with The Churchman. The Spirit of Missions is the organ of the board of missions, and The New York Review is almost wholly literary. The principles of The Church Advocate may be gathered from the following Hudibrastic effusion, printed in Lexington and distributed by the little boy who carried the paper to the subscribers living in the town.

CHRISTMAS ADDRESS OF THE CARRIER OF THE CHURCH ADVOCATE TO ITS PATRONS.

Old Thirty-five is nearly gone,
Good Churchmen all, in Lexington!
Soon Thirty-six will be our date,
Good patrons of the Advocate!
We pray you, lend a little time,

To listen to our humble rhyme;

And get a little information

Without much trouble or vexation.

"What is the Church ?" all men inquire :

Some say "A building with a spire,

Where gentlemen and ladies go

To lounge away an hour or so."

Some say, "THE CHURCH, THE KINGDOM COME,

Is every sect in Christendom,

Quakers, and Shakers, and Socinians,

As many CHURCHES as OPINIONS."

Some say (to whom great praise is given)

"Tis all GOOD FOLKS in earth and heaven;

But who they are we cannot tell,

The Church is quite INVISIBLE."

If such be then their doubtful state,

What says the "little Advocate ?"

"The Church is all that mighty host,

In every land, in every coast,

Baptized and taught (through heavenly love)

By those COMMISSIONED from above,

To spread the tidings of salvation

In EVERY AGE and EVERY NATION."

But, hark! we hear our neighbours cry,

"What prejudice and bigotry!

Surely that rule unchurches us,
How monstrous and incongruous!
What arrogance, what zeal intrusive,
For a small sect to be exclusive !"

EXCLUSIVE! did our neighbours say?
Tell us, good reader, what are THEY!!!
Should we be deem'd exclusive, when
ELEVEN-TWELFTHS of Christian men
Within our limits are included,

And only ONE SMALL TWELFTH excluded?
A twelfth which left the way we go
Less than three hundred years ago;
But now, in mercy meek and civil,
Rank us with Antichrist and Devil;
Or, even with that wicked one,
The scarlet dame of Babylon.

Yet even these we trouble not, But wish them all a happier lot;

Again repeating, and again,

"We hate the ERRORS, not the MEN."

Fain would we meet them on the ground

Where holy men of old were found;

Where Peter held the heavenly key,
Where blessed Paul rejoiced to be:
Where Christians long in UNION trod
The peaceful path that leads to God;
In UNION ate the Gospel feast
For fourteen hundred years at least.

But, mark, we never can come down
To the low ground they stand upon;
We cannot leave our noble craft
To sail upon their crazy raft,

Which, tost by faction's stormy breezes,
May in a moment fall to pieces.
Our lot within THE ARK is cast;

We nail our colours to the mast;

Our banner to all eyes unfurl'd,

"THE ARK ALONE CAN SAVE THE WORLD."

CHAPTER XIV.

PRAYER BOOK OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH.

Propriety of alterations.-First plan of an altered Prayer Book.— Objections of the English bishops. Further deliberations in Convention. Subsequent alterations.-New Offices.-Comparison of the American Prayer Book with that of England. -General inference.

EXCELLENT as are its general arrangements, and venerable as are its services, the Prayer Book in America as in England constitutes no essential part of the ecclesiastical fabric. It rests solely upon the authority of the Church, by which it may be altered, newly arranged, or made to give place to another form of worship as circumstances render desirable. The Church of England in the Preface to the Prayer Book has laid down a rule that "the particular forms of divine worship, and the rites and ceremonies appointed to be used therein, being things in their own nature indifferent and

alterable, and so acknowledged, it is but reasonable, that upon weighty and important considerations, according to the various exigences of times and occasions, such changes and alterations should be made therein, as to those who are in places of authority should, from time to time, seem either necessary or expedient."

The same Church has likewise in the articles and homilies declared the necessity and expediency of occasional alterations and amendments, and, accordingly, we find that "seeking to keep the happy mean between too much stiffness in refusing and too much easiness in admitting variations in things once advisedly established, she hath, in the reign of several princes, since the first compiling of her liturgy in the time of Edward VI.

yielded to make such alterations in some particulars, as in the respective times were thought convenient."

When the American states became independent with respect to civil government, their ecclesiastical independence, on Protestant principles, was necessarily included. The American Episcopal Church was therefore left at full liberty, in conformity with the rule of the Church of England, to arrange its forms of worship in such a manner as might be most conducive to its future prosperity. The attention of the General Convention was first drawn to those