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abundance of places, the green turf, for it was pasture land, as it were pared off, two or three inches thick, and wrapt round like sheets of lead. A little further it was not cleft or broken at all, but raised in ridges, five or six feet long, exactly resembling the graves in a churchyard. Of these there is a vast number.

"That part of the cliff from which the rest is torn, lies so high, and is now of so bright a colour that it is plainly visible to all the country round, even at the distance of several miles. We saw it distinctly, not only from the street in Thirsk, but for five or six miles after, as we rode towards York. So likewise in the great North road, between Sandhutton and Northallerton."WESLEY'S Thoughts on the Earthquake at Lisbon.

[Lengthy Prayers.]

"LET us now," says SOUTH, "consider the way of praying, so much used and applauded by such as have renounced the communion and liturgy of our church; and it is but reason that they should bring us something better in the room of what they have so disdainfully cast off. But, on the contrary, are not all their prayers exactly after the heathenish and pharisaical copy? always notable for those two things, length and tautology? Two whole hours for one prayer, at a fast, used to be reckoned but a moderate dose, and that, for the most part, fraught with such irreverent, blasphemous expressions, that, to repeat them, would profane the place I am speaking in; and indeed, they seldom carried on the work of such a day (as their phrase was), but they left the church in need of a new consecration. Add to this, the incoherence and confusion, the endless repetitions, and the unsufferable nonsense, that never failed to hold out, even with their utmost prolixity; so that in all their long fasts, from first to last, from seven in the morning to seven in the evening (which was their measure), the pulpit was always the emptiest thing in the

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church: and I never knew such a fast kept by them, but their hearers had cause to begin a thanksgiving as soon as they had done. And, the truth is, when I consider the matter of their prayers; so full of ramble and inconsequence, and in every respect so very like the language of a dream; and compare it with their carriage of themselves in prayer, with their eyes, for the most part shut, and their arms stretched out, in yawning posture; a man that should hear any of them pray, might, by a very pardonable error, be induced to think that he was all the time hearing one talking in his sleep: besides the strange virtue, which their prayers had to procure sleep in others too. So that he who should be present at all their long cant, would show a greater ability in watching, than ever they could pretend to in praying, if he could forbear sleeping, having so strong a provocation to it, and so fair an excuse for it. In a word, such were their prayers, both for matter and expression, that could any one truly and exactly write them out, it would be the shrewdest and most effectual way of writing against them that could possibly be thought of."-SOUTH's Sermons, vol. 2, p. 215.

[Geasa-Drasidecht, or, Sorceries of
the Druids.]

"I HAVE often inquired of your tenants, what they themselves thought of their pilgrimage to the wells of Kill-Aracht, Tobbar-Brighte, Tobbar-Muire, near Elphin Moor, near Castlereagh, where multitudes annually assembled to celebrate what they, in broken English, termed Patterns, (Patron's days) and when I pressed a very old man, Owen Hester, to state what possible advantages he expected to derive from the singular custom of frequenting in particular such wells as were contiguous to an old blasted oak, or an upright unhewn stone, and what the meaning was of the yet more singular custom of sticking rags on the branches of such trees, and spitting on

COLUMBANUS.

them; his answer, and the answer of the oldest men, was, that their ancestors always did it; that it was a preservative against Geasa - Drasidecht, i. e. the sorceries of Druids; that their cattle were preserved by it from infectious disorders; that the daoini maithe, i. e. the fairies, were kept in good humour by it; and so thoroughly persuaded were they of the sanctity of these Pagan practices, that they would travel bareheaded and barefooted from ten to twenty miles for the purpose of crawling on their knees round these wells and upright stones, and oak trees westward, as the sun travels, some three times, some six, some nine, and so on, in uneven numbers, until their voluntary penances were completely fulfilled. The waters of Logh-Con were deemed so sacred from ancient usage, that they would throw into the lake whole rolls of butter, as a preservative for the milk of their cows against Geasa-Drasidecht!

