In those months, indeed, the Assembly was unusually active over its main work. For, though we have seen chiefly the spray of its miscellaneous interferences with affairs, it must be remembered that it had been called together for a vast mass of substantial work, and that it had been steadily prosecuting that work, in Committees, Sub-committees, and the daily meetings of the whole body. The work expected by Parliament from the Assembly consisted of (1) the compilation of a _Confession of Faith_, or _Articles of Religion_, which should supersede the Thirty-nine Articles, and be the Creed of the new National Church of England about to be established; (2) the composition of a _Catechism_ or _Catechisms_, which should be a manual or manuals for the instruction of the people, and especially the young, in the theology of the Articles; (3) the devising of a _Frame of Discipline or Church-government_, to come in lieu of Episcopacy, and form the constitution of the new National Church; and (4) the preparation of a _Directory of Worship_, which should supplant the Liturgy, &c., and settle the methods and forms to be adopted in worship, and on such occasions as baptisms, marriages, and funerals. Here was a mass of work which, at the ordinary rate of business in ecclesiastical councils, might well keep the Assembly together for two or three years. What amount of progress had they made at the date at which we have now arrived? Naturally, on first meeting, they had begun with the business of the new Articles, or Confession of Faith. The particular form in which, by the order of Parliament, they had addressed themselves to this business, was that of a careful revision of the Thirty-nine Articles. With tolerable unanimity (_antè_, pp. 5, 6 and 18,19), they had gone on in this labour for three months, or till Oct. 12,1643; by which time they had Calvinized fifteen of the Articles. [Footnote: Whoever wants to compare the Westminster Assembly's Calvinized Version of the first fifteen Articles with the original Articles will find the two sets printed conveniently in parallel columns in _History of the Westminster Assembly of Divines_ (1842), published at Philadelphia, U.S., by the "Presbyterian Board of Publication."] Then, however, they had been interrupted in this labour. The Scottish League and Covenant having come into action, and the Scottish Commissioners having become an influence at the back of the English Parliament, the Assembly had been ordered to proceed to what seemed the more immediately pressing businesses of the new Model of Church-government and the new Directory of Worship. The business of a Confession of Faith thus lying over till it could be resumed at leisure, the Assembly had, for more than a year, been occupied with the Church-government question and the Directory. What tough and tedious work they had had with the Church-government question we have seen. Still, even in this question they had made progress. Beating the