corresponded with the three orders of Apostles, Presbyters, and another body of men-not endued with the full powers of the other priests, but ordained like them by the laying on of the Apostles' hands. As in the Jewish Church, so in the Christian, stated hours of prayer and daily worship were observed, one day in seven kept holy, and special festivals held. True, the law of sacrifice was set aside, but it was because God Himself had fulfilled that part, so that nothing could be added to it; only the Sacrifice was to be ever and continually pleaded before Him by man, in the blessed Sacrament of His Body and Blood. The heads of the Church were the Apostles. As believers increased, and the Apostles' work became too laborious, two other orders were appointed to assist them: Presbyters, also called overseers, or eldersand a body of young men, who afterwards received the name of deacons. (Phil. i. 1.) Wherever a Church was founded, an elder was appointed; (Acts, xiv. 23. 1 Thess. v. 12.) and in time, from among this order, certain were chosen, and placed over the rest, with the title of Bishop, or the Overseer. So Timothy was made Bishop of Ephesus; Titus, of Crete. The ordination of men to either office was a solemn act, performed by the laying on of the Apostles' hands, and accompanied by prayer and fasting. (Acts, vi. 6. 2 Tim. i. 6.) And from that time to this, in due succession, the ministry of the Church has been committed to Bishops, Priests, and Deacons.

Two Sacraments were appointed by Christ Baptism, to admit believers into the Church; and the Holy Communionto be their spiritual food and strength. In many matters God tries our faith by not giving us a rule in so many words; but when we hear His voice forbidding to hinder little children from coming to Him; when we know that Jewish children were admitted into covenant at eight days old; when we read of the Apostles baptizing whole households, among whom there must almost necessarily have been infants; and finally learn from the writings of those who lived near the time of the Apostles, that it has ever been the custom of the Church to baptize infants; we may joyfully bring our little ones to our Father, nothing doubting but that He will favourably receive them. The Holy Communion is chiefly mentioned under the names of "breaking of bread," or of "giving of thanks;" and it appears to have been the custom for the early Christians, who in their zeal for Christ had all things in common, and shared their goods with one another, to assemble at general meals, (called by St. Jude feasts of love,) at the conclusion of which the Eucharist was celebrated. But this practice, which began in love, led to

dangerous error, so that the Corinthian. Church is greatly blamed by the Apostle for its irreverent conduct. (1 Cor. xi.) Confirmation, or laying on of hands, is without doubt an Apostolic ordinance. (Acts, viii. 15–17; xix. 6. Heb. vi. 2.)

As to the worship of the Church, it appears that for a time they met in the Temple courts, then in private houses; (Acts, iii.; v. 12; xii. 12.) that their worship and Communions were daily, (ii. 46.) orderly; (1 Cor. xiv. 33.) conducted in a language understood of all: (1 Cor. xiv. 14, 15.) that there was & weekly Offertory on the Lord's Day; (1 Cor. xvi. 1, 2.) that their doctrines were embodied in a form which St. Paul exhorts Timothy to hold fast, (2 Tim. i. 13.) a form which probably, in substance, if not in words, was the Creed we call the Apostles' Creed; that their services included prayers and thanksgiving for all men; (1a Tim. ii. 1.) psalms and spiritual songs; (Eph. v. 19.) and that the congregation joined in the Amens. (1 Cor. xiv. 16.) How they joined, we may judge from knowing that this Amen, of which St. Paul is speaking, which responded to the consecration prayer in the Eucharist, was called from its fervency the Great Amen; and St. Jerome, mentioning it a hundred years after the Apostles' time, compares it to a thunder clap in sound. In case of difficult questions arising, we find the Apostles and Elders meeting in council: St. James, the Bishop of Jerusalem, as president of the council, delivering the sentence agreed upon; and copies of the decrees furnished to the several Churches. (Acts. xv.; xvi. 4, 5.)

Such is then a very imperfect sketch of what we gather to have been among the features of the early Apostolic Church: and much more might be added from the writings of those who lived nearest to those days. Changes, doubtless, there have beenyes, and shall be-to suit the needs of succeeding generations. But compare what has been said with our own practice; think of the eighteen centuries that have rolled away so much that seemed imperishable; and then praise the Lord, who promised to be with His Church always, and whose Word can never pass away. All we need we have from Him; the true doctrine of the Scriptures, the shelter of the Church, the order of ministry, the Sacramental pledges; those essentials which have not and may not be changed. F. M. P.

