WITH 96 ILLUSTrations of arTICLES USED AT CHURCH CEREMONIES BENZIGER BROTHERS NEW YORK, CINCINNATI, CHICAGO: PRINTERS TO THE PUBLISHERS OF HOLY APOSTOLIC SEE BENZIGER'S MAGAZINE PREFACE. THIS Volume, it is hoped, will be the handbook of all those who love to inform themselves upon those ceremonies of which they are too often blind and unappreciative spectators. Mass, Vespers, and the feasts, that is to say, the ordinary offices at which the faithful assist-these are the compass of its pages. In order to explain them the use of symbolism has been chosen, which is the soul, the perfume, the marrow of worship, and the nourishment of Christian piety. senses. The word symbol, in its widest acceptation, answers to sign, image, figure, to the representation of an idea or a sentiment, something not to be reached by the "From a liturgical point of view a symbol is a sign which, under the veil of words or things, represents mysteries above our nature, and which it is important for us to know. Among these symbols the most excellent are the sacraments of the Church, because to the sign they join an effect." (Spicil. de Solesmes, t. iii. l. v.) To symbolize an idea is to give it a physiognomy, a body, in order to make it more easily apprehended by all. All peoples have employed the mysterious language of sym 3 |