own families and managing the affairs of their households. Besides, the Apostle obviously refers to the qualities to be looked for in the candidates before their ordination, and he makes no allusion to the course to be pursued by them in regard to marriage or celibacy subsequent to that

event.

If the Apostles were married men, or if the bishops appointed by them were married, it must appear curious that there is no mention of their wives in the sacred Scripture. I am aware that there is a passage in the First Epistle to the Corinthians which is believed by some to decide the question. The passage is as follows:-" Have we not power to carry about a woman [yvvaika], a sister, as well as therest of the Apostles, and the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?" (1 Cor. ix. 5). These words of St. Paul would prove that the Apostles were, after their ordination, in the married state, if the word yvvaika necessarily meant in scriptural language "a wife." The literal meaning of the word, however, is "a woman;" and in this sense it is often used in the writings of the New Testament. A candid critic, therefore, who cannot deny that such may be the meaning of the word here, and who, in fact, must admit that there is in the context a reason for limiting it to this sense, as the word "sister" is used to qualify it, is forced to the conclusion that no decretorial argument in favour of the marriage of priests can be founded on the passage, especially with the fact before him, of which no scriptural critic can be ignorant, namely, that women were accustomed to follow our Lord and the twelve Apostles in their journeys (Luke viii. 3), pious and generally married women, to supply their wants, and "to minister unto Him of their substance."

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There are no reasons of moment in favour of the marriage of priests to be found in the Gospels, or the Epistles of St. Paul. We may plausibly infer that they were not married, or, at least, that they observed celibacy after their ordination, from the doctrine of the Apostle of the Gentiles in the 8th chapter of his First Epistle to the Corinthians. Virginity is there counselled, and by an in

spired writer, who, as he himself says, has "obtained mercy of the Lord, that he may be faithful"-scil., in giving this counsel,—it is recommended as a more perfect state than that of marriage. Who are to be believed to have embraced it if not they who, from their position as pastors and teachers of the flock, as well by example as by word of mouth, were expected to exhibit in their lives pictures of religious perfection? However this may be, the doctrine of the Apostle is well worth considering here. "It is good for a man," says St. Paul, "not to touch a woman" (1 Cor. vii. 1); and a little further on, "But I say to the unmarried and to the widows: it is good for them if they so continue, even as I" (verse 8). Explaining himself somewhat more plainly, he adds, "Now, concerning virgins, I have no commandment of the Lord; but I give counsel as having obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful. I think, therefore, that it is good for the present necessity, that it is good for a man so to be" (verses 25 and 26). As the groundwork of the foregoing advice, he subjoins: "He that is without a wife is solicitous for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please God. But he that is with a wife is solicitous for the things of the world, how he may please his wife, and he is divided. And the unmarried woman and the virgin thinketh on the things of the Lord, that she may be holy in body and spirit" (verses 32, 33, 34). He concludes in the following terms:-" He that giveth his virgin in marriage doeth well, and he that giveth her not doeth better" (verse 38).

It must not be supposed for a moment that St. Paul penned down the sentences quoted above without authority from his Divine Master. Every word of them was written advisedly and under the influence of divine inspiration. The Apostle admits that he has received no precept regarding virgins from the Lord; but he has received from Him the grace to be faithful in giving them a counsel. In reality the advice or counsel here given by St. Paul is but a repetition of that which is involved in the words of the Redeemer, quoted in the 19th chapter of the Gospel according to St. Matthew (Matt. xix. 12).

Supposing such a sublime counsel to be Gospel law, I repeat that it is difficult to bring oneself to believe that it was not observed by the austere, mortified, and heavenlyguided men to whom the ministry of preaching the Gospel was first committed.

C.

We ought not, perhaps, to leave the apostolic Church without bringing before our readers a few more of its customs and usages. We will, therefore, briefly indicate some further points of similarity between the "Church of Rome" and the Church of SS. Peter and Paul.

Fasting.-Fasting was practised in the Church after the ascension of our divine Redeemer. Whether it was an occasional or a periodical usage we cannot say on scriptural authority; but that it was soon to come into use among His disciples we are assured on the word of our Saviour. "But the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying to his disciples: Why do you eat and drink with publicans and sinners? And they said to Him: Why do the disciples of John fast often and make prayers, and the disciples of the Pharisees in like manner; but thine eat and drink? To whom he said: Can you make the children of the bridegroom fast whilst the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them, then shall they fast in those days" (Luke v. 30, 33, 34, 35).

Perpetual vows of chastity.-There is in the First Epistle to Timothy a short sentence, the meaning of which, it appears, can be culled only from comparing it with the context. It is as follows:-" But the younger widows avoid. For when they have grown wanton in Christ, they will marry; having damnation, because they have made void their first faith" (1 Tim. v. 11, 12). If we may transform this sentence, its latter clause would be fairly represented thus:These young widows, in getting married, will violate "their

first faith;" in violating their first faith they will incur damnation. What is their "first faith," the violation of which is visited with such an awful penalty? Evidently, it is their faith or fidelity to Christ. It is not her faith or fidelity to her first husband, for in her state of widowhood she is released from all obligations to him. If it be her faith to Christ, she must be espoused to Him in a special manner, for, in ordinary circumstances, a widow is free to get married a second time without incurring the guilt of sin. Now, what can be this special espousal to Christ? I think, after reflecting ever so long and deeply on the question, we must come to the conclusion that it can be no other than devoting herself to his service by a vow of perpetual chastity.

Religious poverty.-The "religious state," as it is called, which is at present so widely propagated through the Christian world, appears to have been foreshadowed in the discipline observed by the primitive disciples in Jerusalem. These latter were occupied in the offices of prayer and charity, and were maintained by the goods of each put into a common stock. The Scripture says of them, " And all they that believed were together, and had all things common. Their possessions and goods they sold, and divided them to all according as every one had need. And continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they took their meat with gladness and simplicity of heart: praising God, and having favour with all the people" (Acts ii. 44, 45, 46, 47).

The "religious state," as it now exists, accords to a certain extent with this picture; and if we adjoin to the practice of individual poverty therein delineated the vow of chastity elsewhere alluded to by St. Paul, we may see in the primitive Church a state or condition of life analogous to that which is followed by the inmates of our monasteries and convents.

Excommunication.—The judicial sentence of excommu

nication, fulminated by the proper authority in the Catholic Church, deprives the erring and obstinate [contumax] Christian of the use of the sacraments, of the benefit of the prayers of the Church, and of various other spiritual favours and privileges; it almost hands him over to the dominion of the evil one. Not unlike this, was the sentence pronounced by St. Paul on the incestuous Corinthians "I, indeed" (the words are of the Apostle), "absent in body, but present in spirit, have already judged, as though I were present, him that hath so done, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, you being gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver such a one to Satan, for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of our Lord Jesus. Christ" (1 Cor. v. 3, 4, 5).

Many other doctrines and practices of the Catholic Church are illustrated in the sacred Scriptures. Justification, the necessity of good works, the merit of good works, the insufficiency of faith alone unto justification, and other equally interesting points of divinity, are as clearly spoken of in the Epistles of St. Paul as in the dissertations of the great Jesuit theologians or in the decrees of the Council of Trent.