Number the classes in the Sunday-school. Divide the library into as many sections or alcoves as you have classes. There must be at least as many books in each alcove as there are scholars in any class. A separate catalogue of each alcove should be made and designated as section A, B, C, etc.
Erasive tablets may be easily procured. On one side may be written the names and numbers of the books in each section, and the other side used to record the numbers of the books selected. This being done, after the Sunday-school is opened, let the librarian or assistant give a catalogue of a section to each class; section A to class 1, section B to class 2, etc.
The teachers will then select books for the class, and mark the numbers on the tablet. The librarian collects the tablets and carries to each class the books selected. The teacher notes the number of the book against the name of the child who receives it in his class-book. The next Sunday, let the books be first collected and returned to their places. The catalogues are then given out. Those who chose from selection A before, should now have section B, and so on in rotation. Thus all will in turn select from each section of the library, and the books are distributed in a short time, without noise or confusion.
How shall the books be selected? This is not an easy task. Many have been deterred from starting a library on account of the difficulty in making this selection. In view of this, we have prepared a catalogue suitable for a parochial and Sunday-school library, which the reader can find in our advertising pages. These are put down at the lowest terms, and are selected with care, as the most suitable to make a beginning with. As funds increase, others can be added from time to time.
The Comedy Of Convocation. [Footnote 54]
[Footnote 54: The Comedy of Convocation in the English Church, in Two Scenes. Edited by Archdeacon Chasuble, D.D. 8vo, pp. 135. London: William Freeman.]
Satire without bitterness or rancor is a phenomenon in literature of which the world has seen few examples, and genuine, religious satire has been so rare, that we can hardly recall a single unexceptionable specimen. There was a day, to be sure, when every poet held it a part of his profession to lacerate with the weapon of his wit, or with the rhymed invective which too often passed for wit, whatever creed happened at the time to be most unpopular. Some few even of the great masters of verse, like Dryden and Butler, trenched upon the domain of religious controversy; but Dryden's Hind and Panther and Religio Laici are rather dogmatical poems than satires, and Butler's Hudibras, which is pure satire, is aimed less at a religious sect than at a political party. Here we have, however, a prose satire in the Church of England, which is one of the most admirable specimens of that class of literature in our own or any other language. It is sharp without unkindness; it contains not a syllable of invective; it is honest; it is logical; the wit is radiant; the fun is overpowering; and the application is irresistible. Volumes could not expose the preposterous errors of Anglicanism with half the effect produced by this little pamphlet. The troubles and perplexities of the English divines, the absurdities of the privy council, the purposeless debates of convocations, the conflict of beliefs, the uncertainty of dogmas, the vain theories of deans and doctors, the darkness, the wavering, the inconsistency, the worldliness of the Anglican Church, are pictured in this little comedy to the very life. Its appearance has created in London a profound sensation. Anglicans are smarting under the exposure, and everybody else is laughing at the ludicrous exhibition. The authorship is unknown, but we are inclined to believe that the current rumor which ascribes it to Dr. J. H. Newman is well founded. We doubt whether there is another man in England capable of writing it.
The Dramatis Personae embrace a number of deans, archdeacons, and lesser ecclesiastical dignitaries, and the first scene takes place in "the Jerusalem Chamber," where Convocation is in session.
"Doctor Easy rose to propose the question of which he had given notice at the previous sitting of Con 'Would it be considered heresy in the Church of England to deny the existence of God?' It had occurred to him that he should, perhaps, adopt a form more convenient for the present debate, if he put the question thus: 'Would a clergyman, openly teaching that there was no God, be liable to suspension?'