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whereas they should make their answer for the spirit of prayer, and stay till they have been called upon to attend this great work, and then should they kneel, and not before. The Clerks and people are not here to repeat the last of these versicles; it is designed and ought to be left for the Minister to say it by himself. The same is to be observed in the Office of Matrimony, (there it is not printed differently, but-then the Priest shall say the first, and then-Answer; after which, Minister,) Visitation of the Sick, Burial of the Dead, Churching of Women, and in the Commination.

Then the Minister, Clerks, and People shall say the Lord's Prayer with a loud voice.

By Clerks here are meant such as are still in some Cathedral or Collegiate Churches, who begin the Psalms, read some of the Lessons, and name the Anthem. They were formerly in Deacon's orders, and their business was to assist at the altar, for which they had a competent maintenance, by offerings at those altars. The word Clerk is but once mentioned, and that is in the office of Matrimony. "Then shall they again loose their hands, and the man shall give unto the woman a ring, laying the same upon the book, with the accustomed duty to the Priest and Clerk," i.e. to him that waits upon him, the Sexton, or some other servant that attends him, such as attend any minister in cathedral, or collegiate churches or chapels.

*

To the same purpose did a gentleman, not long since, express himself in his will," To let me be buried in the church-yard wherever I drop, giving to the parson one guinea for performing his customary duty; ten shillings to the clerk for doing nothing; ten shillings to the sexton, who may deserve it, for making my bed and covering me with a green turf."

The parishes of St. Andrew and Charles, in Plymouth, are so large, that there are two persons, in Deacon's orders, to assist the Vicars. Vide "A Journey through England," Vol. II. p. 52.

In town, some of the readers especially would have other-guise usuage from such, than ever they can be supposed to meet with from your common servants, who have frequently wriggled themselves into such incomes as most of the Clergy there can never come up to half the value of. There need not so much have been said here, but that most of these sort of gentry look upon themselves to be of that importance, through the whole service, though, through their peculiar sufficiency, they may perhaps have only learnt how to blunder on, and to fancy that it belongs to them to be still louder than ordinary in so doing that it has caused the people to imagine with them that the more they take upon themselves to say, there is still the less for them to do.

* His rebus sic gestis, manus relaxabunt, et maritus annulum uxori dandum libro imponet unà cum pecuniis, Ministro, ac sibi servienti, debitis.

VOL. XII. NO. I.

Then shall follow three Collects the first for the day, which shall be the same that is appointed at the Communion; the second for peace; the third for grace to live well. And the last Collects shall never alter, but daily be said at Morning Prayer throughout all the year, as followeth; all kneeling :

It may be no improper place to see here what is noted in the Order, how the rest of the Holy Scripture is appointed to be read :-That the Collect, Epistle, and Gospel appointed for the Sunday, shall serve all the week after, where it is not in this Book otherwise ordered.

As it is appointed again, after the Gospel for the Circumcision of Christ: The same Collect, Epistle, and Gospel shall serve for every day after unto the Epiphany; i. e. the same Epistle and Gospel shall serve, wherever there is a Communion, upon any week-day: as at St. Mary's they do, upon some week-day preceding the first day of every term; or as they would, whenever there shall happen to be one, when any new married person shall receive the Holy Communion upon any such day. The second Collect at Evening Prayer is likewise a fine prayer for peace, wherein we desire and pray for that peace which the world cannot give. My peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth give I unto you." "These things have I spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace." And, in the Second Sunday after Epiphany, "Grant us thy peace all the days of our life." These Collects are so called, as they are collected from several parts of the Scripture. Those that have Epistles and Gospels belonging to them, are taken out of the subject-matter for such as they serve for.

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The Collect for the first Sunday in Advent is for preparation for judgment, and is taken out of the Epistle :-"Give us grace that we may cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the armour of light." "The night is far spent, the day is at hand; let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light." The second is for a right use of the Holy Scriptures :-" Blessed Lord, who hast caused all Holy Scripture to be written for our learning; grant that by patience and comfort of thy Holy Word," &c. "Whatsoever things were written aforetime, were written for our learning; that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope." The Author of the "Whole Duty of Man commends this to be often used; but then he must mean that it should be used before the Service begins.

