the "new moons" and the sabbaths, the ancient Hebrews had three
great festivals, all defined as to the time of their celebration by the
natural months.

The first was the Feast of the Passover, which lasted a week, and began
with the killing of a lamb "between the two evenings"; on the 14th day
of the month Abib, the first month of the year--that is to say, on the
evening that the first moon of the year became full. This feast
corresponded to our Easter. The second was that of Pentecost, and was
bound to the Feast of the Passover by being appointed to occur seven
weeks after the consecration of the harvest season by the offering of
the sheaf on the second day of the Passover. We still celebrate the
Feast of Pentecost, or Whitsunday, keeping it in remembrance of the
birthday of the Christian Church. This feast lasted but a single day,
and did not occur at either the new or the full of the moon, but nearly
at first quarter.

The third festival was threefold in its character. It began with special
sacrifices besides those usually offered at the new moon:--

"In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, ye shall
have an holy convocation; ye shall do no servile work: it is a
day of blowing of trumpets unto you."

This then was especially dependent on the new moon, being on the first
day of the month.

On the 10th day of the month was the Day of Atonement, when the people
should afflict their souls. On the 15th day of the month began the Feast
of Tabernacles, which commenced on the night that the moon was full, and
lasted for a week.

We have no special religious seasons in the Christian Church to
correspond with these.

We thus see that with the Hebrews all the days of the new moons, and two
days of full moon (in the first and in the seventh months), were days
for which special ordinances were imposed. And there is no doubt that
the beginnings of the new months were obtained by direct observation of
the moon, when weather or other conditions permitted, not by any rule of
thumb computation. The new moon observed was, necessarily, not the new
moon as understood in the technical language of astronomy; _i. e._ the
moment when the moon is in "conjunction" with the sun, having its dark
side wholly turned towards the earth, and being in consequence
completely invisible. "The new moon" as mentioned in the Scriptures, and
as we ordinarily use the term, is not this conjunction, but the first
visible cr