Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

148 THE SECOND MAN VERIFIED IN HISTORY.ciple of cohesion and subordination without whichthe Body cannot exist.Let us carry on the history of the divine Bodyto another point. How was the Truth transmittedin it ?Peter and his brethren having received throughthe great forty days from our Lord the complementof His teaching concerning His kingdom, were empoweredby the descent of the Holy Ghost to commenceits propagation. And for this work they usethe same instrument which their Lord had usedthe living spoken word. They labour togetherfor some time ; after several years they divide theworld between them; but in both these periodsthey found communities and supply them witheverything needful for complete organisation andfuture increase and progress by their spoken teaching,which therefore contained the whole depositof the truth. The gospel of which S. Paul so re-peatedly speaks was that which he communicatedby word of mouth, and S. Peter and all the rest didthe same. Communities were planted by Apostoliczeal over a great part of the Roman empire beforeas yet anything was written by their founders.The whole administration of the sacraments, andthe order and matter of the divine service, werearranged by this personal teaching of the livingword. All that concerned the Person of our Lord,all that He had taught, done, and suffered, was socommunicated. One reason of this is plain. It