ought till our deaths to be the busi- What is the age, at which the Ought any among our fathers The Protestant reader will note this to be corrected in the best even of Jan- but require from her children that which her Divine Husband requires. Before she admits them to her table, she wishes that they should know how to distinguish the bread of angels, which is there offered to them. The young persons, who wish to be admitted there for the first time, are not exempted from that obligation. "The clergy (says a council of Toulouse) "ought to admit, and even press to communion those young persons whom they shall judge, or who shall be judged by their confessors, to have sufficient discernment in regard to the mystery in which they are to partake.' What then is meant by discerning the Lord's body, unless it be to distinguish it from every thing, which does not deserve to be placed in the same rank of esteem and affection; to regard it, as the most precious gift which Heaven can bestow upon us, as an epitome of the wonders of the Almighty, a concentration of the love which God and his Son Jesus Christ have shewn us? What is meant by discerning the Lord's body? It is to be actuated by a true hunger and thirst after righteousness, to have recourse for the purpose of satisfying that appetite to that adorable flesh, which is the element of all righteousness, and for the purpose of being thoroughly renewed, to that fountain of living water which springeth up into everlasting life. This discernment supposes a certain extent of knowledge, acquired by a long course of instruction, and a heart in which love has been shed abroad by the Holy Ghost; a heart which, being penetrated with horror at sin, has sincerely renounced it, and desires to live henceforward only for God. It is in the solicitude to acquire a knowledge of all the truths of religion, and in the endeavour to mortify within us the love of ourselves and of all created blessings, that so the love of God may reign in us, that the examination directed by " St. Paul consists, when he says, "Let a man examine himself; and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup." It is the same direction on which the charge to the clergy, assembled at Milan, is founded. "It is your duty to examine the young persons, who wish to be admitted to a participation of so great a sacrament. It is your duty to instruct them for a certain time, in order to train them to the belief of so august a mystery, to teach them to make a holy use of it, and to gather the precious fruits which it produces." Is it not obvious, that this preparation of mind and heart does not depend on the number of years we have attained? What then do fathers and mothers mean, when they pretend, that their children are of age, and ought to celebrate their first communion? Have we not a right to reply to them, "The age determines nothing in a matter of such importance?" The point to be ascertained is, whether they have a sufficient measure of instruction; whether they know all the truths included in the Creed of the Apostles; whether they have a correct notion of original sin; whether they understand in what an abyss of spiritual and of bodily miseries the disobedience of our first parents has plunged us, and by what miracles of wisdom, omnipotence, and mercy it has pleased God to deliver us out of it; whether they have an idea of the greatness of the grace which has been granted to them in holy baptism,-a grace of privilege, which is not extended to so many others, as well as of the sanctity of the engagements which they have contracted in it, whether they have learned what is the nature of sacraments in general, what admirable effects they produce in souls well prepared for the reception of them, and with what dispositions they ought to be received; above all, whether they have been carefully taught what is Christian justification, how deplorable is the loss of it which is incurred by mor tal sin; and for what blessings we are indebted to Jesus Christ, who through his unbounded love towards us has condescended to give us, in the sacrament of penance, a method of recovering it; whether they are instructed in the necessity of a contrition, which has faith for its principle, which is accompanied with the hope of pardon, and excited by a commencement of the love of God, as the fountain of all righteousness; whether they have those sentiments concerning the eucharist of which we have spoken above, regarding it as the true bread come down from heaven, given us, while we are pilgrims upon earth, in a manner suited to our present state, to support our weakness during our journey, and designed to constitute in a more perfect manner our eternal nourishment after this life is ended; whether they know what are the duties of a Christian towards God, towards his neighbour, towards himself, which are all comprehended in the commandments of God and of the church, whether they are con vinced of their inability to fulfil them without a succour, which God owes to no one, but which he grants by the merits of Jesus Christ to all those who, perceiving their need of it sensibly, pray for it with humility and fervour, and by means of which they will be able to surmount all the obstacles, which may impede them in their endeavours to become faithful to the law. It is necessary, in the second place, to examine whether the instructions, which must be given them on all these points, have made an impression on their hearts, sufficiently deep to satisfy us, that in the use of the ordinary means of grace it will not only not be ef faced, but will become more lively, and continue to strengthen more and more hereafter; whether they have appeared to have a taste for the service of God, to be pleased with the exercises of piety, atten tive to the correction of the faults to which they have been subject, and to avoid a repetition of them; whether they have a horror of sin, an esteem and love for holiness; whether they are humble and docile, enemies of falsehood, of oaths, of quarrels, devoted to the fulfilment of all their duties, and, in one word, so attached for some time past to the paths of rectitude, that it may be hoped they will derive much fruit from the sacraments, and persevere in righteousness. When a young person unites these dispositions to an age somewhat advanced, on being admitted for the first time to the communion, he will there taste that the Lord is gracious. There is no reason to fear, that such a person will prefer the deceitful allurements of the world; such as the ball-room, the theatre, and the like; or that he will attempt to unite the world with Christ, darkness with light, falsehood with truth; and, even though it should happen that evil example, or repeated solicitations, may one day entice him into those assemblies, amusements, and diversions, which Christianity reproves, he will feel the difference which subsists between the true happiness which he has enjoyed at the foot of the altar, and the vain joys to which men are delivered up in the tabernacles of the wicked. But, when these holy dispositions are wanting in any one who is presented for the first time for the purpose of being admitted to the sacred table, though he should even have more than sufficient instruction, yet, as his heart is not sincerely devoted to God, it is an indispensable duty to keep him away from it, whatever