ecker in 1750 recommending his
clergy to keep up the old practice, but to guard it from abuse, and to
use the thanksgivings, prayers, and sentences enjoined by Queen
Elizabeth.[1039] At Wolverhampton, until about 1765, 'the sacrist,
resident prebendaries, and members of the choir, assembled at morning
prayers on Monday and Tuesday in Rogation Week, with the charity
children bearing long poles clothed with all kinds of flowers then in
season, and which were afterwards carried through the streets of the
town with much solemnity, the clergy, singing men and boys, dressed in
their sacred vestments, closing the procession, and chanting in a grave
and appropriate melody the "Benedicite." The boundaries of the parish
were marked in many points by Gospel trees, where the Gospel was
read.'[1040]

Days appointed by authority of the State for services of humiliation or
of thanksgiving were far more frequent in the earlier part of the last
century than they are now. In King William's time there were monthly
fasts throughout the war, every first Wednesday in the month being thus
set apart.[1041] Thus also, during the period when success after success
attended the arms of Marlborough, there were never many months passed by
without a day of thanksgiving. During the civil wars of the preceding
century fast days had been very frequent. To a certain extent no doubt
they had been used on either side as political weapons of party; but
they were also genuinely congenial to the excited religious feeling of
the nation, solemn appeals to the overruling power which guides the
destinies of men. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, although
religious energies were so far more languid than they had been in the
preceding age, the great war that was raging on the Continent was still
regarded somewhat in the light of a crusade. Not that it inspired
enthusiasm, or awoke any spirit of romance. There was no such
high-strung emotion in those who anxiously watched its progress. Still
it was generally felt to be a struggle in which great religious
principles were involved. The Protestant interest and the religious
future of the Church and State of England were felt to be deeply
concerned in its ultimate issues. And thus a good deal of
half-religious, half-political feeling was centred on these appointed
days of solemn fast or thanksgiving. The prayer for unity, calling upon
the people to take to heart the dangers they were in by their unhappy
divis