There was a time, since the worship of images, (and happy would it have been if the religious habits of the country had thenceforth stood fixed,) when appropriate texts adorned the walls of the dwelling-rooms, and children received at night a father's blessing;--and "let us worship God" was said with solemn air, by the head of the household; and churches were resorted to daily; and "the parson in journey" gave notice for prayers in the hall of the inn--"for prayers and provender," quoth he, "hinder no man;" and the cheerful angler, as he sat under the willow-tree, watching his quill, trolled out a Christian catch. "Here we may sit and pray, before death stops our breath;" and the merchant (like the excellent Sutton, of the Charter House) thought how he could make his merchandize subservient to the good of his fellow-citizens and the glory of his God, and accordingly endowed some charitable, and learned, and religious foundation, worthy of the munificence of a crowned head; and the grave historian (Lord Clarendon himself does so) chose a text in his Bible as a motto for his chapter on politics; and religion, in short, reached unto every place, and, like Elisha stretched on the dead child, (to use one of Jeremy Taylor's characteristic illustrations), gave life and animation to every part of the body politic. But years rolled on; and the original impulse given at the Reformation, and augmented at the Rebellion, to undervalue all outward forms, has silently continued to prevail, till, with the form of godliness, (much of it, up doubt, objectionable, but much of it wholesome), the power in a considerable degree expired too. Accordingly, our churches are now closed in the week-days, for we are too busy to repair to them; our politicians crying out, with Pharaoh, "Ye are idle, ye are idle; therefore would ye go and do sacrifice to the Lord." Our cathedrals, it is true, are still open; but where are the worshippers? Instead of entering in, the citizen avails himself of the excellent clock which is usually attached to them, sets his watch, and hastens upon 'Change, where the congregation is numerous and punctual, and where the theological speculations are apt to run in Shylock's vein pretty exclusively. If a church will answer, then, indeed, a joint-stock company springs up; and a church is raised with as much alacrity, and upon the same principles, as a play-house. The day when the people brought their gifts is gone by. The "_solid temples_," that heretofore were built as if not to be dissolved till doomsday, have been succeeded by thin emaciated structures, bloated out by coats of flatulent plaster, and supported upon cast-metal pegs, which the courtesy of the times calls pillars of the church. The painted windows, that admitted a dim religious light, have given place to the cheap house-pane and dapper green curtain. The front, with its florid reliefs and capacious crater, has dwindled into a miserable basin.