6. In the case of the five loaves a miracle of the same type excites our wonder. By their increase five thousand men and countless women and children are saved from hunger; the method eludes our powers of observation. Five loaves are offered and broken; while the Apostles are dividing them a succession of new-created portions passes, they cannot tell how, through their hands. The loaf which they are dividing grows no smaller, yet their hands are continually full of the pieces. The swiftness of the process baffles sight; you follow with the eye a hand full of portions, and meantime you see that the contents of the other hand are not diminished, and all the while the heap of pieces grows. The carvers are busy at their task, the eaters are hard at work; the hungry are satisfied, and the fragments fill twelve baskets. Sight or sense cannot discover the mode of so noteworthy a miracle. What was not existent is created; what we see passes our understanding. Our only resource is faith in God’s omnipotence.

6. Aut quomodo quinque panes excreverint.---Sed et de quinque panibus non dissimilis facti admiratio est (Matth. XIV, 17). Incrementis eorum, quinque millium virorum et innumerabilium mulierum ac puerorum fames vincitur: fugit oculos sensus nostri, operis intelligentia. Quinque panes offeruntur et franguntur, subrepunt praefringentium manibus quaedam fragmentorum procreationes. Non imminuitur unde praefringitur; et tamen semper praefringentis manum fragmenta occupant. Fallunt momenta visum; 0079B dum plenam fragmentis manum sequeris, alteram sine damno portionis suae contueris; inter haec fragmentorum cumulus augetur. Praefringentes in ministerio sunt, edentes in negotio sunt, esurientes saturi sunt, duodecim cophinos replent reliquiae. Non sensus, non visus profectum tam conspicabilis operationis assequitur. Est quod non erat, videtur quod non intelligitur: solum superest ut Deus omnia posse credatur.