The custom of devoting the evening of the Sunday to the purposes of domestic instruction needs no panegyric. Such a practice, where it can be well conducted, and is made to include reading, catechising, explanation, exhortation, and prayer, will usually be found far preferable to frequenting a third or evening service at church. It is not denied that such services are often highly useful, and deserve for a variety of reasons to be widely adopted; but they cannot supply the place of the familiar and affectionate instructions of a religious

be distinct, and to be introduced with the Litany." And speaking of the last alteration of the Rubric, respecting sending in the names of the communicants to the minister (would that this custom were still kept up!), he thus remarks: "The design of this alteration was not that both offices should be united into one, but that the Curate might have a more competent time to inquire of, and consult with, those that offered themselves to communicate. The offices are still as distinct

as ever, and ought still to be read at different times; a custom which Bishop Overall says was observed, in his time, in York and Chichester: and the same practice, Mr. Johnson tells us, prevailed at Canterbury long since the Restoration, as it did very lately, if it does not still, at the cathedral of Worcester. It is certain that the Communion Office still every where retains the name of the second service; and Bishop Overall, just now mentioned, imputes it to the negligence of ministers and the carelessness of the people that they are ever huddled together into one office."-Wheatley, 1810, p. 259.

This account is doubtless very true; but to alter th custom is now too late, except by lega lauthority.

master or parent. We shall only remark further on this head, that our late revered Sovereign is stated, while in health, to have regularly assembled his household on the Sunday evening, in order to read to them a sermon from some one of our standard divines ;-an example deserving of general imitation, and which, it is hoped, may not have been destitute of good effect among the higher classes of his subjects.

3. The third mode mentioned, by which the arrangements of every family may be made subservient to the interests of religion and the church, was by a suitable attention to the spiritual improvement of servants. This may, however, be considered as already anticipated; for where the plans just enumerated are zealously adopted, where family prayer and the reading of the Scriptures are devoutly observed throughout the week, and an attendance on public worship is permitted and enjoined on the Sunday, there is just reason to hope that no member of the family can long remain quite ignorant of the chief principles and duties of religion. Still, when we consider how large and important a class of the community is comprehended under the term of servants, and how great is the responsibility of the head of every Christian family in relation to them, it must be earnestly wished that every other suitable means

were habitually in operation for their religious improvement. Scarcely any class of persons, perhaps, is less favourably disposed towards religion than the generality of domestics in large families; and may not the cause of this serious evil be traced, in a considerable measure, if not to the grossly unchristian example, at least to the religious supineness of their employers? on whom, however, as if by a retributive retaliation, the evil re-acts in various ways, and, amongst others, by means of the bad principles and practices which their own children are too apt to imbibe from servants, even where their intercourse with them is the most limited.

It is readily allowed, that the modern usages of society do not in every case very well admit of a master or mistress carrying into literal practice all the injunctions of the Ferrers and Herberts of former days, with regard to their dependents; but, without at all intrenching on the just gradations of station, much may be done by frequent occasional advice or admonition; much by encouraging Christian principles, especially where they do not seem directly to bear upon the master's own interest; much by the various means already suggested; and most of all, perhaps, by a truly devout example, and an habitual exhibition of the graces and virtues of the Christian character on the part of the

master himself; thus demonstrating to his family, by the strongest of all arguments, that he values religion not merely as an engine of policy and good government, but on account of its intrinsic importance and universal necessity for the sanctification and salvation of the human soul *.

4. The last way alluded to, in which the laity may render their domestic arrangements conducive to the increase of devotion and church principles, was the religious education of

In the present reading age, it might be a beneficial practice to form in every family a small select servants' library, consisting, besides the Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, and the Homilies, of a few unexceptionable books and tracts, either directly moral and religious, or combining amusement and instruction. Much reading certainly is not necessary for persons in that sphere of life, and might, on many accounts, prove a snare to them; but while profane, seditious, and obscene publications are constantly obtruded upon them in fearful numbers, and with every possible allurement to suit their taste, it is certainly the duty of every master and mistress of a family to provide them with the best antidote in their power to the contagion.

While on this subject it may be well to add the duty of suitable arrangements being made in every family, to accommodate those "devoutly-disposed" servants who are anxious to receive the holy sacrament; at least, as far as practicable, on the great festivals. Many families, who do not debar their domestics from attending the other public services of the church, make no provision whatever for this; as if it were no loss or injury to a religious and conscientious servant to be deprived of this "most comfortable sacrament of the body and blood of Christ."

their children. And here, while it would be unjust and ungrateful not to acknowledge that considerable improvement has been visible in many quarters during the last few years, it must not be concealed that much, very much, remains to be accomplished; for the religious education of the children of the higher and middle ranks of society -not only has not reached the abstract standard of perfection-but has not even kept pace, or any thing like it, with the improvements in the education of the poorer classes. Not a few of our nobility and gentry are beginning to complain that they are themselves unable to conduct the examination of a common national school, and that their own children, at the public seminaries of the land, are not so well informed on scriptural topics as many of those of their poorest tenants and labourers. There must, therefore, be some fundamental defect in the education of the sons of our higher and middle classes; and the plain truth is, that in too many cases they receive scarcely any religious instruction beyond the first few years of their childhood. British mothers, it is true, have long been celebrated for displaying a warm maternal interest, and often a strong sense of duty, in educating their infant offspring; and to them we are usually indebted for the first accents of prayer and praise which