ing the objections which are popularly made (1) to t Physical evil; (2) to the existence of Moral evil; and proportion between the Crimes and the punishments of work seems to us fairly successful; but it is a drawback t writers quoted who are of mere local celebrity.

W. P. SNOW, the author of The Death of Christ, readers will be interested to know, is none other than "the Patagonian Missionary Society." We are glad to fi midst of his anxieties he is able to turn his mind to reli The present little Tract is just a narrative of the Passion to have been seen in a Vision.

A Brief History of Church Rates (Masters) is intended circulation," and therefore does not pretend to any very g But it seems carefully done and cannot fail to be useful.

A Few Devotional Helps for Easter-tide (Masters) is companion volume to the one which we noticed favourably ning of Lent. Devotions for the other seasons are also to

Had we been in the congregation to whom the Rev. T LINS' Sermon was delivered at Clifton Campville, we sho have derived as much pleasure as any present, but the me dation of a passage in the Evangelic History seems rather basis on which to build a published Sermon on The Exte ligion. (Masters.)

The Pathway of Faith; or, a Manual of Instructions a (Masters.) A feeling has been for some time growing among that the manuals in common use with us are neither so acc devotional as they ought to be. Exceptions of course there "The Manual" of Mr. Heygate, and "the Pious Church lished in Scotland. But the former of these is unnecessar too exclusively intended for the poor: while the other is far complete. On both certainly the work before us is a gre and improvement; and without saying that it is likely to book of the Church (in fact we are not yet prepared for ad thing as a Church) it will be welcomed with great thankful great body of Catholic Churchmen. The Table of Contents subjoin, will show how comprehensive the scope of the bo structions in Christian Faith and Practice-Morning anPrayers-Instructions and Preparation for the Holy Euchar of the Holy Communion, with Instructions and Prayers, pages-Meditations and Prayers before and after Holy Com Confirmation-Penitence-Marriage-Visitation of the Sick

193

WE are somewhat surprised to find that among the many clergymen who approve in general of the ritualistic developements which have taken place during the last few years, there are not a few who tenaciously cling to the old Puritan tradition of celebrating the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar entirely, or almost entirely, at the north end of the Holy Table. There is indeed considerable variety of usage among this class of ritualists, but all agree in one point, and that is, to keep their faces any way but towards the east during the greater portion of the service, and to move either not at all, or as little as possible from the beloved north end. A year or two ago, (omitting minor differences, such as turning or not turning toward the east at the Nicene Creed and Gloria in Excelsis) we should have subdivided this class into two, those who said the whole service at the north end of the altar, and those who said the whole of it there except the "Prayer of Consecration." But since the publication of Professor Blunt's lectures on the Duties of the Parish Priest, we find it necessary to make a third subdivision, consisting of those who refuse to speak anything whatever except from the north end of the altar, but who venture to the west side for the purpose of getting the elements ready for consecration.

Our own view of the case is, that the celebrant should stand at the front (or west side) of the Altar during the whole of the service, and that, except when he is exhorting, absolving, blessing, or reading Holy Scripture to, the people, he should uniformly stand or kneel with his face towards the Altar: and, as is well known, this is the practice adopted in many churches.

By this of course we do not mean that he is to go at once to the middle of the Altar. This was never a part of the English Ritual. All the first part of the service, according to the Sarum use, was to be said ad dextrum cornu Altaris, up to the Gloria in excelsis, which stood formerly before the Creed.

And the argument really lies in a very small compass. In the old times of the English Church a Priest was never known to stand in any other way than before the Altar. The phrase used to express this position was accedat ad altare, which translated into English is simply go and stand At the Altar. And this point being determined, as it is beyond the possibility of doubt, all that the rubrics had further to settle, were first, in which part of the front of the altar he is to take up his position, and secondly, which way he is to face. In both, there cannot be a question, the old usages were continued. It is true that the rubrics are incomplete; but all the directions will be found consistent with ancient practice.

1 Page 334.

not, in their silence, hesitate to throw ourselves up tom and interpret the Church's written by her un neither ought we in any other question that seems

And as the Priest, as matter of course, would star or other of the west-side of the Altar, so with equal he, except when otherwise ordered, turn his face matter of fact, he is only ordered in the English L to the people in two places, viz. in reading the C and in pronouncing the Absolution. In turning while reading the Epistle and Gospel, the Offertory is sometimes wrongly done) and the Exhortations, the Benediction he is only following Tradition-th tion, which, till it was unhappily in recent times lo also directed him always to remain before the Altar. And here we may just refer to two other rubr upon the question.

The one is the direction after the Sursum Corda the Altar,"-i.e. ad Altare, and which of course agree all that has been before said.

The other is the phrase in the rubric before the "standing before the Altar," of which it is custom phasize the three last words as to imply that the Prie this not been before the Altar at all. The emphat ever, is really "standing." In the Prayer of "Hu he had been directed to kneel; and now he is to st dextrum cornu but in medio, "before," i.e. in the Altar.

This we conceive is the true and simple way of question of the Priest's Position. But the Altar its has been shifted about in the Post-Reformation Churd therefore must also be taken into consideration as Position of the Priest. And the history can scarcely few words.

