cipal differences between this and the Roman liturgy * are stated to be followed in the Common Prayer Book of our church, so that the reformers, when they translated and made selections from the services of the church of Rome, really reduced back the form of prayers to a nearer conformity to our more ancient liturgies.

§. 6. The arrival of the heathen Saxons overturned the ecclesiastical as well as civil government, and their barbarity spread such devastation through the land, that Christianity was confined to those mountainous districts where the Britons still retained their liberty. But the records of these times furnish little more than the mere detail of uninteresting events.

Christianity was again introduced into England, now become Saxon, by the arrival of St. Augustin, in 596. The comparative tranquillity which had for some time prevailed throughout the island, and the marriage of Ethelbert, king of Kent, with Britha, daughter of Charibert, king of Paris, had prepared the country for its reception. She was allowed the free exercise of her religion; and her chaplain, a French bishop, had openly performed the ceremonies of the church, thus softening down that animosity

c These consisted in a confession of sins, wherewith the ser vice began ; in proper prefaces, which were introduced for certain days before the consecration of the elements ; in several expressions which mark that the doctrine of transubstantiation had not then been received; and in the attention to singing paid in the Roman church.

* Stillingfleet, 232.

towards Christianity, which a bloody struggle against its professors had excited in the minds of the Saxons. Nor, in speaking of their conversion, must we neglect to take into account the growing dissatisfaction which heathens, as they advance in civilization, must always feel towards their former superstitions, even when they continue to observe them; a disgust which the Saxons seem frequently to have displayed*. Gregory I. came to the papacy in 590, and soon put into execution a determination which he had forined while in a private station. He had been struck with the personal beauty of some English slaves whom he happened to see at Rome, and made the resolution of trying to convert their fellow countrymen; an attempt which he would have begun in his own person, if circumstances had not prevented him. It was in order to fulfil this benevolent design, that he afterwards despatched St. Augustin with forty monks, who, having obtained interpreters in France, landed in Kent, and was permitted to settle in Canterbury, and to undertake the conversion of the inhabitants.

9. 7. The success of these missionaries was so great, that Augustin was consecrated archbishop of England by the archbishop of Arles, and more ecclesiastics were sent to his assistance, accompanied with presents of books, and other articles of which

a Wanley has given a catalogue of the books sent by Gregory. These were, 1. A Bible, adorned with some leaves of a

they might stand in need; and among these, relics were not forgotten. They received at the same time orders from Rome, which directed them to accommodate, as much as possible, the festivals of the church to the seasons of heathen amusement and feasting b. The scheme of an ecclesiastical

purple and rose colour, in two volumes. 2. The Psalter of St. Augustin, with the Creed, Pater Noster, and several Latin hymns. 3. Two copies of the Gospels, with the Ten Canons of Eusebius prefixed; one of which Elstob believed to be in the Bodleian library, and the other at Cambridge, p. 42. 4. Another Psalter, with hymns. 5. A volume containing legends on the sufferings of the apostles, with a picture of our Saviour in silver, in a posture of blessing. 6. Another volume on the martyrs, which had on the outside a glory, silver gilt, set round with crystals and beryls. 7. An Exposition of the Epistles and Gospels, which had on the cover a large beryl surrounded with crystals. Augustin also brought Gregory's Pastoral Care, which Alfred translated. See Elstob, p. 39–43 ; and Wanley, 172, whose description is taken from Thomas de Elmham, a monk of Augustin's Abbey, in the time of Henry V. See also Cave, Hist. Lit. p. 431. Turner's Ang. Sax. p. 332. i.

b This circumstance may account for the retention of many Saxon names in matters connected with religion. Thus Yule, the old name for Christmas, is derived from Jule, a Saxon feast at the winter solstice; and Easter from the goddess Eostre, who was worshipped with peculiar honours in April. Lent signifies spring. From the deities Tiw,Woden, Thunre, Friga, and Saterne, are derived the names of the days of the week. See Turner's AS. i. 213. Superstition has probably borrowed from the same source. Luck probably comes from a Saxon deity, Loke ; (Turner, i. 226. 216. 13;) Deuce from certain demons called Dusii by thc Gauls. Ochus Bochus, a magician and demon, and Neccus, a malign deity who frequented waters, may be the origin of the names Hocus Pocus and Old Nick. The common derivation of Hocus Pocus, from a rapid pronouncing of hoc est corpus, is hardly admissible.

establishment, which was to consist of two archbishops, each having under them twelve suffragans, was also transmitted to them, but seems never to have been adopted*.

Augustin before his death †, which took place about 605, tried to bring the churches of the British into unity with that over which he presided, and insisted on three concessions only. That they should keep Easter at the Roman time, should use the forms of that church in baptizing, and preach to the Saxons. His efforts however were unavailing, and he was rejected for a supposed want of apostolical humility, though he had performed a miracle in attestation of his ministry. The point at issue seems really to have been, whether the British prelates should submit to Augustin and Rome. The question about the time of observing Easter was also discussed in the council of Whitby §, where Oswi decided it in favour of the Roman method, because both parties agreed that St. Peter kept the keys of heaven, and that he had used the Roman method of computing c. (A. D. 664.)

c The question of the time of keeping Easter long agitated the Christian community. The eastern church kept it according to the Jewish ritual, on the fourteenth moon of that lunation which occurred after the vernal equinox, whether it were Sunday or no: in 197. Victor, bishop of Rome, excommunicated them for so doing. They were in consequence called quarto decimani. In order to avoid any coincidence with the

* Lingard, Ang. Sax. Church, p. 14. Henry, Hist. Eng. iii. 194.

§. 8. In 668, Theodore, a native of Tarsus in Cilicia *, was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury, on the nomination of Vitalian the then pope; a step which he was induced to take on the death of Wighart, who, with most of his companions, was destroyed by the plague at Rome, where he had been sent in order to be consecrated. Theodore was very serviceable to the British church by the learning which he and his friend Adrian introduced, and

Jews as to the day of keeping this feast, most of the western churches ran into the opposite extreme, and in those years in which the Jewish passover occurred on a Sunday, they kept the Easter-day on its octave. The council of Nice (325) decided that it was to be kept on a Sunday, but as the British church which received its canons kept Easter on the fourteenth, when it happened to be a Sunday, it seems probable that the expression of the Nicene canon was originally so general as not to decide this point, and that the great nicety in avoiding the day of the Jewish passover originated with Rome. The church at this same period generally adopted the Metonic cycle of nineteen years, by which Easter was newly calculated in the Tables of Eusebius of Cæsarea, and rejected the cycle of eighty-four years, which was very faulty and derived from the Jews. The question in England was the general one of keeping Easter as the Roman church did. The difference consisted in two points : the British churches seem not to have used the same cycle, probably that of eighty-four years, and to have kept Easter on the fourteenth, if that day happened to be a Sunday. (Fuller, p. 68.) This had arisen from the separation of the British church from the rest of the world during the troubles in England, which succeeded the council of Nice, of which they had adopted, in all probability, merely the general rules. The churches of Northumbria having been converted by Scotch missionaries retained the British forms. See a note in Johnson's Canons, 673. i. d.

* Collier, p. 100.