[Sidenote:  Prayers for the dead.]

The canon of the mass next follows, which as well as many of the preceding and following prayers is said in a low voice, according to the ancient custom alluded to by Innocent I, S. Augustine, Origen, and other Fathers[16].  In it the priest prays for the church, the Pope, the bishop of the place, the living and the dead[17] he reveres the memory of the B. Virgin, the Martyrs and other Saints[18], and having once more implored the blessing of God, and spread his hands over the victim, according to the custom of the Jews, he pronounces over the bread and wine the words of consecration according to the command of Christ, and adores and raises for the adoration of the people the body and blood of our Divine Lord.  It is in this consecration that the sacrifice of the mass principally consists; as by it the victim is placed on the altar, and offered to God, viz.  Christ himself, represented as dead by the separate consecration of the bread and wine, as if His blood were separated from His body.  After some other prayers, in which the priest offers to God the holy sacrifice, and prays for mercy and salvation for all present, he elevates the host and chalice together; this was the ancient elevation, as the more solemn one, which follows immediately after the consecration, was introduced generally in the 12th century, in opposition to the heresy of Berengarius.  Then concluding the canon the priest recites the Our Father, and breaks the host, as Christ broke the bread, and as His body was “broken” for us[19]; he puts a particle of the host into the chalice[20]; he implores mercy and peace from the lamb of God, at solemn masses gives the kiss of peace according to the recommendation of scripture, and receives the two ablutions of the chalice, one of wine, the other of wine and water, lest any portion of the sacred blood should remain in it:  he recites the communion or anthem, which was originally sung while the holy communion was distributed; he says the prayer or prayers called postcommunion, dismisses and begs God’s blessing on the people, in fine he recites the beginning of St. John’s gospel or some other gospel appropriate to the day.  We shall on other occasions recur to various ceremonies of the mass[21].

[Sidenote:  Latin the language of the liturgy.]

The language of our liturgy has descended to us as a precious legacy from the time when Peter and Paul preached in Rome.  It would be incongruous that our ancient hierarchy robed in ancient vestments should perform our ancient liturgy in a moderne language.  As in all parts of the globe there are members of the Catholic church, she has wisely preserved in her liturgy a language common to all countries, the language too of majesty, civilisation and science, as De Maistre observes.  Like her divine founder she is the same yesterday and to-day:  like the rock, on which she is built, she is proof against the winds and waves; she is unchanged and unaffected by the wayward caprices of fashion.  Translations of her liturgy are published for the use of those who are unacquainted with Latin so that they may either join in reciting the prayers of the church, or say others which their own devotion may suggest.