Come, eat of my bread, and drink of the wine which I have mixed.
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Ambrose of Milan
AD 397
And so he comes; whether you eat or drink, if you call upon Christ he is present, saying, “Come, eat of my bread and drink of my wine.” Even if you are asleep, he is knocking at the door. He comes, I say, frequently and reaches in through the window. Frequently (but not always and not to everyone) he comes to that soul which can say, “At night I had put off my garment.” For in this night of the world the garment of corporeal life is first to be taken off as the Lord divested himself in his flesh that for you he might triumph over the dominions and powers of this world.
“Come, eat my bread and drink my wine which I have mingled for you.” Do you find delight in songs which charm the banqueter? Listen to the voice of the church, who exhorts us not only in canticles but in the Canticle of Canticles, “Eat, O friends, and drink and be inebriated, my brethren.” But this inebriation makes people sober. This inebriation is one of grace, not of intoxication. .
By divine eloquence, the nature of his divinity and humanity conjoined in Christ’s one person is expressed through this bread and mixed wine, as was said above. Or at least the sacrament through which we are satiated at the table of his altar is clearly shown in the bread of his body and in the mixed wine of his most holy blood. .
The same food is called “meat,” “bread,” “milk” and “wine.” However, fools say that they take it as [simply] bread and mixed wine. But if it were really taken in that manner, how would we interpret the words: “So men ate the bread of angels”? Now “bread,” it seems to me, should be understood as the firm commandments of God and “wine” as the knowledge of God through meditation on holy Scripture; similarly also [the knowledge of] his divine body and his precious blood. Commentary on the Proverbs of Solomon, Fragment
The phrase “she has killed her beasts” denotes the prophets and martyrs [who in every city and country] are slain like sheep every day by the unbelieving, in behalf of the truth, and cry aloud, “For your sake we are killed all the day long, we were counted as sheep for the slaughter.” And again, “she has mingled her wine in the bowl” [by which is meant that the Savior, uniting his Godhead like pure wine with the flesh in the Virgin, was born of her at once God and man without confusion of the one in the other]. And the phrase “She has furnished her table” [denotes the promised knowledge of the Triad]. … And again, “She has sent forth her servants.” Wisdom, that is to say, has done so, [and it is Christ] who summons them with lofty announcement. “Whoever is simple, let him turn to me,” she says, alluding manifestly to the holy apostles who journeyed the whole world and called the nations to the knowledge of him [in truth, with their lofty and divine preaching]. And again, “To those who ...