THE CHURCH IN JERUSALEM.

ACTS, II. TO VIII.

THE effect of the miracle of the Day of Pentecost was to draw an immense number into the faith; and this number daily in

creased. Those same rulers and priests, who scarce two months before had tried, by every instrument of cruelty and malice, to put down His doctrines, who in mockery they called the King of Israel, were there to see His own prophecy accomplished: He, having been lifted up, was drawing all men unto Himself. The new faith worked like leaver; miracles attested its truth: and the people were sufficiently impressed for the priests to fear that if they harmed the Apostles a tumult might follow, which would bring the Roman force upon them, and further lessen what present liberty they enjoyed. For the Romans, though supremely indifferent as to their religious opinions, jealously watched any symptoms of rising or insurrection among the fierce Jews.

So we find the rulers evidently perplexed, and uncertain what course to take, when Peter and John, acting together, (as we so often saw them before their Master's Death,) performed that wonderful miracle in the Temple, which gave soundness to a man lame for forty years. Astonishment brought a great crowd together; and St. Peter delivered a second sermon, similar in some respects to that of the Day of Pentecost, but varying in this, that while his first dwelt chiefly upon the fulfilment of ancient prophecies by Christ's Resurrection, his second exhorts more fully to faith and repentance, and to looking forward to the second coming of Christ, and our resurrection through Him.

Pharisees, Sadducees, and the Roman captain, came upon them as they thus preached; the latter attracted by the suspicious concourse of people; the Pharisees angry at their teaching at all: the Sadducees at their teaching the Resurrection. The Apostles were imprisoned for a night, and the next day brought before the Sanhedrim. Caiaphas was high priest; but Annas once had been so; and although deposed by the Romans, he continued to hold a very high position with his nation, as prince, or president of the Sanhedrim. St. Peter, as usual the prominent character and spokesman, boldly uttered to these rulers the same message which he had before declared to the people; and they, perceiving them to be unlearned and ignorant men-that is, "men of ordinary education, contrasted with those specially trained in the schools of the Rabbis," men ignorant of public life-marvelled at their boldness, but dared do no more than threaten them, and let them go. Then we are shown that beautiful example of their joining the assembly of the Church, with unshaken trust, praising and praying to God, and being strengthened with a heavenly sign. Love worked powerfully among the converts, (as yet only called believers,) and from

among the abundant gifts they bestowed, two instances are noted: one, that of the gentle Levite Barnabas, from the island of Cyprus; the other a stern warning-the first danger which threatened the Church from within-the first miracle of punishment recorded in the New Testament. Husband and wife acted a hypocritical lie, and, as the Apostle declared would be their doom, the vengeance of the Lord smote them with the lie yet trembling on their lips; and great fear fell upon all.

The numerous miracles which followed, and converted numbers, further irritated the High Priest and the Sadducees (who, from his belonging to their sect, had much influence in the Council.) Again the Apostles were imprisoned; but the prison doors were opened by an angel, and the Apostles returned to their preaching in the Temple. Being charged before the Sanhedrim, they boldly refused to obey any command but that they had received from God; and the council would have punished them by death, had not Gamaliel, the most learned doctor among them--and as a Pharisee opposed to the party of the Sadducees-persuaded them to release the Apostles, and leave the new doctrine to be tried by the test of time.

The daily ministration we read of in the sixth chapter was a distribution of food and goods to the poor, which the Apostles were enabled to make from the gifts which poured in from the richer members: and the Grecians, or Hellenists, who thought they had cause for complaint, were Proselyte Jews-Gentiles who had been circumcised. Their murmuring occasioned the ordination of seven men, whose office was afterwards called that of deacon; and whose Greek names imply that they may have had some connection at least with the Grecians, who complained of neglect. Stephen and Philip are the only two of whose history we learn more; and we all know that the former of these was the first martyr of the Christian Church.

It was in this year that general tradition supposes St. James to have been chosen by the other Apostles, or, as some believe, by command of the Lord before His Ascension, (1 Cor. xv. 7.) Bishop of Jerusalem; and this James is most commonly thought to have been the Apostle, the son of Alphæus.

St. Stephen's martyrdom was brought about by the malice of some foreign Jews, the Libertines, (or sons of Jews who had been taken captive to Italy, and then freed,) and others from Egypt and Asia Minor, in whose synagogues he disputed. Unable to answer his arguments, they drew him before the Sanhedrim, where, for his defence, he made the long answer related in the seventh chapter.

