firmness of our faith; from joining in which a truly pious mind would
have no ground for inward misgiving, nor for the aspiration, Would it
were founded in truth!

[Footnote 105: "The Assumption of the Virgin Mary is the
greatest of all the festivals which the Church celebrates in her
honour. It is the consummation of all the other great mysteries
by which her life was rendered most wonderful. It is the
birthday of her true greatness and glory, and the crown of all
the virtues of her whole life, which we admire single in her
other festivals." Alban Butler, vol. viii. p. 175.]

Before such a solemn office of praise and worship were ever admitted
among the institutions of the religion of truth, its originators and
compilers should have built upon sure grounds; careful too should they
also be who now join in the service, and so lend it the countenance of
their example; more especially should those sift the evidence well, who,
by their doctrine and writings, uphold, and defend, and advance it; lest
they prove at the last to love Rome rather than the truth as it is in
Jesus. So solemn, so marked, a religious service in the temples and at
the altar of HIM who is the truth, a service so exalted above his
fellows, ought beyond question to be founded on the most sure warrant of
Holy Scripture, or at the least on undisputed historical evidence, as to
the alleged matter of fact on which it is built,--the certain,
acknowledged, uninterrupted, and universal testimony of the Church
Catholic from the very time. They incur a momentous responsibility who
aid in propagating for religious truths the inventions of men[106].

[Footnote 106: Very different opinions are held by Roman
Catholic writers as to the antiquity of this feast. All, indeed,