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The third is for the success of God's ministers; it being sometimes one of the Ember weeks :-" "We beseech thee to afford such a blessing to the pious labours of the pastors of the Church, who are the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God." "Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ," &c.

The fourth is for rescue from temptation, or for power to resist temptation.

The Church has set aside these four Advent Sundays, as a solemn time of preparation for the great feast of the Nativity: and they are so called because they are to prepare us for a religious commemoration of the Advent or coming of Christ in the flesh. Which High Day is next celebrated with some other feasts attending it. Then

comes on the Circumcision, then the Manifestation to the Gentiles, commonly called the Epiphany, (which is celebrated as a high day too, the royal family going, with the usual state, to the Chapel Royal, to hear Divine Service; and his Majesty, according to ancient custom, making his offering at the high altar, of gold, frankincense, and myrrh :) then his Doctrine and Miracles, his Passion, his Burial, his Resurrection, his Ascension, his sending of the Holy Ghost. For all which unspeakable goodness, we do afterwards give praise and glory to the whole and undivided Trinity.

These Collects are all taken out of Gregory's Sacramentary; and a further account of them may be seen in Nicholls's Commentary, at the end of the Collects, Epistles, and Gospels.

The Feasts of the Apostles were taken from the office of Sarum, of which St. Andrew is the first in order, in memory and imitation of the Saints, because he was the first disciple whom Christ called to follow him, and which his Collect tells us he did without delay. For a further account too, of these, vide "Nelson's Companion," &c.

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At the beginning of each Collect there is some great attribute of God mentioned as the encouraging ground of our prayers to him; and we end them all, not in the new-fashioned way of putting up our petitions to the throne of Grace; but with the merits and mediation of Christ, as the only person that can obtain for us what we pray for. "Whatshall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you." "Hitherto ye have asked nothing in my name," i. e. you have not addressed yourselves to God through my mediation: "Ask and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full;" that is, hitherto, when you have requested any thing, it has either been by your immediate addresses to God, or else you have desired me to pray in your behalf; but you have not yet addressed yourselves to God through my mediation from henceforward make use of this method in your prayers; beg every thing for the sake of Jesus Christ your Lord, and God will always be ready to grant what you pray for.

Note, that the Collect appointed for every Sunday, or for any holiday that has a Vigil or Eve, shall be said at the Evening Service before.

These were called Vigils, from some of the first Christians passing the preceding night (upon account of the persecution of their enemies) in prayer and fasting, as sure instruments of religion, to prepare their minds for the due observation of the ensuing solemnity. Moses received the Law from God with fasting. (Deut. ix. 9.) When Christ entered into the great office of his mediatorship it was with fasting. (Mat. iv. 2.) Those that have none, are placed between Christmas and Candlemas, or between Easter and Whitsuntide; which were always esteemed seasons of joy. St. Michael and St. Luke are excepted from the rest then about; but the latter was once a celebrated holiday in our Church; and upon the former we celebrate those ministering Spirits, that were created in full possession of bliss.

There are particular directions as to the reading of some Collects. The Collect for the First Sunday in Advent is to be repeated every

day till Christmas Eve. The Collect of the Nativity follows St. Stephen's, St. John's, the Innocents', and "shall be said continually till New Year's Eve." Before the last review, it was to be said till New Year's Day; but now the Collect for that takes place at the Eve, though it has no Vigil.

The same Collect, Epistle, and Gospel shall serve for every day after, unto the Epiphany. The Epiphany Collect then should not be read upon the Eve, the Church never using two of these, but in the octaves of Christmas and during Advent and Lent.

The Collect for the Sunday before Easter must have been read on till Easter Eve, had not others been provided instead of it. The fifth Sunday after Easter would have gone on to the sixth; but there is otherwise ordered an Ascension Collect, till the Sunday after Ascension day; which Collect, with that of the Epiphany and Ash Wednesday, being placed among the Sunday ones, they are to be continued on, without the others, till their Sunday Eves. As the Epiphany, so has Trinity Sunday more or fewer Sundays after it.

