LESSON (Lat. lectio, Fr. /econ, a reading, called by the Greeks anagnosma), in litur gical literature, means a portion of the church service appointed to be read, chiefly with a view to instruction and exhortation, not couched in the form of a prayer, nor, even when found in the mass or the communion service, directly bearing upon the consecra tion of the eucharistic elements. The lessons of the eucharistic service in the Roman Catholic church are always taken from the books of the Old or New Testament (includ ing the apocrypha); but in sonic of the other services of the Roman, Greek, and oriental churches, portions of the writings of the fathers, lives of saints, and occasionally short narratives from church history, are employed. The very earliest notices which we have of the liturgical services of the first Christians allude to the usage of reading portions of sacred Scripture publicly in the church. The practice existed among the Jews in their synagogues (Luke iv. 16), and St. Paul frequently alludes to its use also in Chris tian assemblies, in his epistles to the infant churches of Colossm, Laodicea, and Thessa lonica. It is even more circumstantially referred to by Tertullian (Apolog. c. 39; raid again, Prescript. c. 36), and by Justin the Martyr in his Apology (1 Apol. n. 67). Our information regarding the liturgy of this early period is too scanty to enable us to say what order was followed, and what principles were adopted in selecting the portions of Scripture for these solemn readings; but from the fathers of the 4th and later centuries, it is plain that the selection was in some degree regulated by the seasons; and, at all events, that it was not left to the determination of each individual minister or even church. It would seem that in general the extracts were so disposed as to present the several books of Scripture in succession ; but at particular times, portions were chosen which seemed appropriate to these times. Thus, the lessons at and after Easter were the gospel narratives of the resurrection; between Easter and Pentecost, the Acts of the Apostles; in Lent, they were taken from Genesis and the other books of the Pentateuch; in Passion-tide, from the book of Job. In the modern Greek church, so strictly is this order observed, that the Sundays of certain periods are known by the names of the Evangelists read at that time—as the first, second, or third " Matthew-Sunday," "Mark Sunday," etc. In the Roman missal, the distribution of the gospel lessons is regulated more by the subjects than by the authors; and in addition to the distribution according to time, there is another which is regulated by the nature of the festivals, or the special characteristics of the saints to whose offices they are appropriated. The time and the
origin of this distribution are uncertain; but it is commonly ascribed, at least in part, to St. Jerome, and distinct traces of it are found in several writers of the 5th and follow ing centuries.
In the service-books of the Roman Catholic church, the lessons of the missal are always from holy Scripture; and they are, unless in a few exceptional cases, two in number, the first called (as beino. ordinarily taken from one of the epistles of St. Paul, or the canonical epistles) the "Epistle"; the other, the "Gospel." A second gospel is commonly read, which is taken from the 1st chapter of St. John, The epistle is taken either from the canonical epistles of the New Testament, or, less frequently, from one of the books of the Old Testament, including the apocrypha (generally from Wisdom, Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiasticns, or Proverbs), but occasionally from the books of the Penta• tench and other historical books. On a few exceptional occasions, chiefly in advent and lent, or at the quarter tenses (as the ember-days are named in the language of the Roman church calendar), more than one epistle occurs. The distinction of the " Epistle Lesson" and the " Gospel Lesson" is at least as ancient as the time of St. Augustine (see Aug. Serm. 176). In the solemn or high mass, each of these lessons is chanted or recited by a separate minister—the epistle by the sub-deacon, the gospel by the deacon ; the former being chanted at the right side, the latter at the left side of the altar. In the low mass, both are rend by the priest; but the same difference of position in reciting them is observed by the single priest. Anciently, one or both were chanted from an elevated platform or pulpit called anzbo, and in Gothic churches, from a gallery attached to the rood screen. The recita tion from the ambo is retained in the Ambrosiau rite as still practiced in the Milan cathedral. In the several eastern rites, the lessons are more numerous than those cor responding to the Roman epistle, being chosen from the Old Testament, from the Acts of the Apostles, from St. Paul's epistles, and from the Catholic epistles. The gospel lessons are, of course, taken from the several Evangelists. In the Greek church, the former is read by the anagnostes or lector; the latter by the deacon. In the other eastern churches, both are read by the deacon, with the exception of the Syrian church, in which the gospel is read, not by the deacon, but by the priest.