FEASTS

FESTIVALS, or HOLY-DAYS. Among the earliest means adopted by the holy Church for the purpose of impre ing on the minds of her children the mysterious facts of the gospel history, was the appointment of a train of anniversaries and holy-days, with appropriate services commemorative of all the prominent transactions of the Redeemer’s life and death, and of the labours and virtues of the ble ed apostles and evangelists. These institutions, so replete with hallowed a ociations, have descended to our own day; and the observance of them is commended by the a ent of every discerning and unprejudiced mind, and is sustained by the very constitution of our nature, which loves to preserve the annual memory of important events, and is in the highest degree reasonable, delightful, profitable, and devout. There is something truly admirable in the order and succe ion of these holy-days. The Church begins her ecclesiastical year with the Sun days in Advent, to remind us of the coming of Christ in the flesh. After these, we are brought to contemplate the mystery of the incarnation; and so, step by step, we follow the Church through all the events of our Saviour’s pilgrimage, to his ascension into heaven. In all this the grand object is to keep Christ perpetually before us, to make him and his doctrine the chief object in all our varied services. Every Sunday has its peculiar character, and has reference to some act or scene in the life of our Lord , or the redemption achieved by him, or the mystery of mercy carried on by the ble ed Trinity. Thus every year brings the whole gospel history to view; and it will be found as a general rule, that the appointed portions of Scripture, in each day’s service, are mutually illustrative; the New Testament casting light on the Old, prophecy being admirably brought in contact with its accomplishment, so that no plan could be devised for a more profitable course of Scripture reading than that presented by the Church on her holy-days. The objections against the keeping of holy-days are such as these. St. Paul says, “Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years.” This occurs in the Epistle to the Galatians. Again, in the Epistle to the Colo i ans, “Let no man judge you in respect of a holy-day,” . From these it is argued, that as we are brought into the liberty of the gospel, we are no longer bound to the observance of holy-days, which are but “beggarly elements.” Respecting the first, it is surprising that no one has “conscientiously” drawn from it an inference for the neglect of the civil division of time; and in relation to both, it requires only an attentive reading of the Epistles from which they are taken, to see that they have no more connexion with the holy-days of the Church than with episcopacy. The apostle is warning the Gentile Christians to beware of the attempts of Judaizing teachers to subvert their faith. It was the aim of these to bring the converts under the obligations of the Jewish ritual, and some progre appears to have been made in their attempts. St. Paul, therefore, reminds them that these were but the shadow of good things to come, while Christ was the Body . The pa ages therefore have no relevancy to the question; or if they have, they show that while Christians abandoned the Jewish festivals, they were to observe their own . If they were to forsake the shadow , they were to cleave to the substance . It should moreover be remembered, that they apply to the Lord’s day no le than other holy-days appointed by the Church. To observe “Sabbaths,” is as much forbidden as aught else. And it is but one of the many inconsistencies of the Genevan doctrine with Scripture, that it enjoins a judaical observance of Sunday, and contemns a Christian observance of days hallowed in the Church’s history, and by gratitude to the glorious company of the apostles, the noble army of martyrs, and the illustrious line of confe ors and saints, who have been baptized in tears and blood for Jesu’s sake. Again; if we keep holy-days, we are said to favour Romanism. But these days were hallowed long before corruption was known in the Roman Church. And waiving this, let it be remembered, that we are accustomed to judge of things by their intrinsic worth, and the main point to be determined is, whether they are right or wrong . If they are right, we receive them; and if they are not right, we reject them, whether they are received by the Church of Rome or not. Rubric before the Common Prayer. “A Table of all the Feasts that are to be observed in the Church of England throughout the Year: All Sun days in the year, the Circumcision of our Lord Jesus Christ , the Epiphany, the Conversion of St. Paul, the Purification of the Ble ed Virgin, St. Matthias the Apostle, the Annunciation of the Ble ed Virgin, St. Mark the Evangelist, St. Philip and St. James the Apostles, the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ , St. Barnabas, the Nativity of St. John Baptist, St. Peter the Apostle, St. James the Apostle, St. Bartholomew the Apostle, St. Matthew the Apostle, St. Michael and all Angels, St. Luke the Evangelist, St. Simon and St. Jude the Apostles, All Saints, St. Andrew the Apostle, St. Thomas the Apostle, the Nativity of our Lord , St. Stephen the Martyr, St. John the Evangelist, the Holy Innocents, Monday and Tuesday in Easter week, Monday and Tuesday in Whitsun week.” Rubric after the Nicene Creed. “The curate shall then declare to the people what holy-days or fasting days are in the week following to be observed.” Canon 64. “Every parson, vicar, or curate shall, in his several charge, declare to the people every Sunday, at the time appointed in the communion book, whether there be any holy-days or fasting days the week following. And if any do hereafter wittingly offend herein, and being once admonished thereof by his ordinary, shall again omit that duty, let