The Lord's Prayer, ADAPTED TO THE FOUR ENDS OF SACRIFICE, OR THE FOUR KINDS OF OBLATIONS; FOR THE USE BOTH OF PRIESTS AND COMMUNICANTS. The Sacrifices of the old Law were various. First, the holocaust; secondly, the peace-offering, which was of two kinds; the first, to give thanks for a blessing received; the second, to obtain a bless. ing; lastly, the offering for sin; hence are reckoned commonly four kinds of sacrifices, called, 1. Latreutic, or the Sacrifice of praise, offered to God solely for his praise, for the honour of his supreme majesty, and for the love of his sovereign goodness. Hence the victim was to be burnt whole, to signify, 1. The sovereign dominion of God over all things. 2. That all things are to be referred to him as their final end. 3. That we belong wholly to God, &c. 2. Eucharistic, or the Sacrifice of thanksgiving, by which are rendered thanks for the Divine blessings. 3. Impetratory, by which we ask for grace, and Divine blessings, both corporal and spiritual, for ourselves and others. 4. Propitiatory, which is to obtain pardon of our sins, and to make God favourable to us. The whole force and effi1 Levit. i.-vii. cacy of all these sacrifices are signally comprised in the one Sacrifice of the new Law. Hence a good and profitable way of hearing, celebrating, and communicating at Mass, will be to refer that holy action to these four ends; for which the Lord's Prayer may be conveniently used as follows: Our Father who art. O Lord, holy Father, who hast comprised the multitude of legal victims in the victim of the one Sacrifice of the new law, and hast thyself displayed upon Mount Calvary, in thy beloved Son, the great Priest, and High Priest of both Testaments, the pattern of a perfect oblation for us to follow; make us, we beseech thee, by thy grace, conformable to the image of thy Son, who, in the form of a servant, has vouchsafed to become like us. And as he offered himself, body and soul, in a bloody manner, according to the rite of Aaron, on the cross, and in an unbloody manner, according to the order of Melchisedech, in the last supper, to thee his eternal Father; I. LATREUTIC. Hallowed be thy name. O Lord Jesus Christ, who, for the love of the eternal Father, and in all things and by all things seeking not thy glory but his, hast given thyself for us an oblation and sacrifice to God for an odour of sweetness; from my whole heart I praise and adore thy supreme power, goodness, wisdom, justice, mercy, &c., which wonderfully shine forth in this sacrifice and work of redemption. I rejoice that, by this oblation, the vain idols and profane sacrifices of the Gentiles have been abolished, and true and sincere worship and honour restored to thee the true and living God. Therefore I now sacrifice to thee the Sacrifice of praise, and pay my vows to the Most High. I believe thee, and hope in thee, and love thee above all things, and fully resign myself to thee, and offer thee the victim of my whole will, memory, and understanding, for a perpetual holocaust; and this until Thy kingdom come. Which from the beginning of the world thou hast_prepared for us, O great King, and prince of the kings of the earth! who hast reigned from the tree, and hast cast out the prince of this world; who hast loved us, and washed us from our sins in thy blood, that thou mightest make us a kingdom, and priests to God. Jesus, my king and my God! behold I, thy servant and son of thy handmaid, choose thee this day in this Communion (or sacrifice of the Mass) to be my king for ever; and I offer myself to thee to be thy servant for ever. Henceforth to thee alone will I offer up the sacrifice of praise, and will invoke thy name. Blessed be thy name, O Lord, now, henceforth, and for ever. II. EUCHARISTIC. O Lord Jesus Christ, who camest into this world to do the will of thy Father, and to accomplish the work of our redemption, which he had given thee to do; to fulfil which thou becamest obedient to God the Father unto death, even the death of the cross; by the merit of which obedience, all grace, salvation, and life, and all blessings so largely flow in upon us. What return shall I make to the Lord for all that he has given me? I know that nothing more acceptable to thee can be done than to do thy will in all things. Behold, therefore, in union with thy most holy Sacrifice, by which thou didst of thy own will submit thyself to the will of the eternal Father (for thou wert offered up because it was thy own will), which sacrifice I now commemorate in this Communion (or Mass), I willingly and wholly submit my own will to thine; and I desire exceedingly that it may be done everywhere, and always most fully by all; and this in thanksgiving for all thy benefits of creation, redemption, preservation, guidance, &c. