which you have sold for thirty pieces of silver, O Judas; this is the very Blood which you have just shamefully bartered to the unfeeling Pharisees. O loving kindness of Christ! O foolish madness of Judas! On the one hand Judas sold Him for thirty pieces of silver, whilst Christ even after this did not refuse to give that Blood, which had been betrayed, to the traitor for the remission of his sins, if he had so willed. And Judas was there, and he partook of the sacred table. For, as Our Lord had washed his feet, together with the other disciples’, so did he eat with them of the sacred table, in order that he might have no excuse for remaining obdurate. Our Lord did everything in His power, yet Judas persisted in his wickedness. But it is now time for us to approach that tremendous table. Let us, therefore, all go to it with becoming sobriety and watchfulness. Let there be no Judas here, no guilty man, no one infected with poison, no man with one thing in his mouth and another in his mind. The same Christ is now here Who prepared that table. And He it is Who is now preparing it. For it is not a man who makes the offerings become the Body and Blood of Christ, but the very Christ for us crucified.[21] Fulfilling what he represents, the priest stands there, speaking those words; the power and grace of them are God’s. _This is My Body_, he says, and this word transforms what lies before him;[22] and just as the words, _Increase and multiply and fill the earth_, were once spoken and endue our nature through all time with fruitfulness, so those other words once spoken from that time till to-day and until His coming, make the sacrifice over each table in the churches complete. Therefore, let no hypocrite approach, no one filled with sin, no one with poison in his mind, that he may not receive judgment to himself, for then, too, Judas had partaken of the oblation when the devil leapt into him; not that the devil despised the Lord’s Body, but Judas for his shameful conduct. This was to teach you that the devil continually attacks and assails those who unworthily partake of the divine mysteries, as he did Judas. For honourable things profit the good, but inflict a greater punishment on those who abuse the use of them. I say this not to terrify but to fortify you. Let there be no Judas, then; let no one enter in poisoned with evil. For the sacrifice is spiritual food; and just as bodily food, when received by a stomach which has bad humours, strengthens disease, not from its own nature but because of that stomach’s weakness, so does it usually happen with the spiritual mysteries. They, too, when received by a soul full of wickedness, wither it up and corrupt it the more, not by their own nature, but through the weakness of the participating soul. Let no one, therefore, indulge in bad thoughts; let us rather cleanse our mind, for we are approaching an immaculate sacrifice; let us make our souls holy. This may be done even in one day. How? If you have