Page:The Nestorians and their rituals, volume 2.djvu/443

Rh ciled unto by His ; how much more shall we be saved through His life."

By this sign the Apostles wrought miracles, and the laying on of hands for the Priesthood, and all the other Sacraments of the Church are perfected thereby. These things, handed down from the Apostles, and confirmed by all those who succeeded them, declare that "the preaching of the Cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of ."

The observance of the First day of the Week is also the matter of an Apostolical Canon, it being the great day on which our rose from the dead, and by His resurrection made all created beings to rejoice by giving them, in His own Person, a most certain proof of the general resurrection and of everlasting life. For as the First-born of men arose on the first day of the week, so shall all the race of Adam arise on that same day,—a day which shall be the commencement of an endless world,—of that world which shall not begin with a beginning, but which is to appear. Surely it becomes us to hallow the day on which such great events transpired, and, seeing that at the resurrection all worldly labours shall cease, and all shall return to the worship of, and be engaged in the contemplation of His unutterable mysteries; hence the Apostles ordained, that on the first day of the week Christians should suspend all worldly occupations, and engage in prayer to , in reading the Holy Scriptures, and in meditating on the life of. And they enjoined more especially the study of the Prophetical books, which are, as it were, the foundation and introduction to the truth of the life and actions of, Who came to fulfil the prophecies and not to destroy; (for He who cometh to perfect that which was imperfect, though in some things he substituteth perfection for imperfection, how can such a one be deemed a looser or destroyer?) "Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify" that