OF

PRIVATE DEVOTIONS:

IN THE

PRACTICE OF THE ANCIENT CHURCH,

CALLED THE

HOURS OF PRAYER:

AS THEY WERE

MUCH AFTER THIS MANNER PUBLISHED BY AUTHORITY

OF QUEEN ELIZABETH, 1560.

TAKEN OUT OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES, THE ANCIENT FATHERS, AND THE DIVINE SERVICE OF OUR OWN CHURCH,

ELEVENTH EDITIO N.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR J. G. & F. RIVINGTON,

ST. PAUL'S CHURCH YARD,

AND WATERLOO PLACE, PALL MALL.

1838.

59.

THE

APPROBATION.

FEB. 22, 1626.

I HAVE read over this book, which, for the increase of private Devotions, I think may well be printed; and therefore do give licence for the same.

GEO. LONDON.

NUSTIC

LLUMEA

BIBL

THE EDITOR'S PREFACE.

THE Author or Compiler of this Manual was Dr. John Cosin, the pious and learned Bishop of Durham, in the reign of King Charles II. He was born in the city of Norwich, on St. Andrew's day, 1595, of parents who seem to have trained him from his first infancy in those principles which characterized his life. He was educated at the grammar-school in his native city; and, at the age of fourteen was removed to Caius College, Cambridge, where he became fellow and tutor. His worth must have been early known, since, in the

year 1616, at the age of 21, he was simultaneously offered by Bishops Andrews and Overall, then respectively Bishops of Ely and Lichfield, the office of private librarian. He accepted the offer of the latter, and continued with him till his death in 1619.

He next came under the patronage of Neile, Bishop of Durham, at whose house he became acquainted with those excellent men who so nobly endeavoured to stem the torrent which was about to overwhelm the Church of England. It was from them that he learned the undeveloped depth of her system, in which lay her true security from Romanism on the one hand and Puritanism on the other; and which, perhaps, he has contributed, in his few short works, to illustrate as plainly as any one of her champions and confessors.

In the year 1634 he

was elected Master of Peter-house, Cambridge, and in 1640 was installed Dean of Peterborough; but had scarcely taken possession, when, through the violence of party spirit, he suffered that severe sentence by which, in 1641, he was stripped of all his ecclesiastical preferments, the first who fell a victim to a vote of the House of Commons. Being discovered to be actively employed in the interests of King Charles, he was soon after ejected from his mastership of Peter-house, by warrant dated March, 1643. Upon this he withdrew to France, where, by the King's order, he officiated as Chaplain to the Protestant members of the Queen's household. With these and other illustrious exiles, who were daily resorting to Paris, he formed a congregation, first in a private house,