"The same customs existed amongst the Irish colonies of the Highlands and Western Islands; and even in some parts of the Lowlands of Scotland. 'I have often observed,' says Mr. Brand, 'shreds, or bits of rags, upon the bushes that overhang a wall in the road to Benton, near Newcastle, which is called the Rag-well. Mr. Pennant says, they visit the well of Spye in Scotland, for many distempers, and the well of Drachaldy, for as many offering small pieces of money and bits of rags."-COLUMBANUS ad Hibernos, p. 82, No. 3.

[Pope's Supremacy.]

"Ir is very well known that even when Henry VIII. renounced the pope's supremacy, our chiefs, believing that he meant only to renounce the pope's temporal supremacy, joined him in that renunciation! In their fourth general submission, which was made in the 33rd of Henry VIII. they unanimously acknowledged by indenture that he was their sovereign lord and king; confessing his supremacy in all causes, and utterly renouncing the pope's jurisdiction

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as to all manner of temporals both in church and state.' COLUMBANUS ad Hibernos, p. 36, No. 2.

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[Head of the Church.]

"YET it must, in common justice, be acknowledged that the title of Head of the Church, though odious to a Catholic, means no more in the acceptation of an Englishman, than Temporal Head of the Church, or Defender of the Faith. No Englishman ever yet for a moment supposed that the king could administer sacraments, ordain priests, give a mission for preaching or teaching, or be the source of spiritual as of temporal power. They give him no authority in church discipline, but such as is necessary for maintaining order in the state, supporting by the civil sword the laws of morality, defending the rights of the inferior as well as of the superior clergy, and excluding all foreign interference from the management of those temporal concerns which are necessarily connected with every species of human authority. This is the explanation which the English divines give of their own principles; and no one has a right to attribute to them principles which they utterly disavow. If they approached us as nearly in other points as in this, I should not despair of a gradual approximation, which would end in mutual charity; for it cannot be denied that the pope has no temporal power, and ought to have none, directly or indirectly, in any state but in his own."-COLUMBANUS ad Hibernos, p. 91,

No. 1.

[Jesuitesses.]

FULLER, writing about the year 1650, says the Jesuitesses "began at Liege about

1 Council Book of Ireland, 32, 33, and 34 of Henry VIII. "This was not only done by the mere Irish," says Sir J. Davis, "but the chiefs of the degenerate English families did perform the same; as Desmond, Barry, and Roche, in Mounster, and the Bourkes in Connaght."

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thirty years since, Mistris Mary Ward and Mrs. Twitty being the first beginners of them. They are not confined, as other nuns to a cloister, but have liberty to go abroad where they please, to convert people to the Catholick faith. They wear a huke (?)1 like other women, and differ but little in their habit from common persons. The aforesaid two virgins, or rather viragins, travelled to Rome with three of the most beautiful2 of their society, endeavouring to procure from his Holiness an establishment of their Order; but no confirmation, only a toleration would be granted thereof. Since I have read that, Anno 1629, Mrs. Mary Ward went to Vienna, where she prevailed so far with the empress, that she procured a monastery to be erected for those of her Order, as formerly they had two houses at Liege. Since I have heard nothing of them, which rendereth it suspicious that their Order is suppressed, because otherwise such turbulent spirits would be known by their own violence, it being all one with a storm not to be, and not to bluster: for although this may seem the speediest way to make their Order to propagate when Jesuita shall become hic et hæc, of the common gender, yet conscientious Catholics conceive these Lady-Errants so much to deviate from feminine (not to say virgin) modesty, (what is but going in men being accounted gadding in maids) that they zealously decried their practice, probably to the present blasting thereof."History of Abbeys, p. 364.

Urban VIII. suppressed them by a Brief dated 21 May, 1631. Helyot, who has not thought it worth while to name the founder of this curious society, says that under his pontificate, or towards the end of his pre

1 Southey has put a note of interrogation as above, but, no doubt, the word is right. Nares explains it "A kind of mantle or cloke worn in Spain and the Low Countries." See Glossary

in v. for authorities.-J. W. W.