He denounced their exclusive and bigoted adherence to the rites and ceremonies of the Law; showing that Abraham and his children were accepted, and the promises made to them, years before the Law was given; and that the ceremonial parts were but types and shadows, Moses himself having bid them look forward to their fulfilment in Christ. He exposed their mistaken bigotry in clinging to the shadow, and opposing those who pointed out its spiritual significance, and from the earliest times of their history, displaying the same persecuting and narrow-minded spirit; until, full of righteous indignation, he broke off into the language of reproach. Then his enraged hearers, further wrought up to madness by his declaring a Heavenly vision of the Son of Man, Whom they had cruci

fied, standing at the right hand of Godfell upon him in wrath, and thrusting him out of the city, probably by the gate which opens towards the Mount of Olives, stoned him to death-the doom of the blasphemer: he the while praying for his murderers, as the Saviour had done before.

One was there-bitter against him-approving of his death--who was afterwards to proclaim to the Gentile world what the martyr uttered before the Jewish council. St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians is the fullest exposition of St. Stephen's defence; and it may have been from St. Paul's lipa that St. Luke learned those particulars of this holy death, which were so deeply graven into the Apostle's heart.

F. M. P.

ISAIAH, LVI.

1. WHAT merciful call is here given? 2. How does our Lord repeat the call? St. John, iv. 13, 14. 3. What is that blessed water of life? St. John, vii. 38. 4. How is the call repeated? Ren. xxii. 17. 5. How are we shown how free to all, even the poorest, is God's grace? 6. Is there anything with which we could buy anything so precious as that grace? 7. Yet on what do people spend time and labour? 8. What is it that is not bread, and satisfieth not? 9. How does Habakkuk speak of this vain toil for worldly things? Chap. ii. 13. 10. What is the hunger that shall be satisfied? St. Matt. v. 6. 11. For what does God promise? 12. What new covemant is this? Jer. xxxi. 31-33. 13. What are the terms of our new covenant? 14. In whom was that covenant confirmed? 15. Whose descendant was Christ after the flesh? 16. How was He promised to David? Psalm lxxxix. 28. 17. What was He given to be to the people? 18. Whom should He call? 19. How is this promised in the eighteenth Psalm? 20. Who are these nations who had once been strangers to Him? 21. But when must the Lord be sought? 22. When is He near? 2 Cor. vi. 2. last part. 23. What blessed hope is given to those who do seek the Lord by repentance? 24. Where do the Sentences that begin the Daily Service hold out the same promise? 25. Can we understand all God's dealings with us? 26. Why not? 27. How did God teach Job how little we can enter into God's thoughts and ways? 28. How does God go on to show that His word is sure? 29. To what does He compare His Word? 30. What effect have the

31. And what comes of the watering of the earth? 32. As the rain does its work in the earth, what shall God's Word surely do? 33. But does the effect of the gracious rain show itself directly? 34. Then what is required of those who watch for its effect? James, v. 7, 8. 35. What was the hope of the Jews of old? 36. What is our hope now? 37. Who shall at the coming of the Lord be led forth with peace and joy? 38. What change shall come over the earth? Romans, viii. 20, 21. 39. What will then be made? Rev. xxi. 1. 40. How is the change in this earth here described? 41. What was the beginning of thorns and briers? 42. Why will there be none of them in the new heavens and new earth? 43. What is the way in which we should seek to have our share in all this peace and joy?

FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY.

ISAIAH, LVIII.

1. WHAT is the prophet here commanded to show to the Jews? 2. How were they living outwardly? 3. How in his very first chapter did Isaiah show them that they must do more than make outward observance? 4. What was the great fault of the Jews when our Lord came among them? 5. What are they here said to declare they had done? 6. What was the boast of the Pharisee in our Lord's parable? 7. What was the only fast appointed by Moses? Lev. xvi. 29, 30. 8. But why were other fasts kept? Joel, ii. 12-15. 9. What fasts did the Jews observe? Zech, viii. 19. 10. What did the

Jews expect when they fasted? 11. And what was their complaint? 12. What does the Lord tell them was the fault in their way of fasting? 13. What was their outward way of fasting? 14. Why did they put on sackcloth and hang down their heads? 15. How did our Lord describe this way of fasting? St. Matt. vi. 16. 16. But what is the right way of fasting? St. Matt. vi. 18. 17. How does Joel describe the right sort of fast? Joel, ii. 13. 18. For what is fasting a token of? 19. Is it a real fast where there is no repentance? 20. What shows that the Jews here described were not repenting of their sins while they fasted? 21. What is the fast God requires? 22. What is meant by breaking yokes? A. Setting free. 23. When did the Jews in a time of distress thas pretend to break every yoke? Jer. xxxiv. 19. 24. But what did they afterwards do?

