"Well," said Miss Merton, "it certainly is a very horrible belief, that about penance, and purgatory, and that sort of thing."

Mr. Wilkinson made no answer, not wishing to discuss the question with one who seemed to have thought very little about it. They rejoined the party, Miss Merton declaring her fixed intention of never becoming a Nun.

CHAPTER XIV. THE CHURCH IN HER INFLUENCE.

JUST before the completion of the work of restoration at Letherton Church, the Rural Dean made a visit to the Rectory. He had heard much of the new decorations and the stained windows; so, having a secret dread of such things, he came to admonish and expostulate, not, of course, in an official capacity, but only as a neighbour and a friend.

It

On entering the church the first object which met his eye was the stone altar. It was handsomely but simply designed, and chaste and inoffensive in its construction and ornaments. stood upon six pillars, the front being left open. Upon it were standing two silver candlesticks of antique ecclesiastical design, which had just arrived from Birmingham.

Mr. Montague looked very grave and shook his head when he saw this. It was not only directly contrary to the canons, but it tacitly recognised the most corrupt of all the popish heresies. Stone Altars were both idolatrous and heretical, and they were sure to prove an abomination in the eyes of the parishioners, as they certainly did in

his own. For his part, he said, he would rather

die than consent to use them for the celebration of the Sacrament.

The Rural Dean expressed himself with so much warmth and vehemence, that the Rector was by no means favourably impressed with the reverence or the sincerity of his friend. He could not help thinking that such language was but an ebullition of party feeling; and well knowing how prone the best of us are to be hot and violent on subjects the most solemn, and how angrily we contend in defence of what we call our deep religious convictions—as if religion depended in the least upon men's notions-he wisely surmised that there was more of impulse and prejudice than of deliberation in the objection. He answered, therefore, that he had not erected the stone table without mature consideration, and was fully prepared to contest the point with him as a matter of argument and fair controversy. He freely confessed that he had himself thought somewhat differently on the subject six months ago; but the absence of prejudice, and attention to the importance and proprieties of church arrangements, had convinced him of his former error.

"And first," said he, "let me explain the reasons which induced me to take a step which appears to you so objectionable.

66

"My principal motive was reverence. Wooden

tables have been tried, and have failed to secure proper respect. It has been found impossible to preserve from general abuse and desecration the mean and unsightly wooden frames which have been used in the Church since the Reformation. Vestry meetings are held upon them, carpenters use them as work-benches, schoolmasters as desks, workmen sit upon them with their hats on; nay, any village idler will lean against them unconcerned while he smokes his pipe. So rapidly did this feeling increase, that rails were found absolutely necessary, in less than a hundred years, to secure the table from actual profanation. In fact, so complete and so obvious is the association in the thoughtless mind between the sight of an ordinary table and the idea of its secular use, that I have known the parishioners make a general practice of sitting within the rails on chairs and forms, and jangle over it about a church-rate. I have seen it used as a scaffold in whitewashing a church; I have seen it turned up on end to assist in climbing up to a window-cill; I have found it used as a hall table in a rectory-house; ejected and put to some ignominious use in a damp and dirty corner of the church. Many and many a time have I seen coarse and rough pieces of deal hammered together and covered with a soiled and torn rag of green baize; broken and dusty boards, not fit to place in a cottage, are perhaps the ordi

nary altars of Protestant churches. Now I do maintain that a stone table never could be liable to such desecration: and the reasons are, first, because it is fixed, (by its own weight at least,) secondly, that it cannot be viewed in the same light as a mere piece of domestic furniture. The conditions of the canon are, I conceive, satisfied, if a stone table is so far moveable, that it is not built into the solid masonry of the wall. For no one I will ever be able to shew that the word "table" implies of necessity some particular material. The ancient altars, with their anointed crosses, their various decorations of painting, drapery, and sculpture, their relics, and what was considered their superstitious consecration, having been removed (though I find that a large number certainly remained till Cromwell's time),—and removed, I conceive, much more from these reasons than simply because they were of stone,—" tables" were ordered to be used, without specifying the material at all, which it is really incredible that the canon should have failed to specify, if the sole ground of objection lay in their being of stone. Whether the adoption of the word "table" in the Rubric was merely to satisfy the prejudice of parties, and the canon intentionally compiled with a view to a restoration of the more Catholic usage in a less critical period, it is for more learned ritualists than myself to determine.