Of the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar

Of the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar
By Robert Southwell, Catholic priest, martyr (1561–1595)

The angels’ eyes, whom veils cannot deceive,
Might best disclose that best they do discern;
Men must with sound and silent faith receive
More than they can by sense or reason learn;
God’s power our proofs, His works our wit exceed,
The doer’s might is reason of His deed.

A body is endued with ghostly rights;
And Nature’s work from Nature’s law is free;
In heavenly sun lie hid eternal lights,
Lights clear and near, yet them no eye can see;
Dead forms a never-dying life do shroud;
A boundless sea lies in a little cloud.

The God of Hosts in slender host doth dwell,
Yea, God and man with all to either due,
That God that rules the heavens and rifled hell,
That man whose death did us to life renew:
That God and man that is the angels’ bliss,
In form of bread and wine our nurture is.

Whole may His body be in smallest bread,
Whole in the whole, yea whole in every crumb;
With which be one or be ten thousand fed,
All to each one, to all but one doth come;
And though each one as much as all receive,
Not one too much, nor all too little have.

One soul in man in all in every part;
One face at once in many mirrors shines;
One fearful noise doth make a thousand start;
One eye at once of countless things defines;
If proofs of one in many Nature frame,
God may in stranger sort perform the same.

God present is at once in every place,
Yet God in every place is ever one;
So may there be by gifts of ghostly grace,
One man in many rooms, yet filling none;
Since angels may effects of bodies shew,
God angels’ gifts on bodies may bestow.