Modern unbelief, which denies the divinity of Christ and rejects every supernatural insti tution, does not of course recognize the sacred character of the Mass. Using the so-called historico-religious method, it accounts for the Eucharist and the Eucharistic sacrifice as a result of a spontaneous development in the re ligion founded by Christ; but this line of argumentation neither explains nor explains away the Mass, and succeeds only in raising still more difficult problems for solution.
Despite all the attacks to which it has been subjected, the Mass remains the great central act of sacrifice in the Catholic Church, the distinctive feature of the Catholic religion, the everlasting witness and guarantee of the bond which unites all Catholics with the Roman See. Catholics are required, under pain of grievous sin, to attend Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation, unless prevented from doing so on reasonable grounds, such as sickness or too great distance from a church. Some lax Catholics, it is true, shirk their duty in this re spect; but the crowded condition of the churches both in town and country in every land during the hours of celebration shows how generally and how generously the law is ob served. In practice, multitudes of Catholics hear Mass and receive holy Communion every day.
Bibliography.— The bibliography on this subject is enormous. 'The following books are tentatively suggested for further study: Bona, cRerum•liturgicarum libri du& (Paris 1672); Martine, antiquis ecclesiz ritibus' (3 vols., Rouen 1700-02) ; Lebrun, (L'Explication lit terale, histonque et dogmatique des prieres et des ceremonies de la messe' (Paris 1716-26) ; Pope Benedict XIV (1740-58), (De sacrosancto sacrificio missz libri tres' (ed. Schneider,
Mainz 1879) ; Rock, (Hierurgia, or the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass' (2 vols., London 1840); Daniel,
liturgicus ecclesix univers& (4 vols., Leipzig 1847) ; Probst, 'Liturgie der drei ersten christlichen
(Tiibin ge_n 1870) ; (Die altesten nimischen Sacramen tarien und Ordines erklart) (Munster 1892) ; 'Die Liturgie des vierten Jahrhunderts und deren Reform' (Munster 1893) ; (Die abend landische Messe vom fiinften his zum achten Jahrhundert> (Miinster 1896) ; de Fleury,
Messe: etudes archeologiques sur ses monu ments' (8 vols., Paris 1884-89) ; Gasquet and Bishop,
VI and the Book of Common Prayer> (London 1890) ; Gihr, Was heilige Messopfer dogmatisch, liturgisch und ascetisch erklirt> (6th ed., Freiburg i. Br. 1897) ; Magani,