Verse 11. 25. What was the punishment? Verse 17. 26. What is meant by hiding from our own flesh? A. Keeping out of the way of helping our poor brethren. 27. What then besides repentance is needed to make a fast acceptable? A. Mercy and charity. 28. What fast shall we soon have to observe? 29. What is our day of public repentance? 30. But what must we do to make our Lent fast pleasing to God? 31. Think about what Isaiah has told us about the right inward sort of fast, and find out some way in which you may keep the fast of Lent in the acceptable way. But Who alone should we look to in fasting? 32. What reward does He promise? 33. What is meant by God being our rereward? A. Taking care of us behind. 34. In the Collect for the Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity, how do we pray for this protecting care before and behind? 35. What farther promise does God give of being ready to hear the prayers of such as fast rightly? 36. What sins does He further say should be put away? 37. What does putting forth the finger stand for? A. Scorn. 38. Who despiseth his neighbour? Prov. xi. 12. 39. What is speaking vanity? 40. What is the blessing to such as put away these sins? 41. How does the first Psalm promise the same blessing? 42. What further promise is here held out? 43. When was Jerusalem a waste place? 44. What good men were the repairers of her breaches? 45. What other observance did God here tell them how to keep? 46. When was the Sabbath ordained? 47. What is the rule in the Fourth Commandment? 48. What does Jeremiah repeat about its observance? Jer. xvii. 24, 25. 49. Who enforced its observance? Neh. xiii. 19. 50. When was it fulfilled that a King of the house of David really rode in at the gate of Jerusalem ? 51. Had the Jews deserved to

have a more complete fulfilment of the promise? 52. What sort of Sabbath is here described? 53. But when our Lord was on earth, did they make the Sabbath a delight? 54. What were they always blaming Him for? 55. How did He answer them? St. Mark, ii. 27, 28. 56. What is the day we now keep? 57. What is it in remembrance of? 58. Whose day is it? 59. Then how must we try to observe it? 60. What must we not seek? 61. What must we not speak? 62. But who must we put first in all we do? 63. What will the Sunday then become to us? 64. For what is the only real kind of joy? 65. And if we so enjoy our Sundays, what high place and heritage will be ours?

FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY.

ISAIAH, LXIV.

11.

12.

1. WHAT is grieving and vexing the prophet? A. The sin and misery around him. 2. What does he cry out to God in his indignation? 3. When did God manifest Himself on the mountains? 4. What mountains ever do flow down with melting fire? 5. Where do the Psalms describe such an appearance? xcvii. 5. 6. When shall the elements melt with fervent heat? 7. What is then in store for the righteous? 8. How does Isaiah speak of those precious things? 9. How does St. Paul repeat this description? 1 Cor. ii. 9. 10. Whom does God meet favourably? But have we any righteousness? What is all our righteousness like? 13. Why is it only filthy and torn? 14. What do we fade like? 15. What blows as away? 16. What is Isaiah's prayer? 17. What are we made of? 18. Why does he call God our potter? 19. How did God thus show His dealings to Jeremiah? Jer. xviii. 2-6. 20. Why does Isaiah plead with God that He is our Maker? What piteous sight does Isaiah ask God to look on? 22. What was the holy and beautiful house? 23. What Psalm laments over the Temple? lxxiv. 4-9. 24. When did the Temple lie in this state? What then is Isaiah prophesying of? 26. Did the desolation happen in his time? 27. When was the greater desolation? 28. What brought that greatest desolation on the Jews? 29. To whose righteousness had they chosen to trust? 30. So what swept them off the land? 31. But to what righteousness may we trust instead of our own? 32. What will He present us in instead of our own filthy rags? 33. How did Zechariah see JESUS in figure clothed? Zech. iii. 3. 34. What were those filthy garments? A. Our sins. 35. But what did He put away? Verse 4. 36. And what does He clothe us in? St. Luke, xv.

21.

25.

