elaboration (till Tillotson introduced a simpler style), of facetiousness (South's sermons kept his congregation in constant mirth), and of the difficulties of extemporary preaching, which Burnet and others began to encourage, the popularity of sermons increased rather than diminished between the days of Charles I. and those of Anne. The most remarkable example of this taste is the fact that after his death two thousand five hundred guineas were given for the copyright of the two volumes of Tillotson's discourses, which now would not arouse interest in the most impressionable or the most pious of men.

The substitution of unwritten for written sermons appears to have been due to influences external to the English Church-to the examples of Puritans and Papists. A story of Charles II. and Stillingfleet illustrates the change that was taking place. It is said of the latter that

'while chaplain to King Charles, his Majesty asked him "How it came about that he always read his sermons before him, when he was informed he always preached without books elsewhere?" He told the King that "the awe of so noble an audience, where he saw nothing that was not greatly superior to him; but chiefly, the seeing before him so great and wise a prince made him afraid to trust himself. . . ." "But pray," says Stillingfleet," will your Majesty give me leave to ask you a question too? Why you read your speeches when you can have none of the same reasons? "Why truly, doctor,"

says the King, "your question is a very pertinent one, and so will be my answer. I have asked them so often and for so much money,

that I am ashamed to look them in the face.""

The change made way very gradually; the number of published sermons so late as 1714 shows that it had not even then conquered. With the progress of the change there began to disappear, though gradually, those extraordinary substitutes for the Catholic requiem, the funeral sermons, from which so much of our knowledge of the religious life of the seventeenth century is derived. No endowments were more common at this period than for a yearly sermon on the obit of some often quite undistinguished person; and no person of any eminence for position or piety was suffered to be buried without a eulogy, which was then published as

a memorial of departed greatness or virtue. A notable sermon of one of the most famous preachers of the day, Dr. Anthony Horneck of the Savoy, on Mrs. Dorothy St. John, fourth daughter of Oliver St. John, preached at St. Martin'sin-the-Fields in 1677, remarks that the office of the preachers 'is to convert souls, not to paint them'; but it may well have been thought that the record of genuine piety was a valuable instrument of conversion. It was, indeed, fit and proper that the world should learn of the beauty of a young damsel's life of whom it might be said that 'the fruits of the Spirit, which are not seen in others before fifty, appeared in her at eighteen, and the joys of the Holy Ghost, which are not counted modish till fourscore, became familiar to her as soon as her reason began to exert itself in action.' No less fit was it that the history of a remarkable conversion like that of the debauched John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, should be told by those in whose hands God had placed his conversion, 'to awaken those who run on to all the excesses of riot.' Sermons, indeed, at funerals, as well as the pertinent epitaphs which preached from every church wall, were in the seventeenth century distinct missionary instruments, which the clergy employed in addition to the ordinary weapons of the spiritual warfare.

It may be noticed in this place that the custom during this period was to wear the black gown in the pulpit, though the use of the surplice had been restored in all the other ministrations of the church. Strype wrote in 1696:

'Yesterday I saw in Low Leighton church that which, to my remembrance, I never did see in a church in England but once, and that is a minister preach in a surplice. For Mr. Harrison, whereas other ministers on Feast days do not so much as wear any surplice, he, by way of supererogation, preached in his. The sight did stir up in me more of pity than anger to see the folly of the man; but if he preach in a fool's coat we will go and hear him.'

The importance of sermons did not diminish the attention paid to the other agencies by which the religious life was fostered. The Sacraments, fasting, books of devotion, Church music, all bore their part, and they were supplemented

by the creation of vigorous Societies for the cultivation of the devout life.

Soon after the Restoration a serious attempt was made by several of the bishops to secure, in parish as well as in cathedral churches, a more frequent celebration of the Holy Communion. The number of communicants had clearly diminished since 1640. Frequency of communion had been discouraged by the action of the Puritans when in power. An 'Ordinance of the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament, together with the rules and directions concerning suspension from the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper' (1645), required assent to statements of doctrine highly disputable, if not explicitly heretical, and examination by elders in a form which the letters of Lady Verney show to have been regarded with disgust and suspicion. The result was natural; sensitive people would not undergo the ordeal; and the custom of frequent communion was never successfully revived. The first and most obvious consequence of this had been the rare administration of the Holy Sacrament. This reformers now set themselves to remedy. The bishops before the War had, it would appear, combined to desire that the blessed sacrament of Holy Communion be administered in the church every month upon the first Sunday, or at least thrice in the year, whereof Easter to be one.' Sancroft's injunctions of 1688 inquire whether this rule is carried out. Patrick, when Dean of Peterborough, noted the archbishop's order that there should be a weekly Communion. Dean Grenville, of Durham, devoted himself persistently for many years to securing the observance of this rule. In 1683 he recorded a conversation with Fell, Bishop of Oxford, who agreed with his wish, but advised 'the stirring up of some devout people, ladies or gentlemen, to desire the same from the Dean and Chapter, as the best expedient to effect that good work, saying that the Dean and Prebends could not justify the denial thereof; and besides, it was a very plausible way for them to steal into their duty without exposing themselves for their past omissions and neglects.' He noted at the same

