The first step towards the general observance of the cultus of particular saints throughout the Church, and the admission of other than merely local saints to a place in the devotions of each community, may have been effected by the Litanies which came into use in France. The oldest form of a Litany of the Saints is contained in the prayer-book of Charles the Bald.[469] The saintly personages of the Old Testament have really the same right to veneration as those of the New, being justified through faith in the future Messias, many of them were martyrs, and all attained to the Beatific Vision after our Lord’s resurrection. They are on this account called blessed by St Paul in Heb. xi. 4-39. The synagogue paid no worship to saints, but honoured the memory of the prophets so far as to erect monuments over their graves (St Matt. xxiii. 29). Accordingly there was nothing to prevent the same cultus being paid to them as to the saints of the New Testament, yet nevertheless it remained exceptional. Eastern calendars contain the names of many Old Testament worthies, Western calendars only a few, and the Roman Church commemorates none with the exception of the Machabees. But even the Eastern Churches have appointed no days in their honour, and so this part of the worship of the saints lies without the scope of this work.[470] 2. _The Festivals of St John the Baptist and St Stephen the Proto-Martyr_ In saying that in antiquity the worship of the martyrs was confined to the localities to which they belonged, it must be borne in mind that this rule admitted of two exceptions from the first. St John the Baptist and St Stephen the Proto-martyr, were honoured throughout the whole Christian Church from the beginning; their commemoration was universally celebrated, and even the former was regarded as a martyr in the ecclesiastical sense of the word. The Baptist had at once been designated by his father in a moment of prophetic inspiration as a prophet and the Forerunner of the Lord, and later on he received from our Lord Himself the recognition of his remarkable sanctity (St Matt. xi. 11). Accordingly it causes no surprise to find proof of his worship and his festivals at a very early date. The latter already appear in the sermons of St Augustine as _solemnitates_, and as fixed on definite dates. Indeed, in course of time a regular little cycle of festivals of the Baptist came into existence. The date of his birth, for instance, was fixed by that of our Lord, as falling six months before Christmas; nine months earlier came the date of his conception,[471] and, in addition to these, the day of his death was celebrated on the 29th August, under the title of _Passio_ or _Decollatio_.