him be censured according to law, until he submit himself to the due performance of it.” Canon 13. “All manner of persons within the Church of England shall from henceforth celebrate and keep the Lord’s day, commonly called Sunday, and other holy-days, according to God’s will and pleasure, and the orders of the Church of England prescribed on that behalf; that is, in hearing the word of God read and taught, in private and public prayers, in acknowledging their offences to God and amendment of the same, in reconciling themselves charitably to their neighbours where displeasure hath been, in oftentimes receiving the communion of the body and blood of Christ , in visiting of the poor and sick, using all godly and sober conversation.” Canon 14. “The Common Prayer shall be said or sung, distinctly and reverently, upon such days as are appointed to be kept holy by the Book of Common Prayer, and their eves.” Time is a circumstance no le inseparable from religious actions and place; for man, consisting of a soul and body, cannot always be actually engaged in the service of God : that’s the privilege of angels, and souls freed from the fetters of mortality. So long as we are here, we must worship God with respect to our present state, and consequently of nece ity have some definite and particular time to do it in. Now, that man might not be left to a floating uncertainty, in a matter of so great importance, in all ages and nations, men have been guided by the very dictates of nature, to pitch upon some certain seasons, wherein to a emble, and meet together, to perform the public offices of religion.— Cave’s Prim. Christianity ; and see this same sentiment, and the subject excellently treated, in Nelson’s Festivals and Fasts ,—the Preliminary Instructions concerning Festivals. This sanctification, or setting apart, of festival days, is a token of that thankfulne , and a part of that public honour, which we owe to God , for his admirable benefits; and these days or feasts set apart are of excellent use, being, as learned Hooker observes, the 1. Splendour and outward dignity of our religion; 2. Forcible witne es of ancient truth; 3. Provocations to the exercise of all piety; 4. Shadows of our endle felicity in heaven; 5. On earth, everlasting records, teaching by the eye in a manner whatsoever we believe. And concerning particulars: as, that the Jews had the sabbath, which did continually bring to mind the former world finished by creation; so the Christian Church hath her Lord’s days, or Sun days, to keep us in perpetual remembrance of a far better world, begun by him who came to restore all things, to make heaven and earth new. The rest of the holy festivals which we celebrate, have relation all to one head, Christ . We begin therefore our ecclesiastical year (as to some accounts, though not as to the order of our services) with the glorious annunciation of his birth by angelical me age. Hereunto are added his ble ed nativity itself, the mystery of his legal circumcision, the testification of his true incarnation by the purification of his ble ed mother the Virgin Mary; his glorious resurrection and ascension into heaven; the admirable sending down of his Spirit upon his chosen. Again, forasmuch as we know that Christ hath not only been manifested great in himself, but great in other, his saints also; the days of whose departure out of this world are to the Church of Christ as the birth and coronation days of kings or emperors; therefore, special choice being made of the very flower of all occasions in this kind, there are annual selected times to meditate of Christ glorified in them, which had the honour to suffer for his sake, before they had age and ability to know him, namely, the ble ed Innocents;—glorified in them which, knowing him, as St. Stephen, had the sight of that before death, whereinto such acceptable death doth lead;—glorified in those sages of the East, that came from far to adore him, and were conducted by strange light;—glorified in the second Elias of the world, sent before him to prepare his way;—glorified in every of those apostles, whom it pleased him to use as founders of his kingdom here;—glorified in the angels, as in St. Michael;—glorified in all those happy souls already po e ed of bli .— Sparrow’s Rationale. In the injunctions of King Henry VIII., and the convocation of the clergy, A. D. 1536, it was ordered, that all the people might freely go to their work upon all holidays usually before kept, which fell either in the time of harvest, (counted from the 1st day of July to the 29th of September,) or in any time of the four terms, when the king’s judges sat at Westminster. But these holidays (in our book mentioned) are specially excepted, and commanded to be kept holy by every man.— Cosin’s Notes. By statute 5 & 6 Edward VI. ch. 3, it was provided, that it should be “lawful for every husbandman, labourer, fisherman, and every other person of what estate, degree, or condition they be, upon the holidays aforesaid, in harvest, or at any other time in the year when nece ity shall require, to labour, ride, fish, or work any kind of work, at their free wills and pleasure.” This was repealed by Queen Mary, but revived by James I. Queen Elizabeth, in the mean while, however, declared in her “injunctions,” that the people might “with a safe and quiet conscience, after their common prayer,” (which was then at an early hour,) “in the time of harvest, labour upon the holy and festival days, and save that thing which God hath sent.” The moveable feasts are those which depend upon Easter, and consequently do not occur on the same day every year. There are, besides Easter, the Sun days after the Epiphany, Septuagesima Sunday, the first day of Lent, Rogation Sunday, (i. e. the Sunday before the Ascension,) Ascension Day, Whit sunday, Trinity Sunday, the Sun days after Trinity, and Advent Sunday.