now,

name of the Saint is added to the calendar for veneration through the whole Church. Comparatively few, however, of the saints have been canonized in this manner; and even if it is proved that any one has been venerated as a saint in any country for a long time, the pope may insert his name in the calendar without further process. Altars and churches may now be dedicated to him, and a special office and mass assigned; his image may have a nimbus round the head; his relics, certified by the bishop or other recognized authority, may be publicly exposed for veneration, and may be placed under the altar of the church. is generally considered by Romanists that the pope's sentence of canonization is infallible if the Church consents, but this infallibility is not de fide; less authority is attributed to the beatification, but even in this case it would be considered rash or presumptuous for any private person to question the decision.

It

14. New devotions (e.g. that of the Sacred Heart) need sanction from Rome, which is generally only obtained with difficulty. The bishop of the diocese, however, can institute new festivals in honour of saints already canonized; and he may publish, or allow to be published, accounts of new miracles due to the intercession of saints or "blessed men. The bishop also has the right to sanction any new images, and any relics, or the translation of relics. The bishop can diminish festivals which are peculiar to his own diocese, but not, generally, those which are common to the whole Church. This rule applies to fasts also.

15. The feasts of obligation are: (1) all Sundays in the year; (2) Christmas day, Ascension day, and All

Saints' day; (3) the Anniversary of the day of Dedication of the parish church, and the feast of the Saint to whom the church is dedicated. These two may be kept by specially observing the Sunday in the octave. The fasts which are of obligation are: (1) Lent; (2) the Ember days of "the Four Seasons;" (3) the vigils of certain festivals. The days of abstinence are all the Fridays in the year, and the Rogation days.

16. The festivals of the Church are marked in public worship by the celebration of the Eucharist, and by the recitation of the hours from the Vespers of the day before the festival till the compline of the festival itself. The duty of the laity is to hear mass with devotion on Sundays and days of obligation, being present from the Epistle at latest to the end of the service; it is praiseworthy to attend the vesper service of the feast as well. All but those excommunicated or lawfully hindered are obliged to hear mass; the lawful hindrances being such as physical infirmity, or attendance on one dangerously ill, or a labourer's duty to his employer. Some customs excuse, such as that which rules that a widow must not appear in public till a certain time after her husband's death. In order to make it possible for Christians to attend these services, the Church has prohibited certain works to be done on feasts of obligation; and wherever it has been able to do so, has appealed to the civil power to make these regulations binding on all, whether

*

*For instance, the Sunday holiday was made universal as soon as Constantine came under the influence of the Faith. In England, where Church festivals, except Sundays, are neglected, it has been found necessary to allow several other public holidays.

Christians or not. Servile works

Servile works are prohibited, the labours of agriculture and mechanics; transcribing and painting pictures are doubtful; but journeys which are not for business purposes are allowed. Trading is prohibited, all public buying and selling, markets and fairs, and making contracts. Legal business in the courts is forbidden, and the courts are closed. In some places, however, fairs are permitted; it is also allowed to open taverns out of church hours. Necessity is also a valid excuse for servile occupations on festivals; but the parish priest should be applied to in order to decide on the urgency, and to obtain a proper dispensation from the bishop. It is obvious that in countries where the Christian religion is not in a position of power, poorer Christians will often be obliged to work on Sundays and other festivals. This must have been the case under the heathen Roman empire, when the observance of the Sunday would have marked a man out as a Christian. The rules for the observance of fasts are, that on days of abstinence no flesh meat may be eaten, and on fast days only one meal must be eaten, at which no flesh meat is allowed. These rules, however, can scarcely be observed in their strictness except by religious; and therefore many excuses are allowed in the case of persons living in the world—such as youth or old age; loss of health in consequence of fasting; delicate health; manual labour; poverty, because the food of the poor is generally but scanty, and not very nutritious. But excess either of lenity or severity is to be guarded against; and in modern times the Church has required the discipline of the intellect rather than that of the body from faithful Christians. If the fast is

not observed for any of these reasons, dispensations must be obtained from the bishop, some of which are usual, and others only granted on the merits of the particular case.

B.-The Divine Office.

17. Besides the offices for administering the Holy Communion and the Sacraments, the Church has ap'pointed a service of praise and prayer adapted to the needs of all Christians, which by its arrangement is made to resemble on earth, as far as possible, the continuous worship offered to God by the same Church in heaven. This service is known as "the Hours," because appointed for certain hours in the day-the first, third, sixth, and ninth hours, the hours of sunset, rest, and early dawn. The modern daily office of the English Church is an abbreviation of this ancient service, and, like its original, is ordered to be recited daily by all persons consecrated to God. This service consisted chiefly of the Psalms, which were arranged for recitation once in the week; besides, there were certain canticles of the Old and New Testaments, and readings from the Scriptures and from the Fathers, ending with a collect. Such a service is very ancient in its main conception; but the working out of the plan is no doubt chiefly due to the monastic orders, one of their great duties being to maintain the continual worship of God. The monks thus acquired their own Breviary, or book of services for the canonical hours; and when separate orders were established, each order arranged its own services. Meanwhile, bishops and secular clergy went on using the older offices, modified by the

influence of the monastic improvements. From the nature of a diocese and the relations between bishop and clergy, each diocese had its own "use," ordered by the bishop and used by the clergy of that diocese; for each presbyter or deacon was to suppose himself, while reciting his office, to be present in the bishop's church, joining his voice with the voices of the other clergy and of the faithful assembled there.* In course of time some of the Breviaries came to be recognized as superior to others, and therefore were adopted by bishops in preference to their diocesan use; and it is one of the singular honours of the English Church that the Breviary of Sarum, as arranged by its bishop, St. Osmund (d. 1099), became a standard by which very many bishops, both English and foreign, revised their own uses. The Reformation introduced a great change in this respect all over the Western Church. In England, the old and famous Sarum Breviary was superseded by the Common Prayer-book; on the continent the popes pressed for the universal use of the Roman Breviary, as revised after the Council of Trent's recommendation. Nevertheless, the diocesan Breviaries kept their ground, and several of them are well known. Where there is such a diocesan use, the Roman Breviary is forbidden to all beneficed clerks in that diocese; but unbeneficed clerks may use it in private, while in public they must conform to the custom of the place where they dwell. Similarly, strangers assisting

* The same is obviously true of the Missal as of the Breviary. When the priest is at the altar he joins in spirit with all the other priests of the diocese and with the bishop, and, through the bishop, with the whole Church visible and invisible, in the worship of the Lamb slain (Rev. v.).