The Canonical Hours. According to the Use of The Guild of S. Alban. DOMINE EXAUDI. London: J. Masters, Aldersgate Street. J. T. Hayes, Lyall Place, Eaton Square. Hull: C. Peck, Lowgate. Birmingham: B. H. Leather, New Street. mdccclvi. PREFACE. HE OFFICES FOR THE SEVEN CANONICAL HOURS according THE to the use of the Guild of Saint Alban, consist of the Matins and Evensong of the Church of England, with Prime, Terce, Sext, None, and Compline, arranged after the plan of the ancient services for those Hours. Great changes having been made when the Matin and Vesper Offices of the old monastic bodies were converted into Morning and Evening Prayer, and adapted to general use, alterations in the other Hours have become indispensable. It has been our earnest endeavour to make these alterations in a manner agreeable to the principles which guided the reform of our Churcha reform which was indeed only a return to older precedents,and yet to retain the spirit and character of those Offices, used throughout the middle ages, whence the Matins and Evensong of the Church of England were themselves compiled. Thus the Reformers having chosen, in Matins and Evensong, to say the whole Psalter, and to read the whole Bible, regularly through (in the former of which they merely returned to the first principle of all Breviaries), rather than to preserve the very generally commemorative character of those Offices, we have ventured to transfer that character to the Prime, which was always made of more importance than the Day Hours of Terce, Sext, and None. For the rest, we have chiefly followed the Cistercian use, as being the most ancient and the most easily reconciled with the English Church Services. It is the duty of every member of the Guild to use these Offices, but only so often, and in such manner as not to interfere with the other duties of life, and the necessities of his daily avocations. |