bled heart, and composed in a pious spirit, it is suited, as far as human infirmity can effect it, to the acceptance of that great and holy Being to whom it is to be offered. I have said that it is suited to the extent and to the wants of that community by which it is to be offered up. The doors of the Temple of the Lord are thrown open, and every person-high and low-rich and poor-learned and unlearned-young and old, is invited to join in making general supplication to him, who is the author and giver of all good things; and in paying homage to that adorable nature in which all perfections of the Divinity dwell. If we ask how can it happen that the Church Service should be fit alike for all these various classes and grades of society, the answer is plain: it is because it applies to them all in that character in which they all agree, and solicits that of which they all stand in need; it is because it is the service of a sinner acknowledging his treating pardon and peace. earthly rank of the offender, but as a sinner: and to the mercy of his Heavenly Father, to the blood of his blessed Redeemer, and to the sanctifying graces of his Holy Spirit, to these alone can the sinner, of whatever class, appeal for spiritual comfort, for acceptance, for everlasting life. Distinctions there may be at the outside of the offences and enWhatever be the here he appears necessary? A Scripture is laid before him, which tells him that "in the sight of God no man living is justified." The beloved Disciple of the Lord may apprise him of the delusions of his vanity and the falsehood of his assertions. "If we say," says St. John, “that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us." Does Does any suppose that the day of repentance may be safely deferred to some distant season and content himself with the impassioned vehemence and the external forms and shews of grief? The command to "rend his heart and not his garments," the awful notice that "the kingdom of Heaven is at hand" are fitted to correct his error and to accelerate his delay. In short all the misapprehensions respecting penitence, all the objections to enter on it, are met by these introductory sentences, and the most powerful incentives are urged to place the sinner by contrition in that state which fits him to offer up prayers and gives hope that his prayers will be heard. That which the Minister is desired to read after these sentences is, in some degree, a comment founded on them: it is an exhortation to the people to make confession of their sins and to entreat forgiveness of the Lord. With affectionate piety the Minister addresses his dearly beloved brethren, exhorting them to acknowledge and confess without any attempt at dissimulation or concealment, their manifold sins and wickedness: founding this Exhortation on "the Scripture moving them in sundry places to make such confession with an humble, lowly, penitent, and obedient heart," as the most efficacious means to obtain forgiveness by the infinite goodness and mercy of God. To dissemble or cloak them would indeed as much indicate an ignorance of the nature of that omniscient Being whom we address, as it would an estrangement from the dispositions wherewith we should approach him and they who turn away from the Exhortation of the Minister equally turn away from him whose commission he bears and whose service he advocates. This duty of confessing our sins-not to man, but to God— not to seek temporal acquittal but divine forgiveness-this confession of sin, which in conformity with Scriptural incitement we should be at all times in the habit of performing, we are particularly called on to do, when we asassemble for the devout offices of Public Worship. The words of Solomon at the dedication of the Temple have this import: "Hearken thou to the supplication of thy servant and of thy people Israel, when they shall pray towards this place and hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place; and when thou hearest forgive:"* and the words of our Lord expressly * 1 Kings viii. 30. G declare that "where two or three are gathered together in his name, there is he in the midst of them."* The minister therefore exhorts the congregation with a pure heart and humble voice to accompany him unto the throne of heavenly grace, from which alone they can hope to obtain pardon, repeating after him, (himself a sinner and with them alike in need of forgiveness) "the general Confession which followeth." And here it may be observed that the ability with which the respected compilers of our Liturgy executed their task, appears no less in the smaller and incidental matter which came before them, than in that which must have appeared of greatest magnitude and as lying directly in the path of their duty. An instance of this occurs in the Exhortation which we have been examining. It would seem that they thought it important that the congregation should know from them what the several offices were which were included in the rightful performance of Public Worship, and what the several parts of which it ought to consist. This enumeration they considered it eligible to make early in the service, and they have made it in the General Exhortation. "At all times, they say, we ought to acknowledge our sins before God, but most chiefly ought we so to do, when we assemble * Matthew xviii. 20. f and meet together"-they might have said for Public Worship-but they prefer specifying the several parts which they, in their sound judgment and in their devout conceptions, consider that Public Worship should embrace: "when we assemble and meet together to render thanks for the great benefits that we have received at his hands, to set forth his most worthy praise, to hear his most holy word, and to ask those things which are requisite and necessary as well for the body as the soul." And this division you will find they have themselves followed in the service which they have appointed, giving thanks in the general and special thanksgivings and several collects, acknowledging his benefits, setting forth his most worthy praise in the recital and singing of the Psalms, hearing his most holy word in the Lessons, the Epistle and Gospel, and the Commandments, and seeking the supply of our necessities in the Prayers and Litany. I will venture to say that this specification of the objects of Public Worship could not be improved. In no other place in the Church Service could it with equal propriety and effect have been introduced. The directions given in your prayer books between the different offices and parts of the service, (which formerly were printed in red letters, and were thence called, "rubricks,' from a Latin word signifying red) give instruc |