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spiritual meaning had been revealed, they would not have loved it, and,
unable to bear it, they would not have been zealous of the preservation of
their books and their ceremonies; and if they had loved these spiritual
promises, and had preserved them incorrupt till the time of the Messiah,
their testimony would have had no force, because they had been his friends.
Therefore it was well that the spiritual meaning should be concealed; but,
on the other hand, if this meaning had been so hidden as not to appear at
all, it could not have served as a proof of the Messiah. What then was done?
In a crowd of passages it has been hidden under the temporal meaning, and in
a few been clearly revealed; besides that, the time and the state of the
world have been so clearly foretold that it is clearer than the sun. And in
some places this spiritual meaning is so clearly expressed that it would
require a blindness, like that which the flesh imposes on the spirit when it
is subdued by it, not to recognise it.
See, then, what has been the prudence of God. This meaning is concealed
under another in an infinite number of passages, and in some, though rarely,
it is revealed; but yet so that the passages in which it is concealed are
equivocal and can suit bot
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an eternal lamp to illumine the universe; let the earth appear to him a
point in comparison with the vast circle described by the sun; and let him
wonder at the fact that this vast circle is itself but a very fine point in
comparison with that described by the stars in their revolution round the
firmament. But if our view be arrested there, let our imagination pass
beyond; it will sooner exhaust the power of conception than nature that of
supplying material for conception. The whole visible world is only an
imperceptible atom in the ample bosom of nature. No idea approaches it. We
may enlarge our conceptions beyond an imaginable space; we only produce
atoms in comparison with the reality of things. It is an infinite sphere,
the centre of which is everywhere, the circumference nowhere. In short, it
is the greatest sensible mark of the almighty power of God that imagination
loses itself in that thought.
Returning to himself, let man consider what he is in comparison with all
existence; let him regard himself as lost in this remote corner of nature;
and from the little cell in which he finds hims
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and faithful to all men; I have a tender heart for those to whom God has
more closely united me; and whether I am alone, or seen of men, I do all my
actions in the sight of God, who must judge of them, and to whom I have
consecrated them all.
These are my sentiments; and every day of my life I bless my Redeemer, who
has implanted them in me, and who, of a man full of weakness, of miseries,
of lust, of pride, and of ambition, has made a man free from all these evils
by the power of His grace, to which all the glory of it is due, as of myself
I have only misery and error.
551. Dignior plagis quam osculis non timeo quia amo.[94]
552. The Sepulchre of Jesus Christ.--Jesus Christ was dead, but seen on the
Cross. He was dead, and hidden in the Sepulchre.
Jesus Christ was buried by the saints alone.
Jesus Christ wrought no miracle at the Sepulchre.
Only the saints entered it.
It is there, not on the Cross, that Jesus Christ takes a new life.
It is the last mystery of the Passion and the Redemption.
Jesus Christ had nowhere to rest on earth but in the Sepulchre. His enemies
only ceased to persecute Him at the Sepulchre.
553. The Mystery of Jesus.--Jesus suffers in His passions the torments which
men inflict upon Him; but in His agony He suffers the torments which He
inflicts on himself; turbare semetipsum.95 This is a suffering from no
human, but an almighty hand, for He must be almighty to bear it.
Jesus seeks some comfort at least in His three dearest friends, and they are
asleep. He prays them to bear with Him for a little, and they leave Him with
entire indifference, having so little compassion that it could not prevent
their sleeping even for a moment. And thus Jesus was left alone to the wrath
of God.
Jesus is alone on the earth, without any one