The meal, if I am right, must have been a solemn sacrament or communion, the worshippers partaking of the body of the god.

It was a wedding after Michael's and Margaret's own hearts, a solemn sacrament of two people, not a society gathering of critical guests.

Thus the drinking of wine in the rites of a vine-god like Dionysus is not an act of revelry, it is a solemn sacrament.

"But, Prince," said Anna Mikháylovna, "after such a solemn sacrament, allow him a moment's peace!

'I have heard it said by priests that everything depends on the intention and that without it the most solemn sacrament is an empty show!