be the number of his years, until Divine grace have changed the affections of his heart; of which change no assurance can be had, unless a corresponding change be displayed in all his conduct. What then can exceed the blindness of those parents, who, because their children have come to a certain age, require, that they should communicate for the first time, although they have only a very slight CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 307. notion of Christian doctrine, insomuch, that in many instances they do not even know what it is that the faithful receive in the Lord's Supper; although, so far are they from having tasted, they do not even suspect the first sweetness of piety; although they are still ignorant, in what Christian humility, which is the foundation of all virtues, consists; and although they are enslaved to anger and to self-love, that melancholy source of all vices? "What fault," say they, "is to be found in our children? Is it wished, that, before they are admitted, they should acquire the knowledge of evil?" Ah, would to God, ye inconsiderate parents, that you had not your. selves, by your evil examples, by your ill-advised proposals, raised in their minds the first ideas, and infused or developed in their hearts that germ, of evil of which you venture to assert that they have no knowledge! Would to God, that by your continued vigilance you had succeeded in keeping them far from all society capable of corrupting them! But it is hoped, you say, they have not as yet formed any idea of those gross and shameful vices which disgrace human nature. Do you therefore hold them innocent, and worthy, for that reason alone, to be united to a thrice holy God, who requires, in order to our union with himself, that we should be holy? Are there besides those outward and shameful vices no spiritual ones, which easily elude the view and escape the hatred of mankind, the consciousness of which we often conceal from ourselves, but which cannot be hidden from the eye of Him who searches the heart, and with whom the darkness and light are both alike? To go further, let it be supposed, that the grace of God has so prevented your children, that no symptom can be discerned in them of those vices which are enveloped and concealed in the folds and windings of the soul: let it be supposed, that they are even to a certain point exempt from them: is it enough for the purpose 3 E of pleasing God, and being united to him, that we are not vicious? Is it not incumbent upon us to love and to practise holiness? Is it not necessary to know and to do what is good? Is it not required from us, as we have said, to love God above all things, to understand how to appreciate the gift which he has bestowed, in giving us Jesus Christ, his Son, to feel sensibly how great is the love which that Divine Son expresses towards us in the eucharist, and to choose the happiness of possessing him above all the glory, the riches, and the pleasures which the world can offer? It is well known that in the greater number of the houses which receive young persons for the sake of qualifying them for a situation, they are rejected, if they have not previously received the holy communion; and this is the cause which reduces parents to the sad alternative of either compelling them to to communicate, or deferring the business of preparing them for the situation which they wish to embrace. This state of things certainly is painful. But is there any difficulty in choosing, while choice is possible, between the evils of urging a young person to approach every thing which is most august in our holy religion, without being disposed to it, and thus to commit a horrible sacrilege, which will perhaps be the seal of his eternal reprobation, and that of deferring to remove him from the guardianship of his own family, for the purpose of giving him all the time which is necessary for obtaining good instruction, for disengaging him from vicious habits, and exercising him in the practice of all his duties? It is a sad subject of lamentation, and a manifest proof of the decline of the faith amongst us, that scarcely any one is willing to take the trouble of initiating a young man into a situation, and, at the same time, to allow him a few hours in every month for religious instruction, and for receiving the advice of a pious director, and this on account of a paltry temporal interest. But is it not also a proof, that there is nothing of the spirit of Christianity in fathers and mothers, when they prefer sacrificing the souls of their children, by exposing them to trample under foot the body and blood of Jesus Christ, rather than leave them the leisure which is wanted to prepare themselves for receiving them worthily? They have therefore only themselves to blame, if they have the unhappiness of seeing them after their first communion increase in impiety, shake off the yoke of all dependence, give way to the greatest irregularities, cover themselves with contempt, and drink deep into all sorts of bitterness. To what then must we attribute the scandal, that so many of our first communions produce no good fruit, but even open the door to all kinds of disorder, and lead directly to irreligion and impiety? Is it not the fault of those catechists with whom the obligation to instruct children is an insupportable burden, from which they long to be delivered? A number of catechists limit their labours to the task of making the children learn in haste the letter of a very short elementary book; they interrogate them only on that letter during a short space of time without often giving them the least explanation: whether from want of intelligence, or from distaste, they only ask them three or four questions on the day of examination, and then direct them to the confessors with a ticket of admission, so that the knowledge of salvation, which they are bound to teach, is of less value in their eyes than human sciences and arts, which demand much time, care, applica tion, and pains, in order to inculcate them upon the pupils. Further, if confessors would devote themselves to the reparation of those defects, which parents and catechists either do not see, or wish not to see in the children, if they would not admit the young penitents to their first communion, tiil after they have examined them thorough A more lamentable fact is, that Tothe Editorofthe Christian Observer. YOUR correspondent DIACONUS's remarks on the misquotation of 1 Cor. ii. 9. were much called for, as the incorrect version of the text, which he so justly censures, is often used; but his strictures on its misapplication perhaps require some qualification; for it is allowed, that many passages of Scripture, besides the sense obviously intended by the context, have a secondary and more enlarged meaning; and although the former ought always to be kept in view, may we not, with propriety, adopt the latter for the 'purpose of illustration. Admitting, then, the correctness of the interpretation which restrains the primary meaning of 1 Cor. ii. 9. to the blessings of the Gospel dispensation, it can hardly be deemed improper to apply it by way of accommodation to the unseen glories of a future state; especially when we remember that the greatest of these blessings, that indeed by which the Christian revelation is pre-eminently distinguished,-is the bringing of life and immortality to |