In the ancient Church there was no one book answering to our Missal. The service for Mass was contained in the Antiphonary, Lectionary, Book of the Gospels, and Sacramentary. This last, besides matter relating to other sacraments, gave the collects, secrets, prefaces, canon, prayer infra canonem, and postcommunion, and from the eighth century at latest it was known as Missal or Massbook. There were "Completa Missalia," i e. Missals which contained more of the service of the Mass than the Sacramentaries; but we do not know how far this completeness went, for during the ages which intervened between the use of the Liber Sacramentorum and the general adoption of the complete book of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the Missal was in a transition state, sometimes containing more, sometimes less, of the entire office. Thus the MSS. which still exist, vary in their contents (Maskell, "Monumenta Rit.," p. lxiii seq.) There are, of course, printed Missals according to the various ritesMissale Romanum, Ambrosianum, Missa ad usum Sarum (first printed edition known, Paris, 1487), and the various uses of religious orders (Dominicans, Benedictines, etc.) The Roman Missal was carefully revised and printed under Pius V., who carried out a decree of the Council of Trent on the matter, and strictly enjoined the use of this Missal, or faithful reprints of it, in all churches which could not claim prescription of two hundred years for their own use. It was revised again under Clement VIII and Urban VIII. New Masses have of course been added from time to time, and to the Missal as to the Breviary a "Proper" may be added by permission of the Holy See, containing Masses for the saints venerated in a particular county, diocese, order, etc.
THE sacred congregation of Cardinals de propaganda fide, commonly called the Congregation of Propaganda, which had been contemplated by Gregory XIII., was practically established by Gregory XV. (1622) to guard, direct, and promote the foreign missions. Urban VIII.(16231644) instituted the "College of Propaganda" as part of the same design where young men of every nation and language might be trained for the priesthood, and prepared for the evangelic warfare against heathenism or heresy. The management of this college the Pope entrusted to the Congregation. Urban caused the present building to be erected from the designs of Bernini. The College possesses a library of 30,000 volumes, among which are the translations of a great number of Chinese works, and a large collection of Oriental MSS. Attached to the library is the Museo Borgia, which contains several interesting MSS., servicebooks, and autographs, and a collection of objects sent home by the missionaries from the countries where they are stationed, including an extraordinary assortment of idols. "The annual examination of the pupils, which takes place in January (on the day before the Epiphany), is an interesting scene, which few travelers who are then in Rome omit to attend; the pupils reciting poetry and speeches in their several languages, accompanied also by music, as performed in their respective countries. The number of pupils was by the last return, 142."
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