given any positive precept dealing with this kind of attention, she does
the same thing when she commands that the recitation of the Divine
Office take the form of prayer for God's honour, and this recitation of
words cannot be true prayer without internal attention. 4. The Council
of Trent seems to exact this attention when it wishes that the Divine
Office be said reverently, distinctly and devoutly, reverenter,
distincte, devote. 5. If no internal attention be required in reciting
the Hours, it is difficult to see how voluntary distractions are
forbidden by Divine Law.

This is the opinion held by Cajetan (1496-1534), Sa (1530-1596), Azor
(1539-1603), Sanchez (1550-1610), Roncaglai (1677-1737), Concina
(1687-1756), and St. Alphonsus, the great Doctor of prayer (1696-1787).

According to the other opinion, external attention suffices always and
ever to satisfy substantially the obligation of reading the office and
for the avoidance of mortal sin which invalid recitation entails. For,

(1) To pray is to speak to God, to trust in Him, to manifest to Him the
wishes and wants of the soul; but this can be done by a person who has
voluntary distractions of mind, just as a man can read to his king an
address, setting forth the thanks and requests of his subjects, although
the reader's mind is far from dwelling on the words or the meaning of
the sentences before his eyes. But he is careful to read all the words
in a clear, intelligible manner. Now the theologians who maintain this
opinion say that, _a fortiori_, this method of reading the Hours should
be valid; for, in the reading the priest acts principally in the name of
the Church, as her minister, and offers up prayers to God in her name,
and they say that the irreverence of the servant does not render the
prayer of the Church unpleasing to Him,