tholic and Apostolic Church.

I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins, And I look for the Resurrection of the dead, And the life of the world to come. Amen.

SECTION VII.

THE SERMON OR INSTRUCTION.

From the earliest ages of the Christian church, the exhortations and instructions of God's ministers have followed the lessons of holy scripture. During the apostolic age, when the Spirit was poured out abundantly on all flesh, those who were inspired with the gifts of interpretation and prophecy, as well as they who ruled the church, taught and expounded the will of God at this part of the liturgy. When miraculous gifts ceased, they that bare rule in the church by divine commission continued the same practice. The bishops, or successors of the apostles, taught and exhorted their people in every public assembly or liturgy a. By their permission the presbyters of the church also preached in churches where the bishop was not present; but in the event of his presence, the presbyter generally made some respectful allusion to the subject, and the bishop himself preached afterwards b. It was not indeed unfrequent in the primitive church for several presbyters and bishops to deliver their exhortation in

τος,

* Παυσαμένου τοῦ ἀναγινώσκον

ὁ προεστὼς διὰ λόγον τὴν νουθεσίαν καὶ πρόκλησιν (vel παράκαλησιν) τῆς τῶν καλῶν τούτων μιμήσεως ποιεῖται. Justin. Martyr. Apolog. 1. ed. Thirlby, p. 97. Concil. Laodicen, can.

19. Sozomen, Hist. Eccl. lib. vii. c. 19. p. 734. ed. Vales.

b Καὶ τελευταῖος πάντων ὁ ἐπίσкOTOS. Apost. Const. lib. ii. c. 57. p. 263. tom. i. ed. Clerici.

succession; and in this case, the greatest of the bishops, or the bishop of the church, generally terminated the instruction". According to Sozomen, there were no sermons or exhortations delivered in the Roman church in the fifth century, which he remarks as a singular custom of that church. Leo, bishop of Rome in the fifth century, appears to have been the only bishop who preached in the Roman church for many centuries; and it is said, that none of his successors, until the time of Pius the Fifth, five hundred years afterwards, imitated his example e.

The instructions of the preacher may be divided into four parts, according to the ancient practice of the church of England: first, the announcement of feasts or holydays, and of the administration of the communion; secondly, the publication of excommunications and other ecclesiastical acts; thirdly, the prayer preparatory to the sermon; and, fourthly, the sermon or homily.

First, the church has long been accustomed to proclaim the feast or holydays for the ensuing week, and give notice of feasts, at this part of the liturgy. We find in an ancient monument of the English church, which contains the prayers to be said before the sermon, a rubric directing the feasts which were to be kept holy, and which is evidently intended for the use of the preacher. By this document we trace the existing practice of the English church to

C

c Bingham's Antiquities, book ii. c. 3. §. 4. book xiv. c. 4. §. 2.

ὰ οὔτε δὲ ὁ ἐπίσκοπος, οὔτε ἄλλος τὶς ἐνθάδε ἐπ ̓ ἐκκλησίαις διdáσket. Sozomen, Hist. Eccl.

lib. vii. c. 19.

e Bingham's Antiquities, book xiv. c. 4. §. 3.

f Lestrange's Alliance of Divine Offices, p. 341.

the fourteenth century. But it had long been customary to make public announcements at the same places; for,

Secondly, this was the time at which sentences of excommunication were generally read in the time of Hincmar, archbishop of Rheims in the ninth century, who directed his priests to publish an excommunication against certain depredators, not immediately after the gospel, as the custom was, but after the epistle, because some of the guilty departed from the church immediately after the gospel h. At this time also, in many churches, those who had performed public penance were absolved and reconciled i.

Thirdly, the prayers. How long the present form of prayer, directed by the canons of 1603, may have been used in the English church, would be difficult to determine. We have memorials of these prayers as used in England in the fourteenth century. Ivo Carnotensis, who flourished about

g It seems that this was the time to announce any thing to the people, as may be collected from Augustin. Sermo cxi; at the end of which follow these words: Et post concionem "Quod novit caritas vestra suggerimus. Dies anniversarius ordinationis Domini senis Aurelii crastinus illucescit. Rogat et admonet per humilitatem meam caritatem vestram, ut ad basilicam Fausti devotissime convenire dignemini. Deo gratias." Tom. v. p. 563.

h" Propterea fratres unusquisque vestrum quotiescumque cantat missam, usque dum ista quam patimur miseria in

parochia nostra cessaverit, quoniam tales homines sunt, qui non propter salutem, sed propter consuetudinem, ad ecclesiam veniunt, et usque ad evangelium, juxta quod ista prædicare debueratis, in missa stare solent, et recedunt statim post apostolum id est post epistolam, hanc admonitionem ab initio usque ad finem, cum verbis prophetæ vel apostoli legite." Hincmar Remens. tom. ii. epist. 7. p. 149. ed. Sirmond. Paris. 1645.

i Morinus de Pœnitentia, lib. viii. c. 14. §. 4.

j Lestrange's Alliance, &c. ut supra.

A

A. D. 1080, cites a canon of a council of Orleans, which evidently alludes to a form of prayer like that of the church of England. The characteristics of both are, that the preacher admonishes the people what they are to pray for; and the people being supposed to offer up a silent petition for each object that is mentioned, the preacher at the conclusion sums up their devotions in collects or the Lord's Prayer.

These prayers, perhaps, may have passed from France into England. They were at first intended, as appears by the canon cited by Ivo, to follow the sermon; but in the following ages, when there were very few clergy qualified to preach, these prayers were recited without any sermon. Sermons, we know, were very seldom delivered in the Roman church; and during the dark ages, when that church had a great influence in the western churches, the incapacity of the clergy to deliver sermons may have been encouraged by the example of the see of Rome. At length in England it became necessary for those that were in authority, to remedy the evils which arose from the ignorance of the clergy, and in 1281 John Peckham, archbishop

k Ivo. Decretum, pars ii. cap. 120. "Ex concilio Aurelianensi, c. 3. Oportet ut in diebus Dominicis vel festis post sermonem missarum intra solemnia habitum, plebem sacerdos admoneat, ut juxta apostolicam institutionem, omnes in commune pro diversis necessitatibus preces fundant ad Dominum, pro rege et episcopis, et rectoribus ecclesiarum,

pro pace, pro peste, pro infirmis, qui in ipsa parochia lecto decumbunt, pro nuper defunctis, in quibus singulatim precibus plebs orationem Dominicam sub silentio dicat. Sacerdotes vero orationes ad hoc pertinentes per singulas admonitiones solenniter expleant. Post hæc sacra celebretur oblatio, Ait enim primum omnium fieri orationes, &c."