the clergy so use it, they may let the clerk repeat it or not, as suits their own taste; for, being an innovation, there is no rule but analogy to direct them. So, at least, it appears to me; but I shall be happy to be better instructed by any of your liturgical readers. Such points may, indeed, appear trivial; and trivial they are, compared with prayer itself, and the weightier matters of God's law; but we preserve the casket for the sake of the jewel, and nothing that conduces to due order in public worship is unimportant in its consequences.

a lover of the OLD WAYS.

nature, I am apt to think few men, if any, can hope to perform."

The passage is found at the conclusion of Mr. Hume's Treatise on Human Nature. See Life and Writings of Henry Home, vol. i. p. 97, "Methinks I am like a man who, having struck on many shoals and narrowly escaped shipwreck in passing a small frith, has yet the temerity to put out to sea in the same leaky, weather-beaten vessel, and even carries his ambition so far as to think of compassing the globe under these disadvantageous circumstances. My memory of past errors makes me diffident of future; the wretched condition, weakness, and disorder of the faculties I must employ in the

TORIAN.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer. WHAT authority there may be for the story related by O. B. (in your Number of Nov. 1831, p. 683) is not easy to say at this distance of time; but the following letter contains a strong corroboration of the fact that Mr. Hume's death-bed could not have been a tranquil one; and if truth at those awful periods could always be drawn forth, I doubt not it would appear that the last hours of infidels, where they are sensible of their approaching end, are always more or less terrific.

The following passage, being from Mr. Hume's own pen, carries with it melancholy proof of the fruits and folly of sceptical infidelity. It contains the strongest antidote against that particular poison which is derived from metaphysical subtleties applied to the doctrines of revealed truth; and shews that he who launches out upon the ocean of metaphysics on such a subject, while he quits the safe shores of probable evidence, will soon be lost in the unfathomable waves of his new element. We may say of Mr. Hume upon this subject, what Lord Littleton says of Mr. Locke" What Mr. Locke" (and Mr. Hume)" could not do in reasoning upon subjects of a metaphysical

the impossibility of correcting or amending these faculties reduces me almost to despair, and makes me resolve to perish on the barren rock upon which I am at present, rather than venture upon that boundless ocean which runs out into immensity. This sudden view of my danger strikes me with melancholy, and I cannot forbear feeding my despair with all those desponding reflections which the present subject furnishes me with in such abundance. Iam first affrighted and confounded with that forlorn solitude in which I am placed in my philosophy, and fancy myself some uncouth strange monster, who, not being able to mingle and unite in society, has been expelled all human commerce, and left utterly abandoned and disconsolate. Fain would I run into the crowd for shelter and warmth, but cannot prevail with myself to mix with such deformity. I call upon others to join me, in order to make a company apart, but no one will hearken to me:

every one shuns me, and keeps at a distance from that storm which beats upon me on every side: I have exposed myself to the enmity of all metaphysicians, logicians, mathematicians, and even theologians; and can I wonder at the insults I must suffer? I have declared my disapprobation of their systems; and can I be surprised if

they should express their dislike of mine, and even their hatred of my person? When I look abroad, I see on every side dispute, contradiction, anger, calumny, and detraction: when I turn my eye inward, I find nothing but doubt and ignorance. All the world conspires to oppose and contradict me, though such is my weakness I feel all my opinions loosen and fall of themselves, when unsupported by the approbation of others: every step I take is with hesitation, and every new reflection makes me dread an error and absurdity in my reasoning; for with what confidence can I venture on such bold enterprizes, when, besides those numberless infirmities peculiar to myself, I find so many which are common to human nature? The intense view of manifold contradictions and infirmities in human reason has so worked upon my brain that I am ready to reject all belief and reasoning, and can look upon no opinion even as more probable or likely than another. Where am I, or what? from what causes do I derive my existence, and to what condition shall I return? whose favour shall I court, and whose anger shall I dread? what beings surround me, and on whom have I any influence, or who have any influence on me? I am confounded by all these questions, and begin to fancy myself in the most deplorable condition imaginable, environed with the deepest darkness, and utterly deprived of the use of every member and faculty."