2 In the margin Mrs. Vaux Fortescue is named

as one.

decessor's, certain women, or maidens, in some parts of Italy and in other provinces, took upon themselves the appellation of Jesuitesses, and assembled in community under pretext of leading a religious life, though they had not the permission of the holy see. They had colleges and houses of probation, and wore, according to this author, a peculiar habit; but it is evident that, like the Jesuits, they must have been allowed to lay it aside whenever it would have exposed them to inconvenience, or interfered with their object, which was that of making converts. Their superior was called the Prepostress, and they had Visitoresses, Rectresses, and other dignitaries, all in the feminine gender. They went about, says Helyot, whither they would, under pretext of procuring the safety of souls, and doing many other things which were neither suitable to the weakness of their sex nor of their understanding; the pope first desired them to desist by his nuncio in Low Germany, and by the bishops of the various places where they had established themselves, but they paid no regard to these admonitions. At length they began to teach things contrary to sound doctrine, and then the brief for their suppression was issued.

Delacroix, in his Dictionnaire Historique des Cultes Religieux, says that the two English young women who founded this society (and whom he calls Warda and Tuittia) were instigated by the Jesuits in Flanders. "Le but de ces Jesuites etoit de former une colonie de filles qu'ils enverroient comme autant de Missionnaires travailler à la conversion des Anglois, et dont ils esperoient d'autant plus de fruit, que de pareils predicateurs seroient moins suspects, et s'insinueroient plus aisement dans les esprits." I know not on what authority this is asserted, but it is very improbable that the Jesuits should have been concerned, because Loyundertake the superintendance of those ola himself having once been persuaded to women who wished to form a community of Jesuitesses, found it so impossible to

SOZOMEN - WALTON - WILSON.

manage them, that he besought the pope to exempt the company from taking charge of the sex.

[Wisdom of leaving Sectaries alone.] "THEMISTIUS, the philosopher, wrote a book to persuade the Emperor Valens that he should let the different sectaries alone: he remarked to him that there were even more speculative disputes among the heathens; and he might have remarked that these disputes never produced any mischief, because they were never intermeddled with by the rulers."-Sozomen, l. 6, c. 36.

[Bishop Sanderson, &c.-Extempore
Sermons.]

"ABOUT this time his dear and most intimate friend, the learned Dr. Hammond, came to enjoy a quiet conversation and rest with him for some days at Boothby Pannel, and did so, and having formerly persuaded him to trust his excellent memory, and not read, but try to speak a sermon as he had writ it; Dr. Sanderson became so complient as to promise he would. And to that end they two went early the Sunday following to a neighbour minister, and requested to exchange a sermon; and they did so. And at Dr. Sanderson's going into the pulpit, he gave his sermon (which was a very short one) into the hand of Dr. Hammond, intending to preach it as it was writ; but before he had preached a third part, Dr. Hammond (looking on his sermon as written) observed him to be out, and so lost as to the matter, especially the method, that he also became afraid for him: for it was discernable to many of that plain auditory. But when he had ended this short sermon, as they two walked homeward, Dr. Sanderson said with much earnestness, 'Good doctor, give me my sermon, and know, that neither you, nor any man living, shall ever persuade me to preach again without my books.' To which the

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| reply was, 'Good doctor, be not angry; for if ever I persuade you to preach again without book, I will give you leave to burn all the books that I am master of."—IZAAK WALTON'S Life.

[Characteristic Anecdote of the Non-conforming Ministers.]

