But there is a separate line of evidence to be drawn from another and perhaps even still more convincing source: I mean the ancient liturgies of the Church which have come down to us, and tell us in what way the early Christians worshipped God; the place which they assigned to the Holy Eucharist, and the light in which they regarded it in connection with sacrifice, altar, and priesthood. There are four liturgies, (and we are to remember, the word in all ancient writings means merely and simply the Eucharistic service,) which have been shewn to have been reduced to writing in the course of the fourth century, and one of them in the earliest part of it. They bear their witness to the Church’s faith and hope and teaching in those days, and even earlier, because it is generally conceded that they were in use long before they were put into writing, the days of persecution rendering it unsafe for the Christians to have documents which might be seized, and turned against them; or perhaps still more, the desire to preserve the mysteries of their faith, and especially of the Holy Eucharist, from the inquisition of heathen scoffing, indisposing them to keep any records which could be thus profanely used. Of course, after the Empire became Christian, under Constantine, this reason ceased, and it was only what was natural that the services which had been orally in use for years should now be reduced to writing. Now, these four liturgies were used at the four great central sees of Christendom, and their subordinate branches, and so pervaded the whole Catholic world. “The first,” to use the words of a learned writer, Mr. Palmer, the author of the _Origines Liturgicæ_, “is the great Oriental liturgy, as it seems to have prevailed in all the Christian Churches, from the Euphrates to the Hellespont, and from the Hellespont to the southern extremity of Greece; the second was the Alexandrian, which from time immemorial has been the liturgy of Egypt, Abyssinia, and the country extending along the Mediterranean Sea to the West; the third was the Roman, which prevailed throughout the whole of Italy, Sicily, and great part of Africa; the fourth was the Gallican, which was used throughout Gaul and Spain, and probably in the exarchate of Ephesus, until the fourth century.” { 71}