for those who have had educational advantages. But no lady who will take a little pains in preparation need be deterred from such work by fears of insufficient literary qualification. No very great amount of erudition is necessary, and there is the utmost liberty as to the mode of conducting such a class. And in the present day literary help to such work is plentiful. Biblical teaching may sometimes be profitably varied by selections from a suitable biography, or by a well-chosen piece of sacred poetry. But it is not altogether a question of suitable instruction, important as that is. The personal influence, the living sympathy, are what is wanted. The upward limit of should be very if age, any, elastic; but downward the limit is of more consequence. They must be distinctly adult classes, or power will be lost. It is imperative, too, that they have separate class-rooms; and if these cannot conveniently be had in connection with Sunday-schools, a room should be hired or the class held in a private house. The noise of a large school of children would greatly prejudice such an undertaking. Singing should be freely employed, and a tone of Christian cheerfulness should prevail. In conducting such a class two friends or sisters may most advantageously work together. Under good management, classes of this kind will sometimes have from fifty to eighty members. It would be a very blessed beginning of the New Year if a number of Christian ladies would commence such meetings forthwith.

But the point to which I am more particularly concerned to draw attention is this-that possibly something more could be done for Methodism, akin to what is done elsewhere in the way of visiting by ladies. I do not use the last word in a conventional sense; any Christian woman who desires to do good may help in

In some

the work. How much is done in this way in other quarters, some readers of this Magazine may have good reason to know. localities (as I have already said, when treating this subject in one of our Connexional journals),

'there is scarcely a cottage into which the visitors do not penetrate; they know the members of the family and the history of each, where the boys are at school and where the girls are at service; they give help in times of difficulty; little comforts, and sometimes valuable aid, in sickness; they teach an ignorant adult to read or even to write, and they read with the aged or afflicted. In all sorts of ways they endeavour to show themselves the friends of their humbler neighbours. I do not say that all is faultless: sometimes their zeal is felt to be a little obtrusive, a patronizing or even domineering tone is perceptible; they constitute themselves rather too much the guardians of their charge, and interfere and dictate to an extent which is resented by the poor. Moreover, a spirit of extreme exclusiveness animates too many of them; it seems as if their end were not only to aid and serve the needy, but to render it impossible for them to belong to any other Church than that "by law established." Blandishments, and their reverse, are, in some cases, freely and skilfully employed with this design; and a ceaseless stream of effort is directed against Methodism. It is sometimes found, too, that the visitors go further than the Clergyman under whom they act professes to go. But for good or for evil the system is in constant operation, and its results are prodigious. Now, the question very naturally arises whether our own Connexion could not avail itself to a greater extent than at present of an agency which is so freely employed against it. The Establishment has no monopoly of this system, no exclusive right to its advantages, though it may possess unrivalled powers and resources for securing them. If the ladies of our own Church were to devote their manifold gifts and talents to efforts of a similar kind, who can doubt that very great good would result? Those who have had the benefit of their aid in almost any form of our Churchwork will scarcely be among the doubters. The intelligence, experience, zeal and kindliness which the women of Methodism

might in this way bring to bear upon the population surrounding many of our sanctuaries could not fail to secure good results, while the absence of all territorial claims and exclusive Church theories ought to be

helpful to the highest ends of such work. It should not be undertaken only by young ladies; on the contrary, years and experience would be great advantages, but a youthful helper might very well be associated with some of the elder visitors. Tracts would often furnish an introduction to the homes visited many ladies could take a district, and visit on some convenient weekday, instead of on the Sunday, as most of our Tract-distributers are compelled by want of leisure to do. And what new life this would infuse into many a Tract Society! Mere Tract-distribution, however, is not by any means sufficient: the tract would serve very well in some instances, to begin with, bat district visiting means far more than that. Friendly communication on the part of religious people with those less favoured by Providence is required, and nothing less. No doubt in multitudes of instances it exists already, and with blessed results; bat in our own communion it might be extended and systematized with great advantage. Where anything of the kind has been tried, where, for instance, Sundayschool teachers have visited their scholars in their own homes, good has come of it. And good would surely come of an extended application of similar agency. Many & backslider might thus be discovered and possibly restored. Nor should such efforts be restricted to the poor, or the labouring class; "new arrivals "-in what are sometimes described as "respectable neighbourhoods "-might be called upon and invited to our sanctuaries; they are so visited, and invited elsewhere, by earnest Christians of other denominations. And sometimes it would be found that the new arrivals had been accustomed to worship in a Methodist congregation, and were quite ready to welcome the kind greeting and invitation. Of course, visiting among the poor would often be self-denying work: dirt and bad odours might be encountered, and occasionally risk of infection, while, at times, the less pleasing aspects of human nature would become painfully prominent. But these things are encountered by ladies of position and refinement who act as district visitors for the Clergy. Are the ladies of Methodism less zealous for their Church, less willing to aid their Ministers? And there would be benefit as well as discipline for those who engaged in this work. Their own graces would be exercised and matured; influence for good would be obtained; there would be a response to the Master's "I was sick, and ye visited Me"; and solid spiritual results would no doubt reward the patience and faith of the Christian worker. The original idea of such work is truly Scriptural; teaching "every man his neighbour

