Having always considered your acquaintance with the sacred Scriptures as the most solid basis of all your studies, I have introduced the course of gene. ral knowledge, with the soundest opinions and with practical instructions for the pursuit of this object, and named the best, if not the only, books adapted to the use of schools in general, and of ladies' schools in particular. Those books will introduce you to the system called Interrogative, on which I feel it an act of justice to speak with unqualified approbation. I believe it is now used more or less in all well-conducted seminaries, and I never heard an objection to it. It is but common justice to the inventor, Sir Richard Phillips, to state, that the teachers and the rising generation of the united kingdom, are under great obligations to him. It effects the hitherto hopeless purpose of compelling every young student to think of what they are learning, and hence they do learn; and it applies to every branch of liberal education.

The exercise of answering the questions, especially if entered into the spaces in the copy-books, is not the least important part of the system, because it furnishes perennial exercises in writing, spelling, and accurate composition, in all of which you be come expert, even while you are acquiring the elements of religion.

In connexion with these observations on method, I need scarcely commend the Governess's Register, by Mr. Blair, which I introduced among you about three years ago. Its moral effect has been wonderful, and though a trifle, yet it is as great a practical improvement in the management of a school, as any that has been made in my time. Few schools can perhaps boast of the fact which characterized our seminaries of the last half year, when eleven of my scholars had not a single negative mark, a degree of merit which would not have been detected without Blair's Register,

With the aid of the Register and the Copy Books of the Interrogative System, our studies are surprisingly simplified, while they are also extended in their variety far beyond what could have been contemplated thirty years ago. We now have better books, and what is of greater consequence, books which can be relied upon for their effect, while the keys to them diminish exceedingly the study and labour of the teacher.

**

LETTER XIII.

The Service of the Established Church.

MY ESTEEMED Children,

the neces

I have never failed to impress on you sity of regularly attending divine worship, at least once on every Lord's Day. I obey the wishes of your parents in regard to the place of religious service; and though many of you have walked with me to our Parish Church, yet others attend Meetings of On this head I am less various denominations.

anxious than that you should all be imbued with the spirit of devotion, should feel the value and efficacy of prayer, and acquire habits which will be the comfort of your future lives.

The Established Church prescribes the use of the Common Prayer Book, and as it refers to many facts in Ecclesiastical History, and requires some explanation for its ready use, and some illustration of particular services, I shall render you an acceptable service in supplying you with a body of information which I have derived from the works of various learned commentators.

From the earliest ages of Christianity, it is evident that set forms of prayer were used in the church; and several liturgies of great antiquity

have descended down to us, free from those inven tions with which Popery afterwards disfigured and corrupted the religion of Christ; but it was not till the reign of Edward VI. that attempts were made, by our reformers, to compose one uniform order of communion, according to the rules of Scripture, and the use of the Primitive Church.' In this they succeeded so well, that, notwithstanding the revival of Popery under the cruel and bigotted Mary, and several successive reviews of their labours during the reigns of Elizabeth, James I. and Charles II. the substance of our Common Prayer, and indeed the very words, are still nearly what they left us.

The last Act of Uniformity passed soon after the Restoration, after the Liturgy, as it now stands, had been carefully revised and unanimously subscribed to by both houses of convocation. It is thus supported on the joint foundations of ecclesiastical and civil authority; and it has still higher preten sions to our veneration and belief, as it is drawn from the pure word of God, and accords, in all its essentials, with the primitive models. Its language also is simple, perspicuous, and impressive to a high degree: the ceremonies it enjoins are few, and perfectly unexceptionable; and from its adaptation to the various circumstances of human life, it is calculated to meet all our spiritual and temporal wants, and to convey them to the throne of God.

Since the last review and legislative confirmation, four services have been added by royal authority, renewed at the commencement of every reign; namely, those for the 5th of November; the 30th of January; the 29th of May; and the Inauguration. The first three, however, are sanctioned by act of parliament. The whole book, therefore, naturally divides itself into four parts: the Common Prayer; the Psalter; the Form of ordaining and consecrating; and the Services by royal authority, which have just been enumerated.

Though the rubrics in general are sufficiently plain and precise in directing how the service of our church should proceed, yet some observations on the beauty and connexion of its component parts, will neither be useless nor unacceptable. After a short private prayer to compose the scattered thoughts, which every person should frame according to his particular circumstances, on entering the church, he ought to sit in a state of devout meditation till the clergyman appears.

The morning service begins with one or more sentences, selected from scripture, which the minister is to use at his discretion. The first two or the last two are most commonly employed; and they are all well adapted for putting the hearers into a proper frame of mind for the occasion.

The exhortation, beginning, "Dearly beloved brethren," is both an encouragement and direction for us, in approaching the throne of grace, and shews what disposition of mind we ought to possess, in order to entitle us to spiritual benefits.

As we are all sinners, so it is proper we should make a confession of our offences, before we can expect to be forgiven. This form is excellently conceived to suit the whole congregation, and it is to be repeated after the minister, kneeling, in token of humility.

After the confession properly follows the absolution, in which the priest declares and pronounces to the truly penitent, and to those that unfeignedly believe the holy gospel, the pardon and forgiveness of God. During this part of the service, the congregation are still to remain on their knees; but the priest, as the herald of heaven, is to stand up. At the conclusion of this form, and of all other prayers, the people are to say Amen, which, in its general acceptation, means "So be it."

What has hitherto passed, may properly be considered only as a preparation for prayer; but

having now made our confession, and heard the terms on which absolution is to be granted, we are invited to repeat the Lord's prayer, after the minister, in an audible voice. To the prayer used by Christ, the doxology is added in this place; and both the minister and people are constantly to kneel when this divine composition is recited. The versicles and doxology which follow the Lord's prayer seem intended for a grateful variety, to quicken the devotion, and to fix the attention of the congregation. The responses are to be made with distinctness and solemnity.

The ninety-fifth psalm, or invitatory, exhorts us to praise God, to pray to him, and to be obedient to his holy will and word; it is a proper preparative to the psalms and lessons of the day.

The Book of Psalms is a collection of prayers and praises, endited by the Holy Spirit, and composed by devout men on various occasions, with so much universality of application, that they have long been used by Christians as well as Jews in the public worship. Our Church apportions them in such a manner that they may be read once every month; and the custom of singing and repeating them, verse by verse, though not absolutely enjoined by the rubric, is extremely well adapted to keep up attention, and to engage the heart. They are to be repeated standing.

As the psalms in our Common Prayer differ from those used in the Bible, it is proper to observe, that the former are taken from the great English Bible, called Cranmer's, printed in the time of Henry VIII. and not from the last translation made in the reign of James I.*

The Psalter or Psalms may be properly classed, according to their respective subjects, in this manner.

Psalms displaying the power, majesty, glory, and other attributes of God:-8, 19, 24, 29, 33, 47, 50, 65, 66, 76, 77, 93, 95, 96, 97, 99, 104, 111, 113, 115, 134, 139, 147, 148, 150.