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2. THE CATHOLIC TEMPLE A SYMBOL OF THE CROSS Transepts, Apse, and Side Door.-Our fathers added another symbolism to that of which we have just spoken, and, while preserving the form of the ship, the churches took the form of a cross. How was this pious thought realized? The nave and the transverse prolongations, called transepts, represent the cross of the Saviour, that is to say, His body and extended arms, while the high altar by its position figures the sacred head of Jesus Christ. For this reason that part of the sanctuary where it stands, called the apse in English, is in French styled the chevet, or head of the church, the mystical head upon which the Crucified has laid His chief crown. For this head has its crown; it is formed of the chapels which in many churches surround the high altar. complete this symbolism we love to think of the side door as the wound in Our Lord's side.

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Columns.-In some churches the columns are not placed opposite each other. Is this apparent fault in harmony the result of blind ignorance? This would be a ridiculous supposition. By this apparent disorder the vivid faith of the Middle Ages wished to express that text of Scriptures applied to Our Saviour on the cross All My bones have been displaced."

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The Incline of the Nave.-The Gospel shows us Mary standing beneath the cross, and Jesus Christ inclining His head to breathe His last sigh. These two moving scenes have found their place in Christian architecture. The chapel of Mary was ordinarily placed at the right of the nave, which in many churches was decidedly inclined toward it. When we enter one of these

churches, if we direct our steps toward the chapel of the Blessed Virgin, at the sight of the nave leaning toward the side of our mother, let us recall this touching symbolism. It is Mary beneath the cross; she seems to sustain the head of her Son, which leans toward her as if seeking a support when all His friends have abandoned Him; or it is Jesus bending toward His Mother and say ng to us: "She is thine too: Ecce mater tua."

3. THE BELLS.

The Spire.-Christianity aïone shows us in its temples that elevation, that aspiration, which, according to a graceful thought, is impatience of the earth, and ardor for heaven. (Études Philos., t. iii., Du Culte.) The ancient religions in their sacred edifices knew but the monotonous ceilings, straight lines and horizontal. This architecture was replaced by Christian architecture; the vault, the semicircle, the spherical and pointed arch, appeared by turns as the richest expression of the destiny of regenerated man; for, to translate them, it was man raising his eyes toward a heaven reconquered by the sufferings of a God. The towers, the arches, the spires of churches force us to detach our eyes from earth and look to a better world. It is the liturgic chant sung in stone: "Sursum corda" (“Lift up your

hearts").

Lift up your hearts and your hopes, above all the belfry spire repeats to you. "Its silent finger," says a German poet, "shows us heaven."

It shows it to the poor, to the laborers who painfully gain their daily bread, to the numerous victims of persecution, of calumny, to the ill and afflicted, and to all

it seems to say: "Patience, courage, there above is your reward."

Bells.—Tradition is unanimous on their symbolism. St. Hugh of Autun says that "bells, like the silver trumpets of the old law, signify the ministers of the Gospel preaching." And Honorius of Autun adds: "The sound of bells figures the preaching of them whose voices have echoed through all the earth. The towers where they are hung represent the two laws, and in their height between heaven and earth they announce the kingdom of God." (Gemm., i. 142.)

The symbolism of the sound of bells has fixed that of the three peals which announce and precede the public offices. The first, softer than the others, represents the old law, revealed only to the Jews; the second, more solemn, marks the loud preaching of the Gospel; the third, the loudest of all, expresses the confusion of the end of the world.

Cock on the Belfry.—St. Clement (Epist. to Cor. xxxix. 2), and several doctors with him, have considered the return of the sun to the horizon as an image of the resurrection of our bodies. By a natural connection of ideas the first Christians loved to find in the crowing of the cock the symbol of that powerful voice which shall give to all the generations plunged in the sleep of death the signal of the great awaking. The poet Prudentius expressly says that the voice of the cock, which calls the other birds from their slumbers, "is the figure of our Judge." (Cathem., i. 16.) The field of rest, 【laced beside the church, completes the symbol. The cock has been chosen also as the symbol of vigilance. "Placed on the summit of the church," says the Ra

tional, it represents the pastors, for the cock watches during the profoundest night, his crow marks the divi sion of the hours, he wakes those that sleep, and announces the approach of day." (L. i. ch. iv.) Before the use of bells Pope Gregory wrote thus: "The cock is the figure of the preachers, who in the midst of the darkness of this life announce the true dawn of the great day." (Moral., xxxi. 3.)

Part 11.-vespers.

CHAPTER I.-THE DIVINE OFFICE.

1. ORIGIN AND DIVISION.

THE Church has placed a feast at each one of the periods of the year consecrated by an important act in the life of Our Saviour.

But this is not enough for her love and gratitude. Each hour of the day or night marked by an event in the life or passion of Jesus Christ sees a public service established to preserve its memory among men.

This prayer bore the name of the Divine Office, or the Canonical Hours, so called because the Canons regulated their disposal by hours, and they were divided into seven parts: Matins and Lauds, Prime, Tierce, Sext, None, Vespers, and Compline.

The night, illumined by the stars of Bethlehem, also saw the sorrows of the agony; the first rays of day were the joyous witnesses of the resurrection: Matins, sung in the silence of the night, and Lauds, at the dawn, honor these different mysteries.

Toward the first hour of the day Our Lord appeared to Magdalen at the sepulchre, and to the apostles on the seashore Prime is the memorial of these apparitions of the risen Saviour.

At the third hour, toward the ninth hour of the morn.

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