THE following anecdote which is related of Mr. Doolittle, is strongly characteristic of the non-conforming ministers of that age. Being engaged in the usual service on a certain occasion, when he had finished his prayer, he looked around on the congregation and observed a young man just shut into one of the pews, who discovered much uneasiness in that situation, and seemed to wish to go out again. Mr. Doolittle feeling a peculiar desire to detain him, hit upon the following expedient. Turning to one of the members of his church who sat in the gallery, he asked him this question aloud, "Brother, do you repent of your coming to Christ ?" "No, Sir, (he replied) I never was happy till then, I only repent that I did not come to him sooner." Mr. Doolittle then turned towards the opposite gallery, and addressed himself to an aged member in the same manner. "Brother, do you repent that you came to Christ?" "No, Sir, (he replied) I have known the Lord from my youth up." He then looked down upon the young man, whose attention was fully engaged, and, fixing his eyes upon him, said, "Young man, are you willing to come to Christ?" This unexpected address from the pulpit, exciting the observation of the people, so affected him, that he sat down and hid his face. The person who sat next to him encouraged him to rise and answer the question. Mr. Doolittle repeated it, "Young man, are you willing to come to Christ ?" With a tremulous voice he answered, "Yes, Sir," "But when ?" added the minister in a loud and solemn tone. He mildly answered, "Now, Sir."

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"Then stay, (said he) and hear the word of the Lord which you will find in 2 Cor. v. 2. “Behold now is the accepted time, behold now is the day of salvation." By this sermon God touched the heart of this young man. He came into the vestry after service dissolved in tears. That unwillingness to stay, which he had discovered was occasioned by the strict injunction of his father, who threatened if ever he went to hear the fanatics, he would turn him out of doors. Having now heard, and unable to conceal the feelings of his mind, he was afraid to meet his father. Mr. Doolittle sat down and wrote an affectionate letter to him, which had so good an effect, that both father and mother came to hear for themselves. The Lord graciously met with them both; and father, mother and son were received with universal joy, into that church.-WILSON's History and Antiquities of Dissenting Churches.

The Dying Speech of Andreas Zekerman, who with three others was executed at Dublin a few years ago for the murder of Captain Glass.

I

"I was born at Lubeck in Holland. got very little education, neither was I taught prayer, or anything relating to it, though my father and mother were of the Calvinist persuasion, and taught me to believe in predestination, which may be one great cause of my ruin. I was guided by avarice: I would have money to spend, and was far from making a scruple of any unlawful means to come at it; and readily, along with my three fellow-sufferers, embraced the seeming favourable opportunity of committing murder and piracy to enrich myself. But we were all disappointed. It is an usual saying with tender Christians that man proposes but God disposes: it may be so for aught I know: such sort of lessons I have not much studied. I believe there is a powerful Being, viz. God; that vice is not agreeable to Him, yet if a man

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be vicious it is not his fault, for he cannot help it; and if a man be virtuous, no thanks to him for it, for he could not be otherwise; for whatsoever course of life a man follows, or whatever he suffers, was and is unavoidable. Fate decreed it. I will not importune myself, for if I am predestinated to be happy hereafter I shall be so : if miserable, it will be so. I cannot change my destiny.-ANDREAS ZEKERMAN, in the 24th year of my age."

[Unhallowed Discussion.]

"THE Thomists maintain the transmutation of the elements; the Scotists the annihilation: and they proceed to abstract so long, till they could not only separate the matter and form and accidents of the bread from one another, but the paneity or breadishness itself from them all."-BISHOP PARKER'S Reasons for abrogating the Test, p.

22.

[Local Preachers amongst the Methodists.]

A LOCAL preacher among us, in general, is selected from his class by the leader, first called on to pray in our prayer-meetings; then, as his abilities and his graces improve, he is raised to be the leader of a class, and then, from exhorting his little flock he is called on to exhort at some watch-night, or when there is a deficiency of preachers. The gradation from these steps to the office of a local preacher is natural and easy; and in all the way he does not meet with such dangers and seductions as are often thrown in the way of the young man whose course lies through academies and colleges. It has often been my fate to witness young men enter those seminaries with solid piety, modest manners, and an humble deportment, who on coming from them, evinced that they had exchanged piety, modesty, and humility, for a little Latin, Greek, or Hebrew, captious criticism, assuming airs, and dogmatical positivity; amidst which

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