It would be impossible to do _justice_ to the subject without entering fully into the arguments on both sides; and therefore I will confine myself to an observation or two on the text of Irenæus. Let us then look at the passage according to the two methods of punctuation; and we shall find Irenæus affirming according to _one_ that those who fasted any number of days, from one to forty, reckoned the hours both of day and of night into their day; or according to _the other_ that some fasted one day, some two, some more; and that some reckoned forty hours of day and night into their day. Now that any persons could fast forty successive days, both day and night, abstaining from food all the time, cannot be imagined: and if they did not abstain from food all the time of their fast, the mention of its continuance day and night would be unmeaning. To this argument the reply of Beveridge, as may be seen in note 3, is, that no fast was kept strictly throughout the twenty‐four hours by _total_ abstinence from food: and he quotes the 50th Canon of Laodicea to show that the Lent fast was nothing more than abstaining from flesh, &c. and living upon dry food. But, with deference to so great a name, this is but begging the question. The Canon of Laodicea only shows what _the Church required_, not what individuals practised. And Grabe(456) (on this passage) has proved that there were anciently two kinds of strict fasts observed in the last week of Lent; one of abstinence from all food till the evening, and then eating nothing but bread and salt accompanied with pure water; the other, practised by the more zealous, of _holding over_ one, two, three, four, or six days, till the cock‐crowing on Easterday. Both Grabe and Bingham(457) agree (what indeed appears self‐evident) that there is no meaning in words, if these persons did not remain in total abstinence during this whole time; for what extraordinary zeal could there be in their practice, if they broke their fast in the evening, as others did. If, on the other hand, we suppose the fast to have been one of forty _hours_, commencing from the hour in which Jesus gave up the ghost, and terminating with that of his resurrection, there is then a sufficient reason for mentioning that the fast continued day and night; it becomes a thing within the reach of probability; and the period is a very natural one for those persons to choose who felt themselves equal to it. At the time in which the _Apostolical Constitutions_ were written, it was enjoined on Christians(458) to fast the Friday and Saturday, if possible; if not, at least on the Saturday: and in either case it appears that they were not to break their fast till the first cock‐crowing; i. e. in all probability, on Easter day.