and every man his brother" is perhaps the highest possible conception of evangelistic agency. Such work is often greatly needed; sometimes, because the population is so large that all and any efforts cannot overtake its necessities; and sometimes, alas! because those who are most active in doing the work are so diligent in teaching dangerous error. We ought not as a Church to look on contentedly and leave matters in their hands because of their diligence. By means of their activity, no doubt, many have been alienated from our Church who justly belonged to it, or might readily have become connected with it. Systematic visiting is often used against us; can we not employ it in self-defence? It would find an outlet for an immense amount of unused power, of force which is sometimes checked and reserved till it is completely annulled, but which rightly directed might accomplish great things for Methodism and for souls. Will the ladies of Methodism set it free and guide its beneficent energies?'

In an emergency, some such work has been undertaken repeatedly. During the Lancashire cotton famine I frequently presided over a Circuit Relief Committee in Manchester: almost all our visiting was done by women, and the combination of shrewdness and sympathy which they exhibited was truly admirable. I cannot but think that some further effort of the same kind, not reserved for emergencies, but placed among the ordinary activities of our Church, might yield valuable results. Such a proposal can scarcely be challenged as an innovation; for very early in the history of Methodism Mr. Wesley chose forty-six visitors, and, dividing London into twenty-three Districts, sent them, two and two, to visit the sick members of Society. He also constantly urged the duty of visiting the poor and afflicted in his sermons, both preached and printed.

'But there are such difficulties!' There are; and yet others overcome them. There are difficulties of some kind everywhere, except in dreamland, where we float and fly and perform prodigies with perfect ease. It is difficult, for instance, to become

an accomplished musician or to master a foreign language, yet these difficulties are grappled with by ladies daily, and for hours. Difficulties! they are vanquished perpetually by a woman's wit and a woman's will. There is, indeed, one supreme difficulty-a reluctance to engage in such work. That disposed of, all others are likely to furnish illustrations of the saying that ‘difficulties were made to be overcome.'

In our larger Societies where any suitable organizations of Tract Districts or Mothers' Meetings exist, let such

agency as I have ventured to suggest be connected with them. I advocate nothing in the way of additional organization. And in the smaller fields of labour, if no system seems possible, I would say: Don't wait for an organization; go forth together, in the spirit of love and zeal: doors will open, and blessing will follow. To her that hath shall be given. Some of our Class Leaders and Sunday-school teachers are among 'the poor of this world,' and will be very thankful for help given and kindness shown to their afflicted members or scholars, whom they may have but little time to visit or means to relieve. Here are openings, at once, which would often amply suffice.

In

In conclusion, I trust it is not asking too much to bespeak such service or for more of it, for the Saviour and for His cause. woman's work in the Church, surely to win souls may well occupy the highest place, and for winning souls, such work as I have hinted at affords many choice opportunities. To seek, by the power of kindness and sympathy, to draw others to Christ is not an unattainable ideal, and ought not to be an unwelcome duty. Woman has constantly around her a sphere in which her power for good is incalculable. Silent as the dawn, gentle as the breath of summer, and yet mighty as the dew of heaveneven thus may her influence work for Christ. Doubtless the present season is to many a time of consecration: then be it remembered that influence may be consecrated, that the power of sympathy may be consecrated. The charm that sweetens life, that soothes suffering and lightens care, the jewel that money cannot buy, the 'love' that 'is a present for a mighty king,' is not too choice and rare to be brought to the Saviour's feet, not too precious an offering to be laid upon the altar that sanctifieth the gift.'

We all know that the stronghold of Evangelical doctrine in the Church of England is found in the Articles, that of Ritualism in the services and offices. The Articles have more direct authority over the Minister in respect of his creed, the ritual and offices are the mouthpiece of the Minister in the service of the sanctuary, and inspire the multitude of the people. If the Minister is

bound to understand the words of the public service in a sense not inconsistent with the Articles, it would seem to be no less necessary -however difficult-that the Articles should be construed in a sense not inconsistent with the assumptions and implications of the services. And as the Articles are never heard by the people generally, as their place is in the background, and they

have, in fact, no direct relation to the general congregation, it would seem very probable that, in proportion as the public services of the Church become vivid and effective, and lay hold of the feelings and convictions of the people, the most ob vious sense of the ritual and offices is likely to prevail against the teaching of the Articles, whereinsoever there may appear to be a discrepancy between the one and the other. It is no wonder, accordingly, if Ritualistic doctrine has of late become increasingly powerful, and been more and more widely diffused within the Church of England. In these days of revived public ritual, of attractive and popularized congregational services, the apparent teaching of the ritual and offices of the Church has prevailed against the reserved and invisible authority of the Articles. A lesson is thus given to other Churches as to the importance of using only such rites and offices as are strictly in harmony with Gospeltruth and primitive doctrine.