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and let all that is within me bless his holy Name, &c. III. IMPETRATORY. Our daily bread. O most loving Father, by whose infinite bounty thy Son Jesus Christ has been given to us for our guide, physician, shepherd, foster-father, &c., for thou hast so loved the world as to give thy onlybegotten Son. He, therefore, that spared not even his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how will he not also with him give us all things? especially when the Son himself gives ground for such great confidence in him, in saying, If you shall ask the Father anything in my name, he will give it you. Therefore, if we ask of him bread, will he give us a stone; or a scorpion instead of an egg? Behold, I represent to thee, O eternal Father, his Name, and with it the infinite merits of the Sacrifice which he made upon the cross; and I beseech thee to give us our daily bread, the bread of the body, but especially of the soul; asking under the one for all sustenance necessary to the present life, that we may be the better able to serve thee; and under the other, for the food of the soul, or the gifts of grace, and whatsoever is requisite to strengthen the heart, that we may not faint in the way by which we are journeying to our home, where we shall be satisfied with the plenty of thy house, &c. IV. PROPITIATORY. And forgive us. O Father of mercies, with whom we have an advocate, our Lord Jesus Christ, who was made the propitiation for our sins, and who reconciled us to thee by his blood, when he offered himself a sacrifice for sin on the altar of the cross! O great price! O plentiful redemption and superabundant satisfaction for my sins, nay, for the sins of the whole world! This I now represent and offer to thee, O gracious Father, while in this Mass (or Communion) I renew his memory. But I offer thee also the victim of my body and members, by a voluntary mortification, for the sacrifice of an afflicted spirit. Despise not, O Lord, I beseech thee, a contrite and humbled heart; but look upon the face of thy Christ, who, in his body bore our sins,' by whose stripes we were healed. But what will it profit us to be freed from sins past, if we be not fortified against those to come? Therefore let us pray: And lead us not. For the imaginations of man are prone to evil from his youth. Lord, thou knowest our misery and the infirmity of thy creatures, and how we can do nothing without thee. I beseech thee, by the power of thy mercy, and of that propitiatory sacrifice which was completed on the cross, to remove far from us all scandals, temptations, dangers, and occasions, by which thou foreseest that at length we may be induced to sin. Abandon us not, we beseech thee, in thy wrath, to the desires of our own hearts; and suffer us not to be tossed about by temptations, as it were by the waves of the sea, without pilot or oar. 1 1 Pet. ii. 24. O Lord, who desirest all to be saved, and none to perish, we pray thee to be delivered from the evils of punishment, which might drive us into the evil of sin, that is, by offending thee to make shipwreck of our salvation. Mercifully turn away from us the scourges of thy wrath, war, famine, pestilence, &c. These we acknowledge that we deserve to suffer, because we have sinned against thee our Brother, nay, our Father, and are no longer worthy to be called thy sons. Nevertheless, for thy own, and for thy name's sake, Lord, because it is good, remove thy strokes, and favourably turn away from us all evils; or grant, at least, that all, even evil things, may work together for good to them that love thee. To this end I offer thee, O Lord Jesus, this Sacrifice (or Communion) of thy Body and Blood, as an antidote and preservative against all evil. If I walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. Another exercise on the Lord's Prayer, adapted to the seven words of Christ on the cross, will be found below, in ch. vii, on the way to hear Mass. CHAPTER IV. A SHORT METHOD, OR ACT, Both of celebrating and communicating at Mass with devotion and profit. To reap fruit from the sacrament of the Eucharist, and the sacrifice of the Mass, the very manner of approaching them is of the greatest concern. Observe, therefore, that only to repeat certain common set forms of prayer before and after Mass and Communion is a method that is very imperfect, and devoid of spiritual consolation. Surely greater care and preparation are required for a sacrament so sublime, and surpassingly rich in gifts of graces and virtues, but corresponding still in its operation with the manner and disposition of the receiver. For this sacrament is the food of the soul, to which it is no less profitable and necessary than its own food is to the body. Besides, that food does good, and gives most nutriment, which is eaten with hunger, to the excitement of which bodily exercise before taking food is conducive, by carrying off and dispersing the vicious humours that remain in the stomach. Thus the natural heat is excited, and whets the stomach, thereby causing it to be more desirous of food, and the food itself to become fitter for digestion, and for the wholesome nutriment of the entire body. Precisely in the same way is the food of the soul, that is, the body and blood of Christ, to be taken with hunger, that it may profit the more. How this is to be done will be briefly shewn. The mind must be employed in pious meditations and holy exercises, which by degrees will expel the bad passions of the soul, and enkindle in it the heat of charity, and the fire of divine love; that so it may become more eager for the heavenly food, and fitter to receive it with fruit and increase. Otherwise thou wilt receive this food without hunger or appetite, and so wilt |