days most holy over the earth, which all Christians, whom God reconciles to himself in Christ, observe with singular devotion, as Easter approaches.” Serm. ccix. T. v. p. 926. .
Sr. LEO, L. C.-“Let the Apostolical institution of forty days be spent in fasting; not by abstaining from food merely, but by abstaining from vice.” Serm. vi. de Quadrag. p. 222.
“ The present days demand our particular devotion, days approaching to that awful mystery of divine mercy. In them, with reason, were the greater fasts ordained by the Apostles, whom the holy Spirit instructed, that we, uniting ourselves to the Cross of Christ, may take a part in the sufferings which he underwent for us.” Ibid. Serm. ix. p. 230.-It appears from the passage which I have quoted from St. Chrysostom, (and others might be adduced) that, though Lent, at this time, was observed by all, the number of days was not every where the same.
EMBER DAYS AND THE VIGILS OF FEASTS.
These days, observed by us as fasts, are very ancient; and St. Leo, in the fifth Century, speaks of the first as equally venerable with the institution of Lent.
FATHERS.
CENT. V.
St. LEO, L. C.-" This observance of temperance is strongly prescribed in the ecclesiastical fasts, which, by the guidance of the holy Spirit, are so distributed through the course of the year, that each season shall have its allotted abstinence. We keep the vernal fast in Lent; that of summer
