administered at any other church in this town. If it were, it would be contrary to my principles and practice to ramble from church to church. Surely, then, the Church is not made applicable to our wants and necessities; we have a scanty dole, a meagre supply, which gives some confirmation to the language of Dissenters when they say the Church "half starves us." Every day in this large town we are exposed to the temptations of Satan; vice in its most deceiving and alluring guise besets our path, and temptations from within and without accompany us. In the midst of all this, God's gift whereby we are materially enabled "to walk worthy of our vocation" is stinted to us; that which requires the most searching examination, self-denial, fasting, and prayer-which pre-supposes the practice of every christian duty to the best of our ability-which in the most solemn and awful manner brings before us the sublime truths of our religion, and makes us aware of our condition and destiny, and which is the real worship of the Church, is given to us but once a month. I hope and pray that ere long we shall have a weekly communion. I pray God to move His Church to a hearty and universal desire to worship Him fully in His appointed way; that all may be brought practically into the fold by living in the faith of our Holy Redeemer. The ENGLISH CHURCHMAN may materially advance this, and echo the prayers of

Manchester, Feb. 1843.

Reviews.

CATHOLICUS JUVENIS.

1. Plea for National Holydays, by LORD J. MANNERS.

The poor, we are sure, will be glad to hear that a Member of Parliament has raised his voice in their behalf for holydays. At present we fear it is with them very much "all work and no play." Lord John Manners has stepped forward, and, like a true Churchman,

suggests that the holydays of the Church shall be kept as holydays. At present, the poor scarcely know what is meant by the Church holydays. We hope the time may come when they will learn something about them practically. In the meanwhile they may consult their prayer books; count over the red letter days those days, viz. that are marked in the Church Calendars in red letters, and picture to themselves what a boon they would get, if every one of these days, or half of every one, was devoted to the purpose for which the Church intends them, viz. public worship, cessation from hard labour, and opportunity of relaxation and innocent enjoyment to all. When will the poor understand and feel that the Church is their best and truest friend, that she it is who would make all that live by her rules happy on earth, and blessed hereafter in heaven. The time may come, we pray it may, when the English nation will cast away from among them the miserable heresies and schisms that at present exist among us, and return again as a united people to the bosom of their Holy Mother.

Correspondence.

To the Editor of the Christian Magazine.

DEAR SIR,- Our parson has been catechising the school children all through Lent, in the afternoon service after second lesson. I like this a good deal better than afternoon sermons, because I learn more from it. Sermons are sometimes difficult to understand, the parsons shoot over our heads, they dont hit us. In catechising they dont do this. The parson takes a subject, and he dissects it, so to say, bit by bit, and when he has done with it, I understand it all. Before this

Lent I was not half aware of some of the doctrines of the Church the new birth in baptism, the real presence in the sacrament of the LORD'S supper, the sin of dissenting from the Church, and many other things. I only wish he would go on catechising through the year, and they tell me that he ought to do so, for I hear that the only proper place for a sermon is during the communion service, in the morning.

SOCIETY FOR PROPAGATING THE GOSPEL IN FOREIGN PARTS, AND THE CHURCH MISSIONARY SOCIETY.

To the Editor of the Christian Magazine.

; one

SIR, Both these societies profess to be Church societies is so, and the other is not. The Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts obeys the bishops, and the other does not. The Church Missionary Society has lately refused to recognise the authority of the Bishop of Madras, and has turned off one of their missionaries against the bishop's consent, because he, the missionary, wished to act like a Churchman, and to follow the directions of the prayer book. I hate dissensions altogether, but like to have things set before one in a true straightforward way, and as the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel is what it professes to be, a Church society, I will support it, and as the other society is not what it professes to be, I shant support it. I shall do the same with regard to the Curates' Aid Society, which calls itself a Church society and acts upon Church principles. I shall support it, and have nothing to do with another certain society, which wishes to act even above the bishops.

I am, sir, faithfully yours,

A CONSTANT READER.

To the Editor of the Christian Magazine. SIR,Our Sally will go after popular preachers. Now, our clergyman preaches very good sermons, but he is not popular does not draw, as they call it, and so Sally goes after every strange preacher that comes. It is of no use telling her that it is not the preacher that makes the Christian. She thinks it is, and so she trusts to him, and the consequence is that she is growing no better a Christian than she was, and I am afraid indeed she's getting worse. Will you just say a word or two about this popular preacher hunting in one of your next numbers?

Yours humbly,

MARTHA E-.

To the Editor of the Christian Magazine.

SIR, You will be glad to hear, I think, that the clergy in Scotland are turning the black gown out of their churches, and preaching in surplices. The gown, they tell me, came from Geneva, which is quite enough for me to dislike it.

Yours,

AN OLD-FASHIONED CHURCHMAN.

THE ANNALS OF BIRCH CHAPEL.

(Continued from page 102.)

CHAPTER II.-THE HONOURED FOUNDER.

Glad were the vales, and every cottage hearth;
The Shepherd Lord was honoured more and more;
And, ages after he was laid in earth,

The GOOD LORD CLIFFORD was the name he bore.
WORDSWORTH.

THE chronicles from which these annals are extracted, although, as we have already said, chiefly consisting of records made at the various periods when the several events occurred, contain copious accounts of the first foundation of the chapel, and also frequent notices of the family which at a very early period, and for several hundred years, was seated at Birch; the origin, however, of this family is of such remote antiquity that it is impossible to assign the exact date of its first settler; but ancient deeds are still in existence (copies of which may be seen in the Chetham Library, in Manchester), which confirm the accounts given in these our records that the family increased their possessions in the beginning of the thirteenth century, for these deeds contain a grant from "Matthew Son of Matthew de Haversage to Matthew de Birchis of land in Hindley Birchis and pannage in the Wood of Withington for his Swine, and free hopper of all his mills within his fee of Withington;" which grant is attested by Sir Geoffry de Chetham, Sir

CHRISTIAN MAGAZINE, No. XXII.

VOL. II.-L

Adam de Bury, Richard de Trafford, William de Didesbury, and others.

Of this Matthew de Birch it is related, that in the chivalrous days of our Richard the First, when all Europe was in arms for the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre, he had accompanied the Knight of Withington, Matthew de Haversage, to the Holy Land as his Esquire, where, while valiantly fighting under the banners of the Lion-hearted King, the Knight fell grievously wounded by the swords of the Infidels, and would have perished, but for the faithful and courageous conduct of his devoted Esquire, who at the imminent risk of his life bore away the body of his master from the field, and for many months carefully attended him in his slow recovery from his wounds; and afterwards, when, having fallen into the hands of the enemy they were sold into slavery, he, by his brave constancy and devoted services, alleviated the bitterness of his sorrows, and cheered his broken spirit; and eventually, after years of absence from his native land, the Knight returned "a sadder and a wiser man," and being without immediate heirs, he made the above grant to his faithful Esquire, in grateful acknowledgment of his zealous attachment and devoted services.

Nor did the stedfast-hearted Esquire himself fail to learn that "sweet are the uses of adversity," but manifested by his religious acts his value for religious ordinances. Whatever may now be thought of the superstition of those who left endowments "for the good of their souls," and for the saying of masses after they were dead, it must at least be allowed that they acted up to the light that they had, and with a noble and self-denying generosity, unknown to modern days, gave to GOD and His Church, and consecrated for ever, for the purpose of divine worship, ample portions of their earthly possessions as the Church directed. The Church may have been in error on this point and on some others also, as no doubt she was, but is it not