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 GRADUAL

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GRADUAL

because it is sung slowly and mournfully". — De Carpo, " Bibl. liturg.", Pt. I, a. 2, quoted by Gilir, op. cit., 410). Durandus gives this, with other symbolic reasons, for the name: " It is called tract from trahendo because it is sung drawn out {quia tractum canxtur) and with a harshness of voice and length of words ; since it implies the misery and labour of our present life" (Rationale, IV, 21. See the whole chapter). The text of the "Ordo Rom. I" quoted above shows that it was sung from the steps of the ambo, like the Gradual. We have still a few Masses in which the Psalmus tractus has kept its original nature as a whole p.salm. On the first Sunday of Lent it is Ps. xc; on Palm Sunday, Ps. xxi; on Good Friday, Ps. cxxxix. Otherwise the Tract too has been shortened to two or three verses. It is nearly always taken from Script- ure, but not seldom from other books than the Psal- ter; verses from various psalms or other texts often follow one another, connected only by the common idea that runs through them. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays in Lent are the old feria: legitimcp, the official days of penance, that still keep certain peculiar- ities (in choir, on these days, the Office for the Dead, the penitential and gradual psalms are said). Except on Wednesday in Holy Week they have the same Tract, a prayer for forgiveness from Ps. cii and Ixxviii. All feasts that may come between Septuagesima and Easter and all common and votive Masses have a Tract, to be used in that time. Good Friday has two Tracts, one after the Prophecy and one after the lesson from Exodus that takes the place of the Epistle; it has no Gradual. The first Easter Mass on Holy Saturday, among many other peculiarities, keeps so much of the nature of a Lenten vigil that it has, after the great Alleluia and its verse, a Tract. On Whitsun eve the characters of Eastertide and a vigil are com- bined. It has no Gradual, but first an Alleluia, then a Tract. It w'ill be noticed that each verse in the Tracts is marked V. This calls attention to the nature of the old psnlmus tractus that was sung straight through by the cantor. There are no responses for the choir.

The second exception to the usual order is in Easter- tide (from the first Easter Mass to the Saturday after Pentecost). During this time the great .\lleluia is sung; it has displaced the Gradual altogether. "Rightly during the fifty days in memory of this our most peace- ful and happy deed, we are accustomed to sing Alleluia oftener and more joyfully" (St. Bede, II Hom., x). An exception in this season is the Easter octave. The greatest feasts have alw-ays kept older arrange- ments, so on Easter Day and till the Friday following the normal Gradual followed by the AUeluiatic verse (and a sequence) has remained. From White Satur- day to the end of paschal time, including all feasts, instead of these two separate chants, one, the great Alleluia, is substituted. Two Alleluias are sung first as a sort of antiphon; the second has a jubilus. Two verses follow, each with an Alleluia and jubilus at the end. These last two Alleluias have the same melody, different from that of the first two. The verses are taken from all parts of the Bible, in the Proprium temporis chiefly from passages in the New Testament about the Resurrection. In this case too feasts and other Masses that may occur in Eastertide are pro- vided with this great Alleluia, as an alternative to be used then. Lastly, five occasions (Easter, Whitsun, Corpus Christi, the Seven Dolours, and Requiems) have a sequence after the Gradual. These five are all that Pius V's reform left of the innumerable medieval poems once inserted at this place (see Sequences).

III. The Gradual in Other Rites. — In the Ea.st, too, there are fragments of the psalms once sung be- tween the lessons, that therefore correspond to our Gradual. In the Byzantine Rite the reader of the Epistle first chants "the Psalm of David" and then the "Prokeimenon [irpoKftfievov] of the Apostle". Both are short fragments of psalms. The Prokei-

menon only is now usually read. It is printed before each Epistle in the " Apostolos". After the Epistle the reader should sing Alleluia and another fragment of a psalm (Brightman, op. cit., p. 370-1). ThLs too is now always omitted by both Orthodox and Melchites; even the Prokeimenon seems to be said only on Sun- days and feasts in many churches (Charon, Le Rite byzantin, Rome, 1908, 683-4 ; but I have found churches where it is still used every day). The Armenian Rite, which is only a modified form of that of Constantinople, has however kept the older arrange- ment of three lessons. Before the Prophecy a frag- ment called the Saghtnos Jashu (Psalm of dinner- time) is sung, before the Epistle the Mesedi (jueo'iiSioe) , again a verse or two from a psalm, and before the Gospel the Alelu Jashu (Alleluia of dinner-time) con- sisting of two Alleluias and a ver.se (Brightman, op. cit., 425-6). Of the two older rites, that of St. James has the same arrangement as Constantinople (a Pro- keimenon before and an Alleluia after the Epistle, Brightman, 36), that of St. Mark has a verse and an Alleluia after it (ibid., 118). The Nestorians have hymns (not Biblical texts) before both Epistle and Gospel which they call Turgama, and three verses of psalms each followed by three Alleluias (this group is called Zumara) after the Epistle (Brightman, 257- 260). The Galilean Rite in the time of St. Germanus of Paris (d. 576) had three lessons. The Benedicite canticle (which he calls Benedictio) was sung after the second, sometimes by boys, sometimes by a deacon (Duchesne, Origines, 185-7). The place of this canticle was not always the same. At times it fol- lowed the first lesson (ibid.). The present Ambrosian Rite sometimes has a Prophecy before the Epistle. In this case there follows the Psalmellus, two or three verses from a psalm. After the Epistle, Hallelujah is sung (on feasts of Christ, except in Octaves, twice), then a verse, then again Hallelujah. In Lent, on vigils and fast days, instead of this the Cantus (our Tract) is used. After the Gospel follows the Anti- phona post Evangelium, from various books of Scripture (except in Lent and on fast days). And on certain great feasts there is also an antiphon before the Gospel (Rubr. Gen. Miss. Ambros., §11). The Mozarabic Rite has three lessons. After the Prophecy follows a chant marked Psallendo. It has two verses, then a third marked V, then the second is repeated. The priest says; "Silentium facite" and the Epistle is read. Nothing is sung after the Epistle. In the seventh century a Council of Toledo (633) commanded under pain of excommunication that the Gospel should follow the Epistle immediately. After the Gospel follows the Lauda, consisting of an Alleluia, a verse, and a second Alleluia (Missale mixtum, P. L., LXXXV, e. g. for the first Sunday of Advent, col. 110, 112).

IV. Rules for the Gradual. — The nature and arrangement of the chants that form the Gradual in the Roman Rite have already been explained, so that little need be added here about its use. As a result of the reaction of low Mass upon high Mass (by which everything sung by anyone else must also be read by the priest at the altar), the celebrant at high Mass reads the Gradual with the Alleluia, Tract, or Se- quence, according to the form for the day, immediately after he has read the Epistle and at the same place (this is just as at low Mass). As soon as the sub- deacon has finished chanting the Epistle, the Gradual (of course, again, in the complete form for the day) is sung by the choir. There is now no rule for the dis- tribution of its parts. All may be sung straight through by the whole choir. It is however usual (partly for the sake of artistic effect) to divide the texts so that some are sung by one or tw'o cantors. A common arrangement is for the cantors to sing the first words of the Gradual (to the asterisk in the cnoir- books), the choir continues, the cantors sing the versus and the first Alleluia, the choir the second, the cantors