And is this the fruit of those philosophical inquiries, this the only end to which the most penetrating intellect could employ its powers; this the result of his laborious speculations? It is, by the philosopher's own confession. Surely it is not improbable that the death-bed of the man who wrote thus was as wretched as is described in the statement in your Number for last November, whatever affectation of tranquillity he may have assumed to disguise his real feelings, and however his pretended calm may have deceived his biographer.

VINDEX.

ASTRONOMICAL AND METEOROLOGICAL PORTENTS.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer. In looking over (in your Number for Dec. p. 748) the strange farrago of meteorological facts collected by the writers of the Morning Watch as proofs of the speedy advent of Christ and forthcoming judgment, I was reminded of the following passage in an old tract, entitled, The second Coming of Christ, a comfortable Discourse, printed in London in the year 1589," and dedicated to the then Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London. I extract the passage in order to shew-if, indeed, proof were necessary-the futility of adducing such vague astrological and meteorological phænomena to bear upon matters of sacred prophecy.

To make of those tokens foretold of Christ any long discourse, it were a great labour, and peradventure tedious to the reader, because the thing itself and experience do sufficiently prove the signs, after the manifesting of the Gospel, to have been fulfilled; except only those in the sun and moon and other stars as yet have not appeared, which Christ doth foretel should either shew themselves a little before, or in his very coming. The mathematicians' and astronomers' judgment, notwithstanding, is, that in many hundred years past were never seen so many eclipses of the sun and moon, nor yet so strange conjunctions of planets, as will appear within few years; which no doubt are to threaten unto us dangerous and miserable days, as hereafter shall be shewed. Here I will not speak of the prodigious comets and meteors which many times have been marked in this our age: neither will I call to mind the judgment of astronomers and chiefest divines, upon that star which within these three years (anno 1572 and 1573) shewed herself certain months together, as the very messenger and warner of God's coming to judgment; and the rather, because it seemed to be of the same nature and

a somewhat uncharitable method of settling theological controversies. The Papists would consider our friends dishonest because they do not believe transubstantiation, which is quite as plainly laid down as some things which profess to be gathered from the literal interpretation of prophecy.

There is a plain common-sense medium in these matters. The Papist errs in reading what is said of the sacramental body and blood of Christ literally; the Quaker errs in making the sacrament itself spiritual. There is no need for the latter; the sense of the sacred text does not require it. But we do not say that the conscientious Quaker is dishonest, even though he is mistaken; he believes that he is right, and this judgment of charity might surely be exercised towards those who differ from certain new views of an earthly paradise.

A. B. C.

THE CHRISTIAN-KNOWLEDGE FAMILY BIBLE.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer. In reading the notice of Mr. Raikes's work in your last Number, I could have wished that either that author or his reviewer, in alluding to the Christian-Knowledge Family Bible, had added a line to second what you have already urged; namely, an addition of devotional reflections; without which, even if every portion of the theology of the work were faultless, it would be essentially defective as a Family Bible. You have stated that Bishop Hobart, to whose judgment the editors of the Family Bible may defer, so much lamented this great defect that he endeavoured to supply it in the American edition. I mention this as suggesting an improvement which the greatest admirers of the Family Bible would be grateful for, but without pledging myself that even such an addition would render the work all that I desiderate; for, without alluding to former matters of controversy, it would be dis

ingenuous to say that it was likely that any candid man, whatever might be his sentiments on some of the questions which divide the church, could feel satisfied with a compilation written in such a spirit of party, that amidst a hundred and fifty authors quoted, and some of them writers of little note, there is a systematic exclusion, a contemptuous silence, in regard to some of the most illustrious names in biblical annotation. Calvin, for instance, whom Hooker and other worthies of our church delighted to honour, and whose commentary,apart from all matters of system or disputation, would have furnished the compilers with invaluable materials for their work, is not even admitted in their list of authors cited; nay, the only two complete commentaries in the English language on the whole of Scripture, the inestimable and justly popular works of Scott and Henry-in which, much as the compilers of the Family Bible might dislike their notions of doctrine or piety, they would have discovered most interesting and edifying remarks and commentshave been scornfully passed by and stifled, while many tiny scintillations of names, never heard of out of their own favoured school, are protruded, to keep out of sight writers whose very voluminousness renders it impossible that they could have wholly escaped observation, even in the vast collections of Lambeth or the Bodleian. I however view this only as a monument of the temper of days that are gone by; for I cannot, I do not believe that, were such a compilation to be undertaken anew, the Society would allow this spirit of party to disgrace the pages of a Family Bible, and a work, notwithstanding its faults, of great value to every biblical student.

