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 understand the  means  whereby  you  may  worthily  receive and  fittingly  and  lastingly  entertain  so  august and so  imposing  a  guest.

What then,  Brethren,  is  the  Holy  Ghost? He is God,  coequal  and  consubstantial  with  the  other persons of  the  Trinity,  and  yet,  as  the  third  person  of that  Trinity,  He  is  really  distinct  from  the  Father and the  Son. The name  "  Holy  Ghost "  or  "  Holy Spirit "  might  with  equal  truth  be  applied  to  either the Father  or  the  Son,  but  because  the  third  person proceeds from  them  both  as  from  a  single  principle, because He  is  common  to  them  both,  being  the  love of the  Father  for  the  Son  and  of  the  Son  for  the Father, therefore  that  name  which  is  common  to  all three is  rightly  appropriated  by  Him  who  is  the  link that binds  the  universe  to  God  and  God  to  God  in the  bonds  of  benevolence  and  love. If one  might without irreverence  seek  to  still  farther  penetrate  the secrets of  the  Divinity,  a  study  of  the  human  mind will afford  a  shadowy  concept  of  the  Blessed  Trinity. The soul,  the  highest  type  of  creature  known  to  us, naturally bears  the  strongest  semblance  to  the Creator. Now, the  mind,  in  studying  an  object,  produces within  itself  an  image  of  that  object,  and around and  over  that  image,  if  the  object  be  a  lovable one,  the  will  fondly  hovers  and  is  led  on  thereby to the  pursuit  and  the  enjoyment  of  the  object  itself. So it  is  in  a  measure  with  the  Divinity. The Father, contemplating His  own  all-perfect  nature,  begets  an image  thereof,  and  that  image  being  no  less  a  substantial reality  than  His  only-begotten  Son,  there  is