this one only Mediator, in Christ, not apart from Him, but in a secondary sense, we are all mediators one for another.

L. To be sure we are; I quite admit that, because it is in the Bible.

A. And the Apostle Paul, in the very verses immediately before, "exhorts that first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions be made for all men;" but what are intercessions but mediations? and what are intercessors but mediators?

L. To be sure, to be sure!

A. Well, then, it is right both to pray for others and to desire that they should pray for us.

L. I grant it.

A. And the more any one is eminent, either for his place in this Church, or for sanctity, so much more should we value and desire his prayers.

L. I agree.

A. If then "the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much" here below, so much, according to St. James, as even to change the course of nature and to work miracles, does it avail less when his righteousness is perfected in heaven?

L. I admit all that you have said, and all besides that you can say of this sort.

A. Well then, if, in contemplating the Communion of Saints, we must naturally feel comfort in the

thought of their praying for us, so that our will and feeling unite with theirs, and wish them to do that which they are in fact doing, it follows that to express this wish outwardly in words whenever we are naturally and actually moved to do so, can scarcely be wrong. And even irrespective of any ulterior effect, to ask the prayers of the saints may be to a certain extent a means towards our having them-that is, towards cultivating in ourselves that communion and union of spirit, without which we can obtain neither general nor particular benefit from their prayers for us. If so, it will be not only natural and innocent, but positively useful to seek the help of the saints now reigning with Christ, no less than the help of those who are still on earth.

Further, I conceive this may be done in two ways— one, when the mind, speaking to God and Christ in prayer, partly in faith and love, partly in humility and self-abasement, offers the prayers of others who are better and stronger than ourselves—not as if there were other mediators than Christ, but, as touching in them Christ's seamless Robe, the hem of His garment, of which we are unworthy to be a part; and, secondly, when we address the Saints themselves with direct, poetical, rhetorical, and spiritual invocations-not as if they were naturally or bodily present to hear us, but as

speaking to them (if not in form yet in sense), only in Christ and in God, who may give us for our addresses the same benefit as if the Saints were naturally present to hear. May we not safely say this?

CHAPTER CXVII.

Encounter with the Princess continued.

SHE

HE did not attempt to meet these observations directly, but went on thus:

L. But surely you agree with me that there are things in our received worship and ritual which are faulty?

A. Yes, we must confess that when the services of the Church are filled with invocations, and there is a stated cultus, not only for the Saints in general, but also for each Saint individually, and for particular Icons, there may be danger of gross misunderstandings and abuse among the common people. It does not seem that in the earliest and best ages of the Church, when there would have been far less danger of misunderstandings and of abuses, there existed any such efflorescence of saint worship and Icon worship, as is

1 [Less danger? surely greater. The prevalence and the habit of idolatry in paganism may have been the sufficient reason why image worship was not allowed or even thought of.]

now embodied in your ritual. And now you have neither the holy discipline nor the frequent communion of the primitive Church, which are the true practical bonds and safeguards of the communion of saints. One might be pardoned then for wishing that everything of the kind, at least of comparatively late introduction, should be retrenched or modified. Enough might still remain, both of indirect and direct invocation, to keep up the sense of communion with the saints in heaven.

L. Perhaps it would be unnecessary to make omissions; a little verbal alteration would suffice. But why, since you agree with me in thinking that everywhere are faults and things to alter, why do you seek to quit one particular Church for another? It is only changing this set of faults for that. The true essential faith of the Bible is the same in all alike.

A. I do not wish to leave the English Church for the Russian, but to unite the two.

We ought by no means to quit our own Church, merely because it has faults, so long as we believe it to be a portion of the True Church; and no one can do so without sin.. But what do you mean by "particular churches," and, "the faith of the Bible, which is the same in all of them"? We believe there is only one Church, and that visible, as well as invisible.

L. Where then, and which is the Church?