FOR it is impossible for those who NOW consider how great this man were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the HOLY GHOST, and have tasted the good word of GOD, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of GOD afresh, and put him to an open shame. Ry. My heart is fixed. p. lxxvii. Lesson III. FOR the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from GOD: but that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned. But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak. For GOD is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister. Ry. Unto Thee. p. lxxvii. THURSDAY. Of the Epistle to the Hebrews. Lesson I. Chap. vii. Fo OR this Melchisedec, king of Sa lem, priest of the most high GOD, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him; to whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all; first being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that also King of Salem, which is, King of peace; without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually. Ry. In Thee. p. lxxvii. was, unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the Spoils. And verily they that are of the sons of Levi, who receive the office of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham: but he whose descent is not counted from them received tithes of Abraham, and blessed him that had the promises. Ry. O let my mouth. p. lxxvii. Lesson III. AND without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better. And here men that die receive tithes ; but there he receiveth them, of whom it is witnessed that he liveth. And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth_tithes, payed tithes in Abraham. For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him. If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it the people received the law,) what further need was there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchisedec, and not be called after the order of Aaron? For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law. Ry. My lips. p. lxxvii. FRIDAY. Of the Epistle to the Hebrews. Lesson I. Chap. xi. NOW faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. For by it the elders obtained a good report. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. By faith Abel offered unto GoD a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, GoD testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh. Ry. I will thank. p. lxxviii. Lesson II. BY faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because GOD had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased GOD. But without faith it is impossible to please him; for he that cometh to GOD must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his LE Lesson II. ET your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. So that we may boldly say, the LORD is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me. Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation. JESUS CHRIST the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever. Ry. My heart is fixed. p. lxxvii. Lesson III. house; by the which he condemned BE not carried about with divers the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith. Ry. Great is Thy mercy. p. lxxviii. Lesson III. BY faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Ry. The LORD is my refuge. p. lxxviii. SATURDAY. Of the Epistle to the Hebrews. Lesson I. Chap. xiii. LET brotherly love continue. Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; and them which suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the body. Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers GOD will judge. Ry. Destroy me not. p. lxxvi. and strange doctrines. For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein. We have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle. For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp. Wherefore JESUS also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate. Ry. Unto Thee. p. lxxvii. SEPTUAGESIMA SUNDAY. Alleluia is not said henceforth till the First Vespers of Easter Day: but in its place, after O LORD, make haste, &c., is said, Praise be to Thee, O LORD, King of Eternal Glory. Inv. Let us come before His pre* and shew sence with thanksgiving, ourselves glad in Him with psalms. Ps. Venite. p. 3. In the first verse of the Psalm is omitted, Let us come, &c., and in its place the Inv. is repeated by the Choir. Hymn, Primo die. p. 4. Ants., Pss., and YY. of Nocturns as in the Psalter, p. 5. FIRST NOCTURN. Here beginneth the Book of Genesis. Lesson I. Chap. i. IN the beginning GOD created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of GOD moved upon the face of the waters. And GOD said, Let there be light and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and GOD divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day. Ry. In the beginning GoD created the heaven and the earth, and made therein man after His likeness and similitude. . GOD therefore formed man out of the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. After. Lesson II. AND GOD said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear and it was so. And GoD called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas and GoD saw that it was good. And GoD said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and GOD saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the third day. And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth and it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night he made the stars also. And GOD set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and GoD saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Ry In the beginning GoD created the heaven and the earth, and the SPIRIT of the LORD moved upon the face of the waters: * and GOD saw all things that He had made, and behold they were very good. . Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And. Lesson III. AND GOD said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And GoD created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and GoD saw that it was good. And GoD blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day. And GoD said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and GOD saw that it was good. And GOD said, Let us make man in our | He put the man whom He had formed. image, after our likeness: and let To. them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. Ry. The LORD formed man out of the dust of the earth: * and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul. . In the beginning GGD created the heaven and the earth, and formed therein man. And. Glory. And. SECOND NOCTURN. Lesson V. THUS, by one man, sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all had sinned. By the word world, in that place, the Apostle signified the whole human race. This therefore was the case. The whole human race, condemned, was lying in misery; or rather, was rolling on, plunging headlong from one degree of misery to another, and, joined to the side of those angels who had sinned, was paying the penalty most justly From the Manual of S. Augustine the due to impious apostacy. Bishop. Vol. 3. Chaps. xxv. xxvi. and xxvii. THE LORD had threatened the punishment of death to man if he sinned; so enduing him with free will as nevertheless to govern him by command and to terrify him by a threat of destruction: and placed him in the felicity of Paradise, as in the shadow of life, whence, by maintaining his righteousness, he might ascend to better things. Being made an exile from this paradise after his sin, he also involved his posterity, which, by sinning, he had contaminated, in himself, as in a root, in the penalty of death and damnation: so that whatever progeny should be born -of him, and of his wife, through whom he had sinned, condemned together with him, through carnal lust, wherein was repaid a punishment similar to the disobedience, should derive from him original sin, by which it should be drawn through many wanderings and griefs, to that last neverending punishment with the apostate angels, its corrupters, masters, and partners. Ry. The LORD GOD took the man, and put him in a paradise of pleasure:* to dress it and keep it. y. But the LORD GOD had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning, in which Ry. The LORD GOD said: It is not good that man should be alone: * let Us make him an help meet for him. But for Adam was not found an help meet for him: therefore said GOD. Let. WE Lesson VI. WHATEVER wicked men do willingly, through blind and unbridled concupiscence, and whatever they suffer unwillingly by open, or secret punishments, such things pertain to the just anger of God. And yet the goodness of the Creator ceases not to minister even to evil angels life and vital power, (for if this ministration were withdrawn, they would perish,) and in the case of man, although they be born of a corrupted and condemned stock, ceases not to give form and life to seeds, to dispose their members, through periods of time and place, to quicken their senses, and to bestow on them nutriment. For He judged it better to work good out of evil things, than to allow no evil things to exist. Ry. The LORD GOD caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and He took one of his ribs, and the rib which He had taken, He made a woman, and brought her to Adam, that He might see what he would call her :* and he called her name woman, because she was taken from man. . And while he slept, He took one of his ribs, and closed up | the ninth from Moses to the coming the flesh in the place thereof. And the rib. Glory. And he called. THIRD NOCTurn. Lesson of the Holy Gospel according to S. Matthew. Lesson VII. Chap. xx. AT that time: JESUS spake this parable to His disciples: The kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which went out early in the morning to hire labourers into his vineyard. And that which follows. A Homily of S. Gregory the Pope. Hom. 10. On the Gospels. The kingdom of Heaven is said to be like unto a man that is an householder, hiring labourers to till his vineyard. Who can better be compared to an householder than our Creator, Who governs those whom He created, and controls His elect in this world, even as a master the servants of his house? Who has a vineyard, namely, the whole Church, which from righteous Abel to the last of the elect that shall be born before the end of the world, has produced so many Saints, as it were branches. Ry. The LORD GOD had planted a paradise of pleasure from the beginning, and therein he put the man whom he had formed. . And the LORD GOD caused every tree to spring out of the ground that was pleasant to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden. And therein. Lesson VIII. THIS Householder, then, hires labourers to work in His vineyard early in the morning, and at the third, sixth, ninth, and eleventh hours: for, from the beginning of this world to its end, He fails not to gather preachers to instruct His faithful people. And the morning of the world was from Adam to Noah; the third hour from Noah to Abraham the sixth from Abraham to Moses; of the LORD; but the eleventh from our LORD's first coming to the end of the world. And the preachers sent in this last hour are the holy Apostles who, though they came late, yet received a full reward. Ry. Behold, Adam is become one of * beware Us, knowing good and evil; lest he take of the tree of life, and eat and live for ever. y. Unto Adam, also, the LORD GOD made coats of skins and clothed him, and said. Beware. Lesson IX. THEREFORE the LORD hath never instruct His people: as it were, to till His vineyard. For, first by the the law, and the prophets, and lastly patriarchs, and then by the doctors of the moral character of His people, by the apostles, while He elevated He laboured as it were in the culture of the vineyard by the hands of His servants: whoever in whatever form or measure stood forth, with right faith, a preacher of good actions, was a labourer in this vineyard. ancient Hebrew people may be called His labourers in the early morning, and at the third, sixth, and ninth hours; which, in His elect from the beginning of the world, while it strove to worship GOD with a true faith, ceased not as it were from the work of cultivating His vineyard. But at the eleventh hour the Gentiles are called, to whom it is said, Why stand ye here all the day idle? failed to send forth labourers to That Ry. Where is Abel thy brother? said the LORD to Cain. I know not, LORD: am I my brother's keeper? And He said unto him: What hast thou done? * Behold, the blood of thy brother Abel crieth unto Me from the ground. y. Cursed art thou upon the earth, which hath opened her mouth, and received the blood of thy brother from thy hand." Behold. Glory. Behold. A ninth R. is said on Sundays, till |