As to any inconvenience that may seem to attend this ecclesiastical discipline, it is no way material, especially when compared to the great advantages that arise from it; nor does it affect the substance of religion; neither is it a prejudice to the illiterate, who do not understand the Latin; for though they may not perhaps understand the particular form of prayers, which it is only the priest's office to offer to God, for and in the name of the congregation, yet they know them at least as to the substance, and may find the meaning of every thing fully explained in their manuals. They are taught from their childhood to accompany the officiating priest through every part of his function, with proper and suitable prayers, and are frequently instructed in the nature, the benefit, and the ends for which the Mass is offered, and in the manner of assisting thereat with attention and devotion, which is sufficient to concur in and partake of the sacrifice, though the people should neither hear nor cite the same prayers with the priest. The very seeing of the priest was more than God was pleased to require in the old law; for we read, (St. Luke, 1. 10,) _that the whole multitude of the people were praying without_, when Zacharias went into the temple to burn incense; and (Levit. xvi. 17.) it was expressly ordered, that there should be no man in the tabernacle, or temple, when the high-priest went with the blood of the victims into the sanctuary to make atonement, which is a clear proof that it was not necessary for the people to hear and understand the particular form of prayers, that the priest offered to God for them in the sacrifices at which they assisted. {339} Moreover, we find that after the Babylonian captivity, nay, even in our Saviour's time, the public service of the Jewish synagogue was performed in the old Hebrew language, though it was not understood by the common people, who only spoke the Syriac, (Nah. viii. 13,) into which the scriptures were not then translated from the Hebrew.