means general until the Restoration, and those which existed at the commencement of the wars were generally taken down. During the Commonwealth the arms of the State were sometimes fixed up in parish churches. Royal arms, of the date of the Restoration, are not unfrequently to be met with in village churches. In the church of Monkton Farleigh they bear the date of 1662, and in that of Widcombe, Somersetshire, the date of 1660. It is, therefore, clear, from this circumstance, that they were put up in some churches immediately on the return of the king, while in others they were not fixed up until after the Act of Uniformity. We hope that these ancient arms will be preserved, in preference to setting up new ones.

Formerly there was a small bell, which was usually placed in a little turret at the eastern end of the nave, and which was called the Sanctus. It was rung during mass, when the priest pronounced the Ter-Sanctus, and at the elevation of the host. The bell still remains in some few churches, the rope hanging down between the chancel and the nave; and the turret exists in a great number, though deprived of its bell. Mr. Bloxam mentions three instances in Warwickshire where the bell is preserved-Long Compton, Whichford, and Brailes; and we are able to add two more to the list-Portbury, and Weston-inGordano, Somerset, in both of which the bell remains, and is called by the common people the Saint's bell, evidently from the ancient designation Sanctu's. In some cases these bells are rung when the minister enters the church, as a signal to the people that the service is about to commence, and in many parishes it is still the custom to ring the smallest bell in the tower on the same occasion. At Weston the bell is not only called the Saint's bell, but sometimes St. Paul's, to whom the church is dedicated.

Galleries were formerly unknown in churches, with the cxception of the rood-loft, which in some places was of considerable size. They disfigure many of our ancient churches, but they are necessary evils. A few small galleries exist of the seventeenth century, though they were generally erected at the end of one of the aisles, and in most cases for the accommodation of one particular family. The most ancient and the largest of the old galleries with which we are acquainted is in the parish church of Corsham. It extends all along the south aisle, and was erected by a lady in 1632, who owned the property of the present Lord Methuen, to whom the gallery still belongs. In order to afford light to the gallery, it was necessary to insert windows, on the south side of the church, over which is inscribed the date of their erection. The practice of inscrib

ing the date on any alterations was very common during this century, and many such instances as that at Corsham occur.* In some churches, especially in villages, the stand for the hour-glass is preserved. We mention this, not as a decoration, but as an illustration of the habits of our ancestors. It was the practice to preach by the glass--a Puritan practice with respect to its introduction, but still common in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Mr. Bloxam mentions several churches in which these stands remain. We remember some years ago paying a visit to the church of Weston Favel, once the scene of the labours of the Rev. James Hervey, and we found the glass-stand, consisting of circular hoops, fastened to the wall by the side of the pulpit.

It is lamentable to notice the havoc made in some churches for the purpose of making pews. No one has any right to injure or deface the building for such a purpose, and the guilty parties are liable to punishment. It is the duty of the churchwardens to prevent such unseemly acts. The following extract from the Few Words to Churchwardens" is important:

"The chancel arch itself is too often knocked about to make room for pews. You ought to remember that the beauty of a church, when you look up, if from the west, is entirely spoiled, wherever this arch has been allowed to be hurt" (p. 8).

We have in our eyes a beautiful little church, with a most elegant chancel arch, one side of which was recently cut away to make an additional seat in a pew.

The communion plate is an interesting object in a church, and in some places it is of considerable antiquity, though but little was preserved during the troubles between the years 1640 and 1660. In the parish of Widcombe, Somerset, however, there is a cup of the date of 1575.

It has been our aim, in this paper, to encourage that laudable feeling in favour of the preservation of our ancient churches, which has recently been revived in this country; and we indulge the hope, that our remarks may meet the eye of some of the clergy, and induce them to pay attention to a subject, which, in our opinion, is not only a very interesting, but also a very important one. There are two societies, the Cambridge Camden Society and the Oxford Architectural Society, whose object is to preserve our ancient churches, and also to examine and illus

A most singular inscription exists over the porch of the parish church of Priston, Somerset. It was placed there by one of the former ministers of the parish, and is as follows:- Priston! Priston! Repent and believe the Gospel! John Watts, 1595."

trate their architecture and ornaments. Any communication from clergymen or parishioners respecting a church will be received by these societies, and any information will be given. We trust that the day for destroying and defacing churches has gone by, and that both clergy and people are resolved, that all the existing memorials of our forefathers shall be scrupulously and religiously preserved to future generations.

ART. IV. Sermons, Dissertations, Translations, Poems, &c. &c. Three vols. 8vo. Baldwin.

2. The Pleiad; or, Evidences of Christianity. 8vo. 1818. 3. The Works of the Rev. Thomas Zouch, D.D., F.R.S. With a Memoir of his Life. Two vols. 8vo.

1820.

4. Translation of the Lyrics of Horace. 1821.

5. Langhorne's Plutarch. With Notes and Illustrations, &c. Six vols. 8vo. Fifth edition.

1828.

