Form or Freedom.

form or reedom.

FIVE COLLOQUIES ON LITURGIES,

REPORTED BY

A MANCHESTER CONGREGATIONALIST.

Far

"Do I then say that I am to be influenced by no interest?
from it? There is an interest of truth: or how could there be a love
of truth? And that a love of truth for its own sake, and merely as
truth, is possible, my soul bears witness to itself in its inmost recesses."
-COLERIDGE, Aids to Reflection.

"For any person so to sit down and satisfy himself with his book prayer or some prescript form, as to go no further, this were still to remain in his infancy and not to grow up in his new nature; this would be as if a man who had once need of crutches should always afterward make use of them, and so necessitate himself to a continual impotence. It is the duty of every Christian to grow and increase in all the parts of Christianity, as well gifts as graces; to exercise and improve every holy gift, and not to stifle any of those holy abilities wherewith God hath endowed him. Now, how can a minister be said to live suitable to these rules who doth not put forth himself in some attempt and endeavours of this kind? And then, besides, how can such a man suit the desires unto several emergencies? WHAT ONE SAYS OF COUNSEL TO BE HAD FROM BOOKS MAY BE FITLY APPLIED TO THIS PRAYER BY BOOK: IT IS COMMONLY OF ITSELF SOMETHING FLAT AND DEAD, FLOATING FOR THE MOST PART TOO MUCH IN GENERALITIES, AND NOT PARTICULAR ENOUGH FOR EACH SEVERAL OCCASION. THERE IS NOT THAT LIFE AND VIGOUR IN IT TO ENGAGE THE AFFECTIONS AS WHEN IT PROCEEDS IMMEDIATELY FROM THE SOUL ITSELF." **-Bishop Wilkins' "Discourse Concerning the Gift of Prayer," etc., 1653.

*

TO THE

ASSOCIATED

CONGREGATIONALIST MINISTERS AND PASTORS

OF

MANCHESTER AND THE NEIGHBOURHOOD,

THESE

Colloquies on Eiturgies ”

ARE

AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED, WITH GRATEFUL RECOLLECTIONS

OF THE

PLEASANT AND PROFITABLE HOURS

SPENT IN THEIR FELLOWSHIP AT THEIR

MONTHLY REUNIONS, BY

THE REPORTER.