If we would judge truly and charitably in regard to the undeniable discrepancies, at least in tone and tendency, between the Articles and the ritual and offices of the Church of England, we must remember the history of the case. The Articles were the work of theologians, who held to the faith and principles, speaking of course generally, of the Protestant Reformation. As such, they were drawn up for the acceptance of theological students and teachers, to be adopted and signed as the expression of their faith. The pulse of the Reformation, accordingly, ruled their tone; the Protestant intelligence of the Elizabethan period governed their definitions. Whereas the services of the Church, intended for the people of all classes, were changed as little as might be from the ancient use. A violent revolution here would have been very distasteful to the nation

generally. The Articles, in short, represented the mind of the Reforming leaders of the age; while the services were left in such a form as did not too greatly clash with the prejudices of the parish Clergy generally, and the gentry and people throughout the shires, who, as Mr. Froude has shown, had imbibed but little, often indeed nothing, of the intelligence or spirit of the Reforming divines, but remained, in the main, 'Catholic'-Anglo-Catholic, if not Roman Catholic. Parochial England clung to the old forms, and would have them retained in use, notwithstanding the promulgation of the new Articles.

It is probable, also, that even those Clergy who accepted, ex animo, the new Articles, did not always see how far these were at variance with forms and phrases with which they had been familiar all their lives, and the inner, the real, meaning of which, by reason of that familiarity, had never been made to them a matter of reflection or consciousness. Thus a habit may have grown up of at once accepting the Articles, without much thought or scrutiny and using the language of the formularies, in a sense more or less strained or unnatural, but with an implicit conviction that the formularies could not really contradict the Articles, nor the Articles the formularies, and that in some way or other both must be capable of construction in a sense agreeable to the convictions of the Minister using them. One result came out of the whole, that the Articles came to be regarded as 'Articles of peace,'-not to be contradicted rather than to be absolutely and explicitly insisted on,—and that the offices and public services were used and understood with the very widest possible latitude of interpretation; so that, as at the beginning, so always, both the Protestant evangelical and the ritualistic Anglo

Catholic might within the bounds of the Reformed Church of England' 'go in and out, and find pasture.'

My business, however, in this Paper is not to discover how far unnatural straining of language may be pushed. This subject, before we have done, will be found to have a very close relation to that of the revision of our own Wesleyan Book of Offices, now under the eye of the Connexion. The forms of our own Book of Offices have been, for the most part, borrowed from the Church of England.

To understand these forms, as transferred to our own use, it is necessary to examine them in situ, especially when the work to be done is the removal of all expressions which are fairly susceptible of a sense contrary to the principles of our Evangelical Protestantism.'

*

We find ourselves at the core of the question relating to the meaning and intent of the Prayer-Book Baptismal Office, when we read the 'priest's' declaration immediately following the performance of the baptismal act, properly so described. The Minister, 'the priest,' then delivers the following address to the congregation: 'Seeing now, dearly-beloved brethren, that this child is regenerate, and grafted into the body of Christ's Church, let us give thanks unto Almighty God for these benefits; and with one accord make our prayers unto Him, that this child may lead the rest of his life according to this beginning.'t

Here we are at the very heart of the service. All before has led, almost dramatically, up to this. The great end of the ordinance is now accomplished.

An evangelical Churchman would, perhaps, explain that the word 'regenerate' here has reference only to the potential regeneration, or, as it

not

were, the symbolical and ceremonial rehabilitation of the child,as redeemed by Christ, as brought to the Church by Christian parents, as the heir of Christian privileges. I am anxious to deprive the evangelical Churchman of this resort of interpretation. But it is my business in this Paper to ask whether such an interpretation agrees with the apparent, with what would be popuĨarly accepted as the natural, meaning of the words of the office. And as the whole of the original service stands in direct relation to this sentence, and leads up to it as the emphatic consummation of all that had gone before, it is necessary to refer to it, for the light which it throws upon the intention, the mutual relations, the order, and the reasons of the order, of the preceding portions of the service.

The fundamental idea, then, underlying the entire service, according to the form of the Church of England, is that in and by baptism the baptized child is made 'regenerate, and grafted into the body of Christ's Church,' so that it only now remains for him to lead the rest of his life according to this beginning.'

With this clue in our hand, let us follow the order and progress of the service from its opening to its end.

The opening address, then, as in an air of song, strikes the selfsame note at the first as that with which, as we have just seen, the proper and essential part of the service closes. The consummation does but echo the first movement, which is as follows:

'Dearly beloved, forasmuch as all men are conceived and born in sin; and that our Saviour Christ saith, None can enter into the kingdom of God, except he be regenerate and born anew of water and of the Holy Ghost; I beseech you to call upon God the Father, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that of His bounteous mercy He