lo! the Father and the Son send into this world, the Spirit who proceeds from them both. It was a new Gift, and it taught man that the Lord God was in Three Persons. The Spirit, the eternal link of the first Two, is Will, he is Love, in the divine Essence. In God, then, is the fulness of Being, without beginning, without succession, without increase,-for there is nothing which he has not. In these Three eternal terms of his uncreated Substance, is the Act, pure and infinite.

The sacred Liturgy, whose object is the glorification of God and the commemoration of his works, follows, each year, the sublime phases of these manifestations, whereby the Sovereign Lord has made known his whole self to mortals. Under the sombre colours of Advent, we commemorated the period of expectation, during which the radiant Triangle sent forth but few of its rays to mankind. The world, during those four thousand years, was praying heaven for a Liberator, a Messiah; and it was God's own Son that was to be this Liberator, this Messiah. That we might have the full knowledge of the prophecies which foretold him, it was necessary that he himself should actually come a Child was born unto us,' and then we had the key to the Scriptures. When we adored that Son, we adored also the Father, who sent him to us in the Flesh, and to whom he is consubstantial. This Word of Life, whom we have seen, whom we have heard, whom our hands have handled in the Humanity which he deigned to assume, has proved himself to be truly a Person, a Person distinct from the Father, for One sends, and the Other is sent. In this second Divine Person, we have found our Mediator, who has re-united the creation to its Creator; we have found the Redeemer of our sins, the Light of our souls, the Spouse we had so long desired.

Having passed through the mysteries which he

himself wrought, we next celebrated the descent of the Holy Spirit, who had been announced as coming to perfect the work of the Son of God. We adored him, and acknowledged him to be distinct from the Father and the Son, who had sent him to us, with the mission of abiding with us. He manifested himself by divine operations which are especially his own, and were the object of his coming. He is the soul of the Church; he keeps her in the truth taught her by the Son. He is the source, the principle, of the sanctification of our souls; and, in them he wishes to make his dwelling. In a word, the mystery of the Trinity has become to us, not only a dogma made known to our mind. by Revelation, but, moreover, a practical truth given to us by the unheard of munificence of the Three Divine Persons; the Father, who has adopted us; the Son, whose brethren and joint-heirs we are; and the Holy Ghost, who governs us, and dwells within us.

Let us, then, begin this Day, by giving glory to the One God in Three Persons. For this end, we will unite with holy Church, who, in her Office of Prime, recites on this Solemnity, as, also, on every Sunday not taken up by a Feast, the magnificent Symbol, known as the Athanasian Creed. It gives us, in a summary of much majesty and precision, the doctrine of the holy Doctor, Saint Athanasius, regarding the mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation. 1 St. John, xiv. 16.

2

2"It is a psalm or hymn of praise, of confession, and of pro"found, self-prostrating homage, parallel to the Canticles of the "elect in heaven. It appeals to the imagination quite as much as "to the intellect. It is the war-song of faith, with which we 66 warn first ourselves, then each other, and then all those who are "within its hearing, and the hearing of the Truth, who our God "is, and how we must worship Him, and how vast our responsibi"lity will be if we know what to believe, and yet believe not. "It is

"The Psalm that gathers in one glorious lay

"All chants that e'er from heaven to earth found way;

THE ATHANASIAN CREED.

Quicumque vult salvus esse, ante omnia opus est ut teneat Catholicam fidem.

Quam nisi quisque integram inviolatamque servaverit, absque dubio in æternum peribit.

Fides autem Catholica hæc est, ut unum Deum in Trinitate, et Trinitatem in Unitate veneremur;

Neque confundentes personas, neque substantiam separantes.

Alia est enim persona Patris, alia Filii, alia Spiritus sancti.

Sed Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus sancti una est divinitas, æqualis gloria, coæterna majestas.

Qualis Pater, talis Filius, talis Spiritus sanctus.

Increatus Pater, increatus Filius, increatus Spiritus sanctus.

Immensus Pater, immensus Filius, immensus Spiri

tus sanctus.

Eternus Pater, æternus Filius, æternus Spiritus sanctus.

Whosoever would be saved, before all things it is necessary that he hold the Catholic faith.

Which faith, except every one doth keep entire, and unviolated, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.

Now the Catholic faith is this that we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity;

Neither confounding the persons, nor dividing the sub

stance.

For one is the person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost.

But the Godhead of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one, the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal.

Such as the Father is, such is the Son, such is the Holy Ghost.

The Father is uncreated, the Son is uncreated, the Holy Ghost is uncreated.

The Father is incomprehensible, the Son is incomprehensible, the Holy Ghost is incomprehensible.

The Father is eternal, the Son is eternal, the Holy Ghost is eternal.

"Creed of the Saints, and Anthem of the Blest,
"And calm-breathed warning of the kindliest love,
"That ever heaved a wakeful mother's breast.

"For myself, I have ever felt it as the most simple and sublime, the "most devotional formulary to which Christianity has given birth, more so even than the Veni Creator and the Te Deum." (Dr. Newman; Grammar of Assent, page 129.) [Note added by Tr.]

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