SECTION X.--APOSTOLICAL CANONS AND CONSTITUTIONS.

The works known by the name of the Apostolical Constitutions and
Apostolical Canons, though confessedly not the genuine productions of
the Apostles, or of their age, have been always held in much veneration
by the Church of Rome. The most learned writers fix their date at a
period not more remote than the beginning of the fourth century. (See
Cotelerius; vol. i. p. 194 and 424. Beveridge, in the same vol. p. 427.
Conc. Gen. Florence, 1759, tom. i. p. 29 and 254.) I invite the reader
{177} to examine both these documents, but especially the Constitutions,
and to decide whether they do not contain strong and convincing
evidence, that the invocation of saints was not practised or known in
the Church when they were written. Minute rules are given for the
conducting of public worship; forms of prayer are prescribed to be used
in the Church, by the bishops and clergy, and by the people; forms of
prayer and of thanksgiving are recommended for the use of the faithful
in private, in the morning, at night, and at their meals; forms, too,
there are of creeds and confessions;--but not one single allusion to any
religious address to angel or saint; whilst occasions most opportune for
the introduction of such doctrine and practice repeatedly occur, and are
uniformly passed by. Again and again prayer is directed to be made to
the one only living and true God, exclusively through the mediation and
intercession of the one only Saviour Jesus Christ. Honourable mention is
made of the saints of the Old Testament, and the apostles and martyrs of
the New; directions are also given for the observance of their festivals
[Book viii. p. 415]; but not the shadow of a thought appears that their
good offices could benefit us; much less the most distant intimation
that Christians might invoke them for their prayers and intercessions.
There is indeed very much in these early productions of the Christian
world to interest every Catholic Christian; and although a general
admiration of the principles for the most part pervading them does not
involve an entire approbation of them all, yet perhaps few would think
the time misapplied which they should devote to the examination of these
documents. {178}

In book v. c. 6. of the Constitutions, the martyr is represented as
"trusting in the one only true God and Father, through Jesus Christ, the
great High Priest, the Redeemer of souls, the Dispenser o