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DIRECTIONS

TO

COLLECTS AND PSALMS,

IN THE

BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER,

PROPER TO BE USED BY THE COMMUNICANT IN HIS PRIVATE

DEVOTION.

Collects. See

For God's assistance in the perform- ( 1st Sunday after Epiphany,

ance of our duty,

For deliverance from, and support under, afflictions,

For the universal church,

For peace and unity of the church,

For contrition,
Against covetousness,

For conversion from sin,

For the benefit of Christ's death,
For a right and firm faith,

For faith, hope, and charity,

For grace and assistance in our spiritual course,

For eternal happiness,

For humility and patience, For imitation of Christ,

For our imitation of the saints,

9th after Trinity.

8th after Trinity,

3d Sunday after Epiphany,

5th in Lent.

5th Sunday after Epiphany, St. John Evangelist, 2d for Good Friday, 16th and 22d after Trinity. 5th Sunday after Trinity, St. Simon and St. Jude, See Ministers. Ash Wednesday. St. Matthew's Day. 1st Sunday 1st after Easter, St. Andrew's Day,

Advent,

St. James' Day,
St. Matthew's Day.
The Annunciation.

{Trinity Sunday, St. Thomas, and

14th Sunday after Trinity.
2d Sunday in Lent,
4th in Advent,
Easter-Day,

1st, 2d, and 13th after Trinity.
1st Sunday in Advent,
Epiphany,

6th Sunday after Epiphany,
Sunday after Ascension Day.
Sunday before Easter.
2d Sunday after Easter.
St. Stephen's Day,
St. Philip's Day,
St. James' Day,

St. John Baptist's Day,
All Saints Day.

242 DIRECTIONS TO COLLECTS AND PSALMS.

For deliverance from judgments,

For the love of God and his laws,
For love and charity,

For the ministers of God's word

and sacraments,

For mortification,

Collects.
Septuagesima Sunday,
4th Sunday in Lent.
4th Sunday after Easter,

1st, 6th, 7th, and 14th, after Trinity.
Quinquagesima Sunday.
St. Matthias' Day,
St. Peter's Day,

3d Sunday in Advent.

The Circumcision, and Easter-Day.

For the protection of God's provi- ( 2d, 3d, 4th, and 20th Sundays after

dence,

For purity of heart,

For pardon of sin,

For acceptance of our prayers,
For renovation,

To be truly religious,
For Christian resolution,

For sincerity,

Before reading the Scriptures,
Against evil thoughts,

For deliverance from, and support
under, temptations,

For fruitfulness in good works,

Trinity.

The Purification.

12th, 21st, and 24th Sundays affer
Trinity.

10th Sunday after Trinity.
Christmas-Day.

7th Sunday after Trinity.
St. John Baptist's Day.
3d Sunday after Easter.
2d Sunday in Advent.
5th after Easter.
(4th after Epiphany,
2d in Lent.

5th after Easter,

1st, 9th, 11th, 13th, 17th, and 25th after Trinity.

For God's assistance in our sacramental preparation,
For the gift and grace of repentance,

Before self-examination,

For confession of sins, and for forgiveness,

An act of contrition,

On a resolution to lead a new life,

For faith in God's mercy through Christ's death,

For a thankful remembrance of Christ's death,

For the grace of charity,

Psalms,
23, 26, 111.
6, 25, 32, 38.
139.

6, 32, 38, 51.
25.

1, 23, 24, 25, 126.
19, 57.

2, 3, 4, 103

15, 41, 112, 133. 19, 119.

For grace to love God's law,

For a holy life,

85.

For salvation and eternal happiness,

16, 24.

For God's care and protection,

37.

For the comfort of God's holy Spirit,

34.

For humility,

For pardon of sins,

Thanksgiving for God's mercies,

For redemption by Christ,

Against evil and perplexing thoughts,

On Christmas-Day, and seven days after,

Easter-Day, and seven days after,
Whitsunday, and six days days after,

Trinity Sunday,

For the grace of perseverance,

For the morning,

For the evening,

.131.

103, 136, 138.
85, 106, 116.

98, 118.

6, 34, 42, 43, 102. 19, 45, 85.

2, 57, 111.

34, 42, 43, 51.
2, 47, 72, 110.
86, 119.

4, 16, 17, 23, 86.
119, 130, 138.

The seven Penitential Psalms are the 6th, 32d, 38th, 51st, 102d, 130th,

and 143d.

Our Saviour's Sermon on the Mount is the 5th, 6th, and 7th chapters of St Matthew.

THE EIGHT BEATITUDES.

St. Matt. chap. v. ver. 3, &c.

1. Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

2. Blessed are they that mourn; for they shall be comforted.

3. Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the earth.

4. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness; for they shall be filled.

