more conspicuous; for although they may appear of no importance -perhaps superstitious to gentlemen on the north side of the Tweed -yet in England they are necessary, as regulating many local customs, and the holding of law terms and sessions. OLD JONATHAN'S ALMANAC FOR 1859 (Collingridge) is a broadside sheet for the wall. It contains all the usual information; and has a marginal illustration of all the flags in the world; and will be very suitable for halls and kitchens. ..... THE HAND-WRITING ON THE WALL (Saunders and Ottley,) by the Rev. J. T. Campbell, late Rector of Tilston. This is a new and most ingenious dissertation on the prophecy of St. John. In his explanation of the prophecies, we consider that he is altogether wrong; yet there is method in his wrongness; but with respect to the causes of the calamities which have fallen upon this empire, we are altogether at one with him. In his introduction, he says"In the year 1815, the end of the war found us the wonder of the whole world. As a military and naval nation, we had proved our superiority to all; as a commercial nation, we had proved our superiority to all while in politics we proudly reared our head on high, being the only European nation that had outlived its many storms and convulsions. How this came to pass is easily accounted for. In those days we had something to guide us. Principle, not duty, was then our polar star. In plain terms, we then acted on purely Protestant principles and prospered." He admits of all the secular improvements of the age; but he says, they are utterly insignificant compared with the loss we have sustained. "The British constitution, once the most famous in the earth-a constitution that had resisted the shock of centuries, now no longer exists; our churchmen, so noted for their unshaken Protestantism, have now openly apostatized; while the country itself, once so distinguished for its marvellous energy, now looks on with a vacant stare; utterly regardless of what may happen, provided only that taxes are light and bread abundant." With respect to his commentary on the prophecies, we reckon Mr. Campbell to be totally wrong; but his book is worth reading, for it contains many excellent things that are well worthy of being laid to heart. EDUCATION (Rivington). This is a very superior sermon, delivered in St. Andrew's Church, Rochford, Essex, by R. E. E. B. Salisbury, Curate of Thundersley, on the necessity and duty of training up children in the way they should go. We cannot recommend it too Want of strongly to all who are concerned with parish schools. funds is one of the chief obstacles in the way of education among the poor. "When we consider," he says, "that God from the beginning hath required a tenth of man's substance to be given for His service, and that His people under that law, which was but, as it were, a shadow of good things to come-that more merciful and glorious dispensation under which we live-willingly offered at least a tenth -that the deluded followers of Mahomed give a sixth part of their property to maintain the cause of the false prophet; and when we consider the great prosperity with which God has so abundantly blessed our country, it is scarcely credible that while the enormous sum of fifty millions of pounds is spent on strong drink every year in the United Kingdom, only about half a million is diverted towards the support of all the religious societies in the country!" This is a sad reproach to the nation; and we fear it will continue until the children of the poor are educated in the fear and nurture of the Lord, as Mr. Salisbury so strongly recommends. ON VILLAGE AND PARISH FEASTS (J. H. and J. Parker).-Parish feasts were instituted in the primitive church as thankful memorials for the blessings of religion brought to their doors; and there is little doubt but that the feast of the Dedication, instituted by Judas Maccabeus when he restored the temple after its desecration and profanation by Antiochus Epiphanes, and which was honoured, though of man's institution, by our Lord himself-was the original type of our parish feasts and wakes. At first, and until the times of the Puritans, these were purely religious institutions; but the reaction caused by their hypocrisy and persecution of the church caused the religious element to fall into disuse, and the thanksgiving to God has degenerated into riot, drunkenness, and debauchery. The clergy see and lament this unhappy state; and they are laudably anxious to restore the religious and to repress the secular character of the parish feast. These three sermons recommend various modes of effecting so desirable a reformation. But with all their zeal, it will be a difficult task to overcome the lukewarm indifference of their fox-hunting predecessors of the last two centuries. The reformation is difficult; but with divine assistance, those clergy who are happily making the attempt, will succeed. It is a hopeful sign of the and will be favoured with an especial blessing. times; THE WEEKLY OFFERATORY (J. H. and J. Parker) is a sermon preached in the district church of St. Philip, Clerkenwell, by the Rév. W. R. Wroth, the Incumbent. We are glad to see that this subject has the earnest attention of the clergy; and we hail it as a sign of the times for good. In our July number, we noticed Mr. Smytton's excellent sermon on the same subject, and the result of it, in an agricultural congregation. Mr. Wroth had a different description of people; plain, straightforward business men; and accordingly, he went more boldly into the subject matter of his sermon. After alluding very briefly, but very emphatically, to the divine law of tithes; and enumerating the different places where offerings were made and divinely approved of, he says:-"The law of almsgiving, then, is a universal law-a law written by Nature in the hearts of men-a law practised by the Gentiles, who having not the law, did by Nature the things contained in the law--a law of the Jews-a law which our Lord came not to destroy, but to fulfil-promulgated therefore by Himself, and ratified and confirmed by His Apostles-a law, therefore, as binding upon all Christians in their degree as any other law, moral or positive. Of the duty of almsgiving, there can be no question. No man who believes his bible can possibly deny it. And observe further, brethren, that the collections thus made were not for the poor only, though these were special objects of the Church's care, but the clergy were supported, and other expenses discharged, from the same source. In the early days, it was literally the case, that they who ministered about holy things lived of the sacrifice, and they who waited at the altar were partakers with the altar." It would be a consummation devoutly to be wished that the clergy generally would establish weekly offertories, when they would have a constant, ever-ready bank to draw on for all parochial and charitable purposes. THE CHORAL SERVICE (J. H. and J. Parker) by the same preacher was delivered in the Church of St. Peter, Sudbury, being the commemoration of its free opening and restoration. Mr. Wroth gives a complete history of the choral service of the temple, and of the instructions of the New Testament for the musical harmony and praise of God in the Christian Church. We specially recommend this sermon to public attention. "Is it not painful," he says, "to hear of persons speaking of going to Church to hear So-and-So, and seeming to have no idea of going to Church to worship God? Could this all have been if we had done as our Prayer-book bids us, and if the night of a dead, cold, unspiritual age (when even religion stood, as it were, on tiptoe, ready to depart from the land, and people cared not enough about the worship of God to take pains about it) had not suffered all that was good to fall into disuse, and among other things, the service of song?" |