1 Brian Duppa's Articles of Enquiry, Chichester, 1638.

time that Dr. Bury, rector of Exeter College, Oxford, was 'exceedingly positive that it ought to be a constant concomitant of all Feasts as well as the Sunday,' &c., and argued, in writing to Sir William Dugdale, whom he called 'so eminent a champion for our Common Prayer Book,' that 'the rubric (if it be strictly examined) doth at this very day suppose daily' communions. He restored weekly communion at Durham; at Ely, Christ Church, and Worcester, it had always been retained; it was re-introduced at Canterbury, at York, at St. Paul's when it was rebuilt, at Gloucester, and apparently at Rochester. It was part of a general revival of interest in Church observances and rubrics. Thus in the Royal Chapels, when the Court was in London, the Holy Communion was celebrated twice on Sundays, at 8 and 12. The usual hour in the London churches was 7 or 8, but at St. Lawrence Jewry, where the Vicar was a great-nephew of Nicholas Ferrar, the celebration of Holy Communion was at 6. At St. Dunstan's-in-the-West there was a celebration daily during the octaves of Christmas, Easter and Whitsuntide. At Easter 1685 Bishop Crewe issued an Injunction to the Dean and Chapter of Durham, and in the October of that year Dr. Grenville wrote to Sancroft, who had formerly been a prebendary of the same cathedral church: 'Among many other excellent things, my Lord of Durham hath strictly enjoined us to continue the weekly Communion with jubilation (fallen into disuse since the death of Bishop Cosin), and to restore sermons on Wednesdays and Fridays in Lent and Advent.' The bidding of prayer before sermon and the weekly Communion have continued in Durham Cathedral ever since, and the celebration has been 'with jubilation,' that is, chorally; but, till of late years, this has only been given once a month.

Little, if any, change was made in ceremonial. The altar was hung with rich cloths or carpets, of the gifts of which there are many records. It appears from the usage of Sancroft that altar plate was solemnly consecrated to its sacred use. Copes were worn in many of the cathedral churches. Incense was burnt on solemn occasions ('before the office began,' Evelyn records, on Easter Day, 1684, in Whitehall

Chapel), and censers, judging again by the example of Archbishop Sancroft, appear to have been consecrated; but there seems to be some doubt about the matter, and it is probable that only one of the cathedral churches (Ely) kept up the use of incense during divine service, while in parish churches it was employed from time to time in a hardly recognised confusion between the purposes of fumigation and ceremonial.

Almost universally, the Laudian rule as to the position of the altar was accepted at the Restoration. Still, however, in many places the minister came down to give the Sacrament to the people as they knelt in their pews; and the pious Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, on one occasion speaks as though the holy table was at times moved :

'When the minister was going to consecrate the bread and wine, the Communion-table being a good way from before my pew, he of a sudden drew it till he brought it just before my pew; as he was doing so God was pleased to put this thought into my mind, which much affected me, that as the minister drew the table nearer, so God the Father drew near now to me with an offer of my dear Saviour to take away all my sins.'

Frampton's Life records as a scandal the case of a parish priest whose manner was after consecration to carry the holy elements into the reading-desk, and then return and in a most uncanonical manner distribute them to his parishioners.' Nelson tells of Bull, that' whenever he officiated at the altar it was exactly agreeable to the rubric, and with the gravity and seriousness of a primitive priest,' and that his custom was to offer the elements 'upon the holy table, in the first place, in conformity to the practice of the ancient Church, before he began the Communion Service; and this the rubric after the offertory seemeth to require of all her priests.' The revision, in 1662, of the rubric at the end of the Communion Service clearly points to consideration of two questions that of desecration by irreverent clergy-a practice which the writings of Cosin and Thorndike show to have formed a convenient weapon for Roman Catholic controversialists; and that of reservation. With regard to the latter there would seem to be no record; but Thorndike's criticism of the Roman practice of reserving in one kind only