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Blessed are the eyes which see what you see. Luc. 10.
CONSIDER how great a Blessing it was indeede for a companie of poore fisher men to behold God incarnated: fi∣miliarly to conuerse with him: to dis∣course with him in a friendly manner: to
sitt at table and eate and drinke with him, to be the hearers of the sacred words which streamed from his diuine lipps: to be com∣panions of his labours &c. To see him in earth a milde Emmanuel, whom the Che∣rubins and Seraphins adore with trem∣bling in heauen.
[Affection.] Certes, my soule, this was a great blessing; and a thinge ardently brea∣thed after by the Patriarkes and Prophe∣tes, who cryed out: come o Lord, and de∣laye not: come and pardon the sinnes of thy peo∣ple, come and saue man, whom thou didst make of claye. I would to God thou wouldst burst the heauens and descende: and yet this happi∣nesse was not granted them; while we Christians inioy that or a greater. For though (as S. Chrysostome comfortably saith) we haue not the happines to be hold his forme, and figure; his apparell &c. Yet we see him, we touche him, we eate him. O my soule, what a singular honour is this, to be fedd with him, to be vnited to him; and to be made one body of Christ, and one flesh.
CONSIDER that tho those good Ie∣wes (the Apostles) to whom the son∣ne of God was especially sent, had a be∣nediction of preference, to haue seene him in person; yet was there another, noe lesse meritorious, left for vs poore gen∣tiles of seeing him by faith, attested by the same Truth: Blessed are they who haue not seene, and haue beleeued: for there, saith Gregorie, faith hath more merite, where hu∣mane reason produceth noe euidence.
[Affection.] Howeuer, my soule, the preference of seeing our Sauiour in body visibly may seeme a greate happinesse, yet it is not therin, that the happinesse of a Christian doth consiste, but in that he beleeues by a firme faith, him whom the Apostles saw, to be truly the sonne of God: and by so beleeuing begins to hope in him, and to aspire to his loue: since, according to S. Augustine, it is the dutie of a faithfull man to beleeue what he sees not, that by the merite of that faith, he may hope both to see, and loue.