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Warmstry, in 'The Vindication of the Solemnity of the Nativity of Christ,' published three years previous to Mockett's tract, gives satisfactory replies to the objections made by the Puritans, and seems to have embodied the arguments against them, considering it sufficient for us that the Church has appointed the 25th of December for our great feast.
Whether the Apostles celebrated this day, although probable, is not capable of proof; but Clemens Romanus, about the year 70, when some of them were still living, directs the Nativity to be observed on the 25th of December. From his time to that of Bernard, the last of the Fathers, a.d. 1120, the feast is mentioned in an unbroken series; a tract, called ' Festorum Metropolis,' 1652, naming thirty-nine Fathers, who have referred to it, including Ignatius, Cyprian, Athan-asius, Gregory Nazianzen, Ambrosius, Chrysostom, Augustine, and Bede; besides historians and more modern divines. 1 The Feast of Feasts,' 1644, also contains many particulars of the celebration during the earlier centuries of Christianity. About the middle of the fourth century, the feasting was carried to excess, as may have been the case occasionally in later times; and Gregory Nazianzen wars against such feasting, and dancing, and crowning the doors, so that the temporal rejoicing seems to have taken the place of the spiritual thanksgiving. In the same age there occurred one of those acts of brutality, which throughout all ages have disgraced humanity. The Christians having assembled in the Temple at Nicomedia, in Bithynia, to celebrate the Nativity, Dioclesian, the tyrant, had it inclosed, and set on fire, when about 20,000 persons are said to have perished; the number, however, appears large.
The early Christians, of the eastern and western Churches, |
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