Sabaoth," or of "Hosts;" is this a reasonable name for one supposed to be a "God of peace?" The elder Jewish and the Christian ideas of God here come into direct collision: according to one, "the Lord is a man of war" (Ex. xv.), while the other represents him as "the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace" (Isai. ix.). The _Te Deum_ midway changes the object of its song, and addresses itself to the Son instead of to the Father. How far this is permissible is much disputed, for certain it is that in the early ages of Christianity prayer was addressed to the Father _only_, and that one of the Fathers* sharply rebukes those who pray to the Son, since they thereby deprive the Father of the honour due to Him alone. How this can be, when Father and Son are one, we do not pretend to explain. Then ensue those curious details regarding Christ which we shall touch upon in dealing later with the Apostles' Creed. We find ourselves, presently, asking to be kept "this day without sin;" yet, we are perfectly well aware, all the time, that God will do nothing of the kind, and that all Christians believe that they sin every day. Why does the Church teach her children to sing this in the morning, and then prepare a "confession" for the evening, unless she feels perfectly sure that God will pay no attention to her prayer? The wearisome reiteration in the _Benedicite_ is so thoroughly recognised that it is very seldom heard in the church, while the _Benedictus_ (Luke i.) is open to the same charge of unreality as is the _Venite_, that it is a song for Jews only. * Origen. Many other faults and absurdities might be pointed cut which disfigure Morning Prayer, even if the whole idea of prayer be left untouched. The prayers of the-Prayer-Book are dishonouring to God from their childishness, their unreality, their folly, their conflict with sound knowledge. Allowing that prayer may be reasonable, these prayers are unreasonable; allowing that prayer may be reverent, these prayers are irreverent; allowing that prayer may be sincere, these prayers are insincere. They are fragments of an earlier age transplanted into the present, and they are as ludicrous as would be men walking about in our streets to-day clad in the armour of the Middle Ages, the ages of Darkness and of Prayer. EVENING PRAYER. The Church, in her wisdom, fearing that the quaint conceits and impossibilities which we have referred to, the-- "Jewels which adorn the spouse of the eternal glorious King,"