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PREFACE.

WITH this Volume, we have opened to us the second part of the LITURGICAL YEAR, and we begin the long period of the Time after Pentecost. It treats upon the Feasts of the most holy Trinity, of Corpus Christi, and of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. These three Feasts require to be explained apart. Their days date with dependance on Easter; and yet, they are detached, if we consider their object, from the Moveable Cycle, whose aim is to bring before us, each year, the successive, and, so to speak, historic memories of our Lord's Mysteries. upon the sublime drama, which has, by the gradual presenting to us the facts of our Redeemer's History, shown us the divine economy of the Redemption; they come immediately after, and give us a deep and dogmatic teaching; a teaching which is a marvellous synthesis, taking in the whole body of Christian doctrine.

They come close

The Holy Ghost has come down upon the earth, in order to sanctify it. Faith being the one basis of all sanctification, and the source of love, it was Faith that the Holy Spirit would make the starting-point

of his divine workings in the soul. To this end, he inspires the Church, which has sprung up into life under the influence of his impetuous breathing, to propose at once to the Faithful that doctrinal summary, which is comprised in the three Feasts immediately coming after Pentecost. The Volumes following this will show us the Holy Spirit continuing his work, and, on the solid foundations of the Faith he established at the outset, building the entire superstructure of the Christian virtues.

This was the idea which the Author of the LITURGICAL YEAR was busy developing in the second part of his work, when death came upon him; and the pen that had begun this Volume, was put, by obedience into his, who now comes before the Faithful, begging their prayers upon the arduous task he has undertaken, of continuing the not quite finished work of his beloved Father and Master. Yes, we beg of them to beseech our Lord, that he himself will vouchsafe to bring to a successful termination an undertaking that was begun for his honour and glory, and has already produced so much fruit in the souls of men.

SOLESMES, May 10, 1879.

BR. L. F., O.S.B.

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