5. Blessed are the merciful; for they shall obtain mercy.

6. Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall see God.

7. Blessed are the peacemakers; for they shall be called the children of God.

8. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

NOTE A, FOR PAGE 175.

It may not be amiss to present to the reader the following passages from the writings of the Fathers, which, with many others that might be produced, decisively prove, that the primitive church was episcopal.

FIRST CENTURY.

IGNATIUS, Bishop of Antioch, in his Epistle to the Trallians. "Continue inseparable from Jesus Christ our God, and from your bishop, and from the commands of the apostles. He that is within the altar is pure; but he that is without, that is, does any thing without the bishop, and presbyters, and deacons, not pure in his conscience."

In his Epistle to the Smyrnians.

"Let no man do any thing of what belongs to the church without the bishop. It is not lawful, without the bishop, neither to baptize, nor to celebrate the holy communion."

SECOND CENTURY.

IRENEUS, Bishop of Lyons.

"We can reckon up those whom the apostles ordained to be bishops in the several churches, and who they were that succeeded them down to our times."*

CLEMENS, of Alexandria.

"There are other precepts without number; some which relate to presbyters; others which belong to bishops; others respecting deacons." THIRD CENTURY.

ORIGIN, of Alexandria.

"There is a debt due to deacons; another to presbyters; and another to bishops, which is the greatest of all, and exacted by the Saviour of the whole church."

CYPRIAN, Bishop of Carthage.

"The church is built on bishops, and every act of the church is governed and directed by them, its presidents."§

*Irenæus, lib. iii. cap. 5.
Origen, lib. zepì evgns.

Pædag. lib. iii. cap. 12.

§ Cyprianus, principio epist. 33.

The testimony of St. Jerome, in the fourth century, has been supposed, by some, to militate against episcopacy. In his comment on the first chapter of Titus, he advances only as a conjecture," that the churches were at first governed by a college of presbyters, equal in rank and dignity. Afterwards, divisions being occasioned by this parity among presbyters, when every presbyter began to claim, as his own particular subjects, those whom he had baptized; and it was said by the people, I am of Paul, and I of Apollos, and I of Cephas; to remedy this evil, it was ordered, all the world over, that one of the presbyters in every church should be set over the rest, and peculiarly called bishop." But it is evident, that in this passage, St. Jerome plainly refers the degree by which bishops were established over presbyters, to the time of the apostles. He not only assigns, as the occasion of it, the adherence of some to Paul, of others to Apollos, of others to Cephas, which is reproved by St. Paul, in his epistle to the Corinthians; but in his epistle to Evagrius, he expressly calls the distinction of bishops, presbyters, and deacons, an apostolic institution, and taken by the apostles from the Old Testament, where Aaron, his sons the priests, and the Levites, correspond to the three orders of the Christian church. In his catalogue of ecclesiastical writers, he affirms, "that James was ordained bishop of Jerusalem by the apostles; that Timothy was made bishop of Ephesus, and Titus of Crete, by St. Paul; and Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, by St. John," &c. Even in St. Jerome's opinion, therefore, the primacy of bishops over presbyters was an apostolic institution. Yet, were the opinion of St. Jerome otherwise, the opinion of a single Father, in the fourth century, ought not certainly to be adduced against the concurring testimony of all the earlier Fathers.

The primitive church, beyond all doubt, was episcopal. The bishops alone possessed the power of ordination transmitted from Christ, the head of the church, that spiritual power which can be derived from him alone. If, then, presbyters, who never received authority to ordain, were to exercise this power, the ministerial commission which they would confer, would not be derived in the appointed channel from Christ, and of course would not be sanctioned by him. The mode established by Christ and his apostles, of conveying ministerial power in the church to "the end of the world," cannot be altered by any human authority.

The reader who is in doubt on this subject, certainly one of the most important that can engage his attention, is earnestly requested candidly and seriously to peruse Potter on Church Government, and Law's Three Letters to the Bishop of Bangor, which last are published in the Scholar Armed. The former of these writers, by a luminous series of testimony from Scripture and the primitive Fathers, proves that the original constitution of the church was episcopal; and the latter, in a masterly strain of argument, defends this truth against all the objections with which it can be assailed. United, they place the episcopal constitution of the church on the firm foundation of Scripture, antiquity, and sound reason.

The opinion advanced by Sir Peter King, and since by others, that a bishop was originally the head of only one congregation, and possessed no diocesan authority, is entirely refuted and exposed by Slater, in his Original Draught on the Primitive Church. And much valuable information on this subject may be found in A Guide to the Church, by Charles Daubeny, L. L. D. a presbyter of the Church of England.

The principles advanced in this Companion for the Altar, on the subject of the Christian ministry, having been violently assailed, the author found it necessary to vindicate them in "An Apology for Apostolic Order and its Advocates."

THE END.

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