AN OLD MEmber*.

* I was glad to read what Mr. Raikes says of expositions and cottage lectures. You have already alluded to his remarks, but permit me to revive them in the minds of your readers by quoting one or two passages.

"But the pulpit, however great the

FORMS OF PRAYER AGAINST
PESTILENCE.

For the Christian Observer. THE last office which we noticed (see our Number for January) was that of 1604; the next that occurs is that for 1625, when the plague again visited our island and caused grievous consternation and mortality. The

value of the ministrations belonging to it, includes merely a part of the clergyman's duties. There are other employments of a kindred nature, hardly inferior to it in value, and essential to its usefulness. Among these, we must name exposition, or facility of expounding Scripture, and accompanying the explanation of the sense by application to the cases of men. In many places, this has been found a very valuable substitute for the pulpit ministrations of part of the day; and has supplied a more general and connected view of Scripture truth, than was easily given through the medium of sermons. In all places it should be regarded as an essential accomplishment to a clergyman; and whether practised in church under the name of an expository lecture; in the parish workhouse, as an address to those who from age and weakness cannot attend church; in the parlour or the cottage; it should be regarded as a special means, under God's blessing, of diffusing a general and an experimental knowledge of Divine truth. The difficulties which may be felt, or the evils which may be feared in the case of extempore preaching, have no existence here. The circumstance that it is Scripture which is before the eye, prevents the rambling, incoherent language which sometimes prevails in an unpremeditated address. The succession of doctrines obviates the danger of monotony; and those who have the least of natural fluency, may soon gain sufficient facility to explain with clearness, what they have well understood and previously digested." pp. 239, 240.

"Cottage lectures form another, and an important branch of parochial useful

ness.

In many of our larger parishes, a considerable number of people are almost precluded from the opportunity of attending the regular services of the church. Distance of home, badness of roads, bodily infirmity, or the care of children, offer impediments which no zeal can overcome, even where the church accommodation is abundant; and from these causes, many mothers of families, and many other persons from the circumstances alluded to, are cut off from all participation in these means of grace. The occasional visits with which the

exhortation on this occasion, and the form of fasting, were taken from the service of 1604, (as quoted in our last Number,) as were also the general structure of the service, and most of the prayers; but several long collects were added, which are not in our copy of the form of 1604, and which we therefore suppose were now first composed for the occasion, possibly by the Archbishop himself, Abbot, than whom few prelates were better qualified for such an office. We shall quote some of these; and they would be curious and interesting were it only as illustrations of our ecclesiastical history, which have hitherto been neglected and are not generally accessible. If any of our readers prefer modern writing to old

faithful pastor will endeavour to relieve these disabilities, must of necessity, if his charge is extensive, be rare, and in consequence unsatisfactory; and it is expedient, therefore, to collect, at stated places, and at certain times, all those scattered individuals who cannot be expected to attend at church. In most hamlets some cottage can be selected, which shall offer space for the few who may be assembled together; and the persons who cannot by any possible exertion reach the parish church, may be instructed to meet their minister, at the house he may choose to appoint, during the week. To this point. therefore, may come the mothers who are unable to leave their children; the old, the invalid, and the weak. A portion of Scripture may be read to them, and explained in a familiar manner; a few prayers, selected from the Liturgy, may be used; and by this simple means, the bond of parochial communion may be preserved, and a knowledge of Divine truth be kept alive in minds, that might otherwise have been languishing in solitude and ignorance. It is a plan which has now been tried in various situations, and with the most satisfactory results; nor is it easy to imagine, how the superintendence of a large parish can be carried on in any other manner. It is in small assemblies like these, where the instruction given assumes something of the domestic character, that catechising of this indirect sort may be attempted with the greatest ease. Young persons, above the age of those who attend schools, may be frequently collected here; to whom, and through whom, those questions may be addressed, which are intended to enlighten and inform the old. The simplicity of their answers may, in some cases, be more instructive than the language of the minister." pp. 248–251.