In the first English Prayer Book of 1549, two pos Priest were enjoined, the first being that which he was during those portions of the service in which he was GOD, "The Priest standing humbly afore the midst of and the second, when he was speaking to the people, the Priest turn him to the people." From this it w that the ancient position was adopted in the new service

In the Second Prayer Book of Edward VI. this ru tered to the form in which we now have it, the " being now mentioned for the first time. At the sam rubric was worded so as to allow of the Holy Table be "in the body of the Church or in the Chancel ;" and the general practice to set the Table (in either place) wi

east and west, or "tablewise" as it was called, instead of north and south, or "altarwise" as had been, and is now the universal custom. Ridiculing these changes, a Romanist writer of 1556 says, "How long were they learning to set their Table to minister the said Communion upon? First they placed it aloft, where the high Altar stood. Then must it be set from the wall, that one might go between the ministers being in contention on whether part to turn their faces, either towards the west, the north or south, Some would stand southward, some northward, and some westward."1 Another, Thomas Dorman, of somewhat later date, wrote to the same effect; "The weathercock in the steeple was noted not to have turned so often in a quarter of a year as your minister in the Church in less than a month." Now in these changes of position, it is quite clear that the priest and the altar moved together. The priest at first stood on the westernmost of the two long sides, and when this became the north-side by the movement of the Table to a right angle with its ancient position, the priest still stood at the same place with reference to the Table, -though not with reference to the people, since he now stood, not with his back, but with his right hand towards them.

At the same time that the term north-side was first introduced, the Ten Commandments were also ordered to be read, nothing being said as to the priest's position while reading them, because he was already supposed to be in such a position as to be easily heard; the table being table-wise, and he at the north-side. It is significant that the words "turning to the people" were inserted at the last revision in 1662, as if rendered necessary by a general recurrence to the ancient posture during the other parts of the service; the Table, meanwhile, having also returned to its ancient situation.

During the reigns of Elizabeth and her two successors the ru bric at the beginning of the Communion Service respecting the position of the Table and the priest stood just as it now does, having been enforced in the time of the first named sovereign by a special Injunction. There appears, however, to have been a party in the Church which resisted the literal application of this rubric, wishing to retain the Holy Table altarwise as formerly, and the priest also in his ancient position. The subject recurs frequently in publications of the day; and in the well-known Grantham Altar case was so fiercely taken up as in the opinion of some -Clarendon among the number,-to have had an important part in producing the political troubles that followed. In this case, the Vicar of Grantham had endeavoured to restore the Communion Table to its ancient position, against the east wall of the chancel, and was resisted by the Puritan churchmen of the town. Both parties appealed to Williams, then Bishop of Lincoln, who decided

1 The Displaying of Protestants, by Miles Huggard. 1556.

that the Vicar was wrong, and that the Table was to be placed as the Puritans wished-" table-wise." Some years afterwards, the Bishop's decision was severely called in question by writers on the other side, and he wrote an anonymous1 pamphlet in reply, entitled "The Holy Table, Name and Thing," &c. &c., in which he goes into the question at great length for the purpose of justifying his decision.

Some of his opponents had endeavoured to compromise matters by adopting the very usage against which we are now writing, and justified themselves by saying that the end was in fact one of the sides of the Table, and therefore the "north-side" was really used by those who replaced the Table altar-wise and stood at its northend. In answer to this, Williams cites (with much more to the same purpose) the Injunctions of Elizabeth (1561) and says, "The minister appointed to read the Communion, which you (out of the books of fast in 1mo of the King) are pleased to call second service, is directed to read the Commandments not at the end, but at the north-side of the Table, which implies the end to be placed towards the east great window." He adds also, "And so, in King Edward's Liturgies the minister's standing in the midst of the altar, 1549, is turned to his standing at the north-side of the Table, 1552." His opponent had, unfortunately for himself, argued that he was "at the Table" when he was at the end of it, for the end was a 66 part" of it; he had also proved by mathematical argument that as every rectangular superficies must have four sides, therefore the Communion Table has four, and that the north-end was one of them. Bishop Williams has some caustic satire (running through five or six pages,) on mathematical weaknesses, in which he discusses the point; and he sums up by saying that whatever mathematicians might allege, common-sense people would always call the longer boundaries of an oblong table "sides the shorter "ends" in spite of them; and "when," he adds, "you officiate at the end of the Table, you may officiate at a part but you cannot officiate at that part of the Table to which by the rubric confirmed by Act of Parliament you are literally directed and appointed."3

and

The whole of his argument against a Communion Table placed altar-wise is summed up in several propositions, of which we shall bring two into court as evidence:

"1. You may not erect an Altar, where the Canons admit only a Communion Table.

"2. This Table (without some new Canon) is not to stand Altar

1 It is an apt illustration of the dishonest spirit of Puritanism that though Williams published this pamphlet anonymously, and carefully disguised the authorship throughout its pages, he "allowed and approved " of its publication as Ordinary in very laudatory terms, declaring it to be written by "some Minister of this Diocese."

2 Holy Table, Name and Thing, p. 15.

3 Ibid. p. 57.