is thirty years of age, even though he should be peculiarly qualified, for our Lord himself did not begin to preach until he had attained that age."* Now, as Rabanus had just before remarked, "Lectores" are so called "a legendo ;" and if a man was to fill that office for five years before he became even a subdeacon, we may reasonably suppose that, when he came to be examined for, what the Romish church calls, greater orders, it might be taken for granted that he had learned to read; but as to reading well, (I hope no offence to modern times,) it certainly was then quite another question, and one to which some attention was paid. "He," says Rabanus, " who would rightly and properly perform the duty of a reader, must be imbued with learning, and conversant with books, and instructed in the meaning of words, and the knowledge of words themselves; so that he may understand the divisions of sentences, where a clause ends, where the sense is carried on, and where the sentence closes. Being thus prepared, he will obtain such a power of reading as that, by various modes of delivery-now simply narrating, now lamenting, now angry, now rebuking, exhorting, pitying, inquiring, and the like, according to circumstances he will affect the understanding and feelings of all his hearers. For there are many things in the scriptures, which, if they are not properly pronounced, give a wrong sense; as that of the apostle-Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? God who justifieth.' Now if, instead of pronouncing this properly, it were to be delivered confirmatively, it would create great error. It is, therefore, to be so pronounced as that the first clause may be a percontation, and the second an interrogation. Between a percontation and interrogation, the ancients made this distinctionthat the former admitted a variety of answers, while the latter must be replied to by 'yes' or 'no.' It must, therefore, be so read that, after the percontation- Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?'-that which follows be pronounced in an interrogatory manner-God that justifieth ?'-that there may be a tacit answer, 'no.' And again we have the percontation Who is he that condemneth ?" and again we interrogate'Christ that died? or rather that is risen again? who is at the right hand of God? who also maketh intercession for us?' At each of which there is a tacit answer in the negative. But in that passage where he says, "What shall we then say? that the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness,' unless after the percontation- What shall we say then?'-the answer were added that the Gentiles which followed not after righteousness have attained to righteousness,' the connexion with what follows would be destroyed. And there * Lib. i. c. xiii. ap Bib. Pat. tom. x. 572. VOL. VII.-April, 1835. 3 E are many other parts which, in like manner, require to be distinguished by the manner of pronouncing them. Besides this, a reader ought to understand the force of the accents, that he may know what syllables he is to lengthen; for there are many words which can only be prevented from conveying a wrong meaning by being pronounced with the proper accent. But these things he must learn from the grammarians. Moreover the voice of a reader should be pure and clear, and adapted to every style of speaking, full of manly strength, and free from all that is rude or countrified. Not low, nor yet too high; not broken, not weak, and by no means feminine; not with inflated or gasping articulation, or words mouthed about in his jaws, or echoing through his empty mouth; not harsh from his grinding his teeth; not projected from a wide-open mouth,-but distinctly, equally, mildly pronounced; so that each letter shall have its proper sound, and each word its proper quantity, and that the matter be not spoiled by any affectation."* It is true that Rabanus Maurus has taken the substance of this from Isidore of Seville,† who wrote more than two hundred years before, though he has improved it; but if it was good, why should it not be repeated? So thought Ivo, Bishop of Chartres, who gave it again in his discourses "De Rebus Ecclesiasticis," + nearly three hundred years after Rabanus wrote-and I cannot help suspecting that if Robertson had gone to the Archbishop of Seville in the seventh century, the Archbishop of Mayence in the ninth, or the Bishop of Chartres in the eleventh, for holy orders, he would have found the examination rather more than he expected. If I have failed to convince the reader of this, by the extracts already given, I shall hope to do so hereafter; but I think that what has been said must be sufficient to shew that it was not a very uncommon thing, even in the dark ages, for the clergy to be able to read and write. CONFESSIONAL CHAIR AT BISHOP'S-CANNINGS. SIR,-I send you a drawing of what I consider a curious relic, and a great rarity in England-namely, a confessional cell, or chair, in the church of Bishop's-Cannings, Wilts. I have never seen anything of the kind in any church in this country, and have therefore thought that you might like to affix it to the Magazine as a piece of ecclesiastical antiquity. It is of oak, and very strong. I send, on a separate page, the sentences inscribed Lib. ii. c. lii. Bib. Pat. x. 616. + De Eccles. Offic., lib. ii. c. xi., Bib. Pat. x. 209. ANTIQUITIES, ETC. in the hand. The last, I am sorry to say, is so nearly obliterated, that I cannot decipher it. N.B. The inscription on the chair is in black letter. M. The sentences are partly written in the shape of a hand, a common sentence from the wrist belonging to each of those in the fingers, and so elsewhere: Nihil tecum feres Vitam tuam non ( Mortem tuam non devenies potes evadere Meditare debes quod Nescis quo } Nescis qualiter morieris (Nescis ubi cato } Morieris Hora mortis Sincerta est Non homo læteris tibi copia si fluat æris, Hic non semper eris; memor esto quod morieris, 2. (Which is not clear in order or meaning.) Memorare. novissima tua . . . . etiam . æternum. non peccabis. ANTIQUITIES, ETC. THE TWENTY-EIGHT CONSTITUTIONS OF OTHO. XI. No one shall take possession of the church of an absent incumbent until there shall be full proof of the death of him that is absent; nor shall any one intrude upon the benefice of an incumbent who is present; but, in either case, if any one do so intrude he shall be held to the party injured to give a full recompence for the damage arising from such his conduct, and shall also be ipso facto suspended from every office and benefice he may be in possession of. [XI. This constitution was supposed to have been for the benefit principally of Italians, non-resident priests, or such as spent the greater part of their time at Rome. The vast number of priests who held benefices in England, but had their abode in the pope's dominions, and more especially at Rome, contributed much to the benefit of his holiness's purse, as they spent in Italy the incomes which they received from their English benefices; and Otho being himself an Italian, inclined, of course, to favour his own countrymen, not caring for the injury done to England by the encouragement of this spirit of absenteeism, or the very great detriment arising therefrom to the churches, which were thus left destitute of those who ought of right to have served them.] XII. NEVER, at any future time, shall one church be divided into several rectories or vicarages. And such as have been already thus divided, |