus seems to treat her ? Lost sheep of the House of Israel! make good use of this holy season, when your Good Shepherd is so nigh unto you. Before forty days are elapsed, he will be put to death, and the people that shall deny him shall not be His. Before forty days are over, we shall be celebrating the anniversary of this great sacrifice; and the sinner that shall not be converted from the error of his ways, and shall not have come to Jesus, as did this humble woman of Canaan,— will deserve to be for ever rejected. Let us, then, be earnest in the great work of our conversion, and fit ourselves for pardon. Such is the generosity of our Heavenly Father, that if we desire, with all the sincerity of our soul, to be once more his faithful Children, he will give us more than the crumbs which fall from his table; he will give us Jesus, the Bread of Life; and oh! what a pledge of reconciliation is that! Bow down your heads to God. Grant, O Lord, we beseech thee, that all Christian people may acknowledge what they profess, and love the heavenly mystery they so often approach. Through Christ our Lord. Amen. Humiliate capita vestra Deo. Da, quæsumus, Domine, populis Christianis, et quæ profitentur agnoscere: et cœleste munus diligere, quod frequentant. Per Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen. 1 Dan. ix. 26. Let us read this admirable Preface, taken from the Mozarabic Missal. It shows us how Jesus is the Bread of Life, which supports us during our Fast. It will not be the less acceptable, because it is, almost word for word, a repetition of one already given from the Ambrosian Rite. PREFACE. (Illatio. Dominica III. Quadragesima.) Dignum et justum est, æquum vere et salutare est: nos tibi gratias agere, omnipotens Pater, et Jesu Christo Filio tuo Domino nostro; in quo jejunantium fides alitur: spes provehitur, charitas roboratur. Ipse est enim panis vivus et verus qui est et substantia æternitatis: et esca virtutis. Verbum enim tuum est, per quod facta sunt omnia: quia non solum humanarum mentium : sed ipsorum quoque panis est Angelorum. Hujus panis alimento Moyses famulus tuus quadraginta diebus ac noctibus legem suscipiens jejunavit: et a carnalibus cibis, ut tuæ suavitatis capacior esset, abstinuit; de Verbo tuo vivens et valens: cujus et dulcedinem bibebat in spiritu, et lucem accipiebat in vultu. Inde nec famem sensit, et terrenarum est oblitus escarum: quia illum et gloriæ tuæ glorificabat aspectus et influente Spiritu Sancto sermo pascebat interius. Hunc panem etiam nobis ministrare non desi It is meet and just, yea truly right and available to salvation, that we should give thanks, O Almighty Father, to thee, and to our Lord Jesus Christ, thy Son; in whom, they that fast, find the nourishment of their faith, the advancement of their hope, the strengthening of their charity. For he is the true and living Bread, who is the nourishment of eternity, and the food of virtue. For he is thy Word, by whom all things were made; the Bread, not only of the souls of men, but likewise of the very Angels. With this Bread was thy servant Moses fed, when, receiving thy Law, he fasted forty days and forty nights, and abstained from bodily food, that he might be the better able to partake of thy sweetness. He lived and grew strong on thy Word, of whose sweetness his spirit drank, and with whose light his face did beam. Hence, he felt not hunger, and forgot all earthly food, for the sight of thy glory shone upon him, and, through the infusion of the Holy Spirit, he eat interiorly of the word. To us, likewise, thou ceasest not to administer this Bread; yea, thou biddest us unceasingly hunger after it. When we feed on this Flesh, we are strengthened; when we drink of this Blood, we are cleansed. nis sed ut eum indeficienter esuriamus hortaris. Cujus carne dum pascimur, roboramur: et sanguinem dum potamus, abluimur. THE Station is in the Basilica of the Twelve Apostles; it is one of the grandest of the Churches of Rome, and is enriched by the Bodies of the two Apostles, St. Philip and St. James the Less. and do judgment and justice; living he shall live, and shall not die. I will not remember all his iniquities that he hath done; in his justice, which he hath wrought, he shall live. Is it my will that a sinner should die, saith the Lord God, and not that he should be converted from his ways and live? But if the just man turn himself away from his justice, and do iniquity according to all the abominations which the wicked man useth to work, shall he live? All his justices which he hath done, shall not be remembered; in the prevarication, by which he hath prevaricated, and in his sin, which he hath committed, in them he shall die. And you have said: The way of the Lord is not right. Hear ye, therefore, O house of Israel: Is it my way that is not right, and are not rather your ways perverse? For when the just turneth himself away from his justice, and committeth iniquity, he shall die therein; in the injustice that he hath wrought, he shall die. And when the wicked turneth himself away from his wickedness, which he hath wrought, and doeth judgment and justice, he shall save his soul alive. Because he considereth and turneth away himself from all his iniquities, which he hath wrought, he shall surely live, and not die, saith the Lord Almighty. judicium et justitiam vita vivet, et non morietur. Omnium iniquitatum ejus, quas operatus est, non recordabor: in justitia sua, quam operatus est, vivet. Numquid voluntatis meæ est mors impii, dicit Dominus Deus, et non ut convertatur a viis suis, et vivat? Si autem averterit se justus a justitia sua, et fecerit iniquitatem secundum omnes abominationes quas operari solet impius, numquid vivet? Omnes justitiæ ejus, quas fecerat, non recordabuntur: in prævaricatione qua prævaricatus est, et in peccato suo quod peccavit, in ipsis morietur. Et dixistis: Non est æqua via Domini. Audite ergo, domus Israël: Numquid via mea non est æqua, et non magis viæ vestræ pravæ sunt? Cum enim averterit se justus a justitia sua, et fecerit iniquitatem, morietur in eis: in injustitia, quam operatus est, morietur. Et cum averterit se impius ab impietate sua, quam operatus est, et fecerit judicium et justitiam: ipse animam suam vivificabit. Considerans enim, et avertens se ab omnibus iniquitatibus suis, quas operatus est, vita_vivet, et non morietur, ait Dominus omnipotens. Let us not forget the ancient discipline of the Church, during Lent. We should frequently be at a |