6. The Roman Catholic Claims. 8vo. 1829.

7. The British Plutarch. Six vols. 8vo. 1830.

8. Waltoni Prolegomina, Recensuit. F. Wrangham. Two vols. 8vo.

9. New Version of the Psalms. Simpkin.

10. Arundines Cami. Collegit atque Edidit Henricus Drury. 8vo. Cantabrigiæ. 1841.

IT has been frequently remarked, that those who are ever moving and speaking in clubs, and in the chief places of concourse, must always appear greater men in the eyes of the world, than those who live in closets and keep lonely vigils. The histories of the more forward and ostentatious portion of the human race, who have pushed their fortunes into public life with any measure of success, are sure to be recorded. Those even who have busied themselves in narrower circles and in less prominent positions will also have their reward; whilst the select few, whose retiring modesty and gentler nature has made them anxious to escape from the notice and rough contact of the world, are suffered to pass through a life of secret usefulness and devotedness to God almost without remark. Year by year they may have been hiveing glory which shall not end with this world; but they find no "sacred poet," and therefore no record of their faith and love remains,

Nearly allied to this is the lot of those whose minds, first, by what is native there, and secondly, by what has been acquired, have diversified their day with conversing rather with books than individuals with communing with their own spirits rather than with those of living men, who have consequently shrunk, through the repining influence which a classical and inspiring literature has imperceptibly shed upon their hearts, from taking an active part in the public concerns of the world. For that contact with busy life, which is so acceptable to other men, is oftentimes nothing short of a sore trial to the refined habits of the man of cultivated mind, who cannot bring himself to exhibit the coarser lines of individual character, or to descend to those mountebank tricks (since we have not a softer or more perfumed word with which to express our meaning) which are so necessary to captivate the multitude. This latter style of character may not be the most useful to mankind, but it is unquestionably the most amiable and endearing. It was the existence of this interesting trait in the character of Charles James Fox that shed so mild and softening a lustre over it. "He was an awkward and unpractised demagogue (as the accomplished Lord Dudley said of him), who in the art of cajoling a mob was infinitely surpassed by persons whom, in point of talents, it would be quite ludicrous to compare with him. For (he continues) by his habits and feelings he was the creature of polished life, as it existed under the ancient monarchies of Europe." Who, again, can think upon the character of the accomplished nobleman we have just mentioned, and remember how, with the highest, perhaps unequalled, intellectual qualifications, he absolutely recoiled from public life, while he delighted to spend whole evenings in pouring forth the exhaustless stores of his rare mind into the ear of the aged but intellectual Mrs. Dugald Stewart. Canning undoubtedly judged well when he advised him to contribute to the Quarterly, and to "take refuge in the Reviews;" for the privacy of the article without a name-"the piquant side-dish," as some one has characterized his articles, was exactly the thing to suit him.

Mr.

Our readers will easily suppose that we have attempted, in these foregoing remarks, dimly to shadow forth the character of one whose name stands at the head of this article, and whom God has lately taken to himself. For the reasons already stated, we regret that we have not sufficient materials at hand from which we might furnish a full and particular, instead of a brief and passing, sketch of the brilliant but peaceful career of this amiable and accomplished man, from whose valuable writings we have learned so much, and whose exquisite poems, some of

them at least, we have been accustomed to whisper almost from our earliest years.

The late Venerable Archdeacon Wrangham was the son of a somewhat wealthy yeoman, a native of the East Riding of Yorkshire, who, as we are informed, bestowed upon his well-favoured and highly-gifted son the best education which his native province could supply*—a blessing which the son often gratefully acknowledged, and never in more touching terms than in that little sketch of the life of a young lady to which we shall presently have occasion to refer; in which he speaks of the "low and languid morning so often unexpectedly following a day of cheerfulness and a night of repose, the delusive glow of the cheek, the debility and emaciation, and, above all, the importunate and unrelenting cough-as exhibited to me in the last days of a father, to whose judicious tenderness and selfdenying liberality, under God, I owe all my blessings-will never be erased from my remembrance."

Short as is the sketch from which this passage is taken, it leaves nothing to be desired but what is indeed a serious omission-a distinct exhibition of the sole ground of a sinner's hope, which we doubt not for a moment was the strength of her heart whom he has so beautifully described; we only regret that our author did not more clearly exhibit it in the memoir, for most surely he would thereby have richly gilded the prospect, which, as it now stands, is wanting in that which can alone enliven with a cheering ray, and pierce through the otherwise dark cloud.

His amiable and filial feelings are also happily expressed in the following sonnet, bearing the early date of 1794:

"Much on my early youth I love to dwell,
When by my father's side, a stripling boy,

I paced with steps unequal; fain to tell

Of some new-practised game, some new-bought toy.
How oft with bliss, which later days deny,

My prattling tongue its story would repeat!
Bounding beneath his tender smile, how high

With blameless pride my filial heart would beat!
O for those hours of ecstacy again,

Which thus on life's sweet prime their lustre shed!

His first tutor was the Rev. Stephen Thirlwall; his second, the Rev. John Robinson, who afterwards became Master of the Free Grammar School at York; his last, the Rev. Joseph Milner, of Hull, the well known author of the "Church History," which was afterwards continued by Mr. Scott, and of three volumes of Sermons, which will instruct and edify the hearts of many when his history shall have been superseded by a work of principles more clearly defined, deeper research, and of greater accuracy with respect to matters of fact.