Note vii — INTRODUCTION.
Reading edition
It would be very interesting to trace the precise period when the late culpable neglect of Church discipline (more especially in observing the duty of daily prayer in churches) began to be generally prevalent. It would seem to be soon after, and not before, the year 1720. The author has now lying before him a daily journal kept by a collateral ancestor, who was curate of Garstang Church-Town, an agricultural district of this county, in the years 1723–4–5, from which it appears that, even in that retired district, prayers were then said in the church on all Wednesdays and Fridays, and all Saints’ days and Holydays throughout the year. The labour of a curate then, (for the vicar was non-resident,) was such as is seldom surpassed even by the often almost intolerable toils of the present day. The following is a specimen of the journal referred to:—