22. 37. What does He give us to wear at His feast? 38. How must we keep that garment? 39. If we keep it, what is the promise? Rev. iii. 5.

SEPTUAGESIMA. GENESIS, II.

20.

1. WHAT did the first chapter of Genesis give an account of? 2. What is here described as coming after the work of Creation? 3. What is meant by Sabbath? 4. How has this Rest of God been since commemorated? 5. Where was the Sabbath made part of the Jewish Law? 6. Which was the special day of rest in our Saviour's great work? 7. Which day do Christiaus observe? 8. What is the chief thought of our Lord's Day, rest or resurrection? 9. But what remaineth for us? Heb. iv. 9. 10. Who enter into that rest? Rev. xiv. 13. 11. After the description of the great Week of Creation, the fifth verse goes back to which day of the Creation? 12. What was then the state of the earth? 13. What creation is here more closely described? 14. How had the first chapter described the forming of man? 15. What do we here see that his body is made of? 16. But what is breathed into it? 17. How does the Book of Job describe this giving of life? Job, xxxiii. 4. 18. How then was man in the image of God? 19. From Whom does our soul come? How is man's first home on earth described? 21. Can its place now be made out? A. Not clearly. 22. What is supposed to have become of it? A. The Flood is thought to have washed away all that remained of it. 23. Which of the four rivers are still to be traced? 24. What is the present name of Hiddekel? A. The Tigris. 25. What was the man's work in the garden? 26. What was the one rule he was to observe? 27. So what trial was even here given to him? 28. But how do we see God's care for his happiness? 29. What was not found among all the animals? 30. Why not? 31. What had been given to him over the creatures? 32. How was he using that dominion? 33. What was the meaning of his own name? A. Red earth. 34. Why was this name given to him? 35. What does St. Paul say of him? 1 Cor. xv. 47. 36. How was his want of a help meet supplied? 37. What did Adam say of her? 38. What holy rite was then instituted? 39. What is said of the union of man and wife? 40. Where does our Lord repeat this? St. Matt. xix. 5, 6. 41. With what words does the priest join the right hands of those whom he joins in marriage? 42. For how long are they joined together? 43. Who then do we see ordained Holy Matrimony? 44. Of what

45. 46.

is it an emblem? Eph. v. 31, 32. For Who is the Head of the Church? And who is the head of the wife? 47. When was the wife taken from Adam's side? 48. When did our Lord fall asleep in death? 49. What was then pierced? 50. What came thereout? 51. What does that Blood and Water represent? A. The two Sacraments. 52. And what arose from His Death and sleep in the Grave? A. His Church. 53. Therefore what is she called? A. The Bride. 54. How will He present her unto Himself? Eph. v. 27. 55. How did St. John see her thus presented? Rev. xix. 7, 8. 56. To whom then have bridegrooms and brides the great honour of being likened? 57. Then should not there be great fear of any sin to spoil that likeness? 58. What is St. Paul's great reason for husbands and wives doing right by one another?

SEXAGESIMA.

GENESIS, VI.

1. WHAT was the sad history in this Morning's Lesson? 2. Upon whom did Adam's bondage to sin descend? 3. What was the first great crime on record? 4. What was the punishment of Cain? 5. What other son is mentioned as born to Adam? 6. What were the two chief families then in the world? 7. What does this Lesson call them? 8. Look back at the fourth chapter, and see what inventions the family of Cain was remarkable for. 9. And see what sins Lamech committed. 10. What, on the other hand, began in the family of Seth? Verse 26. 11. What great saint was of Seth's line? Chapter v. 24. 12. What is this believed to mean? 13. What was the prophecy of Enoch? (Jude, 14, 15.) 14. What judgment was coming? 15. What led to the corruption of all mankind? 16. What is supposed to be meant by there being giants? A. That there were men stronger and mightier in all ways than they are now that the world is old, just as they were longer lived. 17. But how did they make use of their might and strength? 18. What did God say of the earth? 19. What did He see when He looked down on them? Psalm xiv. 3, 4. 20. How long, however, would He still bear with them? 21. But what was to be prepared in that time? 22. Who was chosen to prepare the Ark? 23. Why had Noah been so named? Chapter v. 29. 24. What does Noah mean? A. Comfort. 25. What are the directions here given about the Ark? 26. What is the gopher wood supposed to be? 4. Cypress. 27. What is the pitch it was covered with? A. Bitumen-a mineral that oozes out in volcanic countries, and hardens with the