If there be any more Sundays before Advent Sunday, the Service of some of those Sundays that were omitted after the Epiphany shall be taken in to supply so many as are here wanting: and if there be fewer, the overplus may be omitted: provided that this last Collect, Epistle, and Gospel shall be always used on the Sunday next before Advent.

When there are more than twenty-five Sundays after Trinity, some have taken the Service next in course, that had been omitted after the Epiphany that year. Others have chosen the last; because, where there is an overplus of Sundays after Trinity, there are more that happen after Epiphany the next; so that if any of the Services for the early Sundays after the Epiphany are taken in to supply those that are wanting after Trinity, the same come in to be used again in a little time. As in 1733, when there were twenty-seven Sundays after Trinity, and but two Sundays after the Epiphany, some took the third and fourth Sundays after the Epiphany to supply the two that were then wanting after Trinity: so that in 1734, there being then four Sundays after the Epiphany, the Collects, Epistles, and Gospels for the third and fourth come pretty soon to be used again: whereas, by making choice of the last, this is not only prevented, but the Service appointed for the last Sunday after Epiphany is a more suitable preparation for the season that is approaching, as the Collect is, for conformity to the design of our Saviour's Manifestation, and to the great Epiphany of him at the end of the World.-"O God, whose blessed Son was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil: : grant that we may purify ourselves, even as he is pure; that when he shall appear again with power and great glory," &c.

The Gospel likewise respects the second Advent:-" And then shall appear the Son of Man in heaven, and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn; and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory."

In 1738, there will be twenty-six Sundays after Trinity, and three Sundays after the Epiphany in 1739; the fourth that was then taken in

will come to be used so much sooner than the sixth, which for the reason first above given, was added at the last review.

Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays are so called, because the last is about fifty days before Easter, the other about sixty, and the other about seventy.

The reason why Genesis is begun upon the first of them, seems to be to show us the danger of sin, by Adam's eating the forbidden fruit, and to fit us for the time of abstinence and fasting, which are the most likely means to prevent our being hardened through the deceitfulness of it.

The First Day of Lent, commonly called Ash Wednesday.

The reason why Lent (which signifies the Spring) begins upon this day, is because the room of the Sundays is supplied by it, those being never made fasting.

The Gospel for the Fourth Sunday in Lent is the same with that of the Sunday before Advent; only that begins at St. John vi. 5, and this at the first. "And Jesus went up into a mountain, and there he sat with his disciples. And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh." The first Lesson is the moving account of Joseph's entertaining his brethren; and the Gospel, being our Saviour's miraculously feeding five thousand, might (some have thought) give rise to what is called Mothering or Midlenting. It was the custom formerly for people to visit their mother Church, on Midlent Sunday.

The Sunday next before Easter is called by St. Ambrose, Authentica; its observation being allowed to be supported by good authority. By others, the Feast of Palms, the Sunday of Pardon, the Sunday of the Competents, whose heads were then washed, that were candidates for baptism, on the Saturday in the Passion or great week, the whole being set apart for more than ordinary prayer and fasting and on that day, the Church, of custom, performed her baptisms, because it is a figure of the death and resurrection of our Lord.

The Thursday in this week is called Maunday Thursday, from the mandate or commandment our Saviour gave his disciples, to commemorate his last Supper, when he commanded them to love one another, after he had washed their feet, in token of the love he bore to them; as we find it recorded in the second Lesson at Morning Prayer. The Almoner to the King performs the ceremony upon this day, of washing the feet of a certain number of persons, and distributes charity to several objects of it. It is said that several gentlemen have each a basket of preserved fruit and sweetmeats: that several others have three yards of cloth for a coat, three ells of linen for a shirt, a pair of shoes and stockings, a quantity of bread and fish in large wooden platters, a quart bottle of wine, two red leathern purses, with as many silver groats, threepences, twopences and pence, as the King is years old; and as many shillings as the years of his reign. This custom is thought to have been brought in by King Edward III.

At the end of this week comes on a very high festival, in memory of our Saviour's resurrection, called Easter. Some are of opinion that it was so called from the word oster, which signifies to rise. The

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