The Progress of Morals: Day 8 (and Penultimate)
Number of sermons read: 9 + 1 tract (this brings the total to 90)
Date range: 1865-1877
Authors of interest: Francis Close, the Dean of Carlisle.
Running themes: Ritualism, dangers thereof; the confessional; Catholicism/Ritualism = Judaism (or a corrupted version of same); the Mass.
Points of interest: Today mostly saw people fulminating against Ritualism--that is, the emerging Anglo-Catholic movement. In some ways, even more interesting than the reading was my discovery that anti-Catholic sermons go kaflooey (yes, yes, a technical term, I know) in the 1880s and 1890s; there are still some to be found, but the number drops off very abruptly. Anti-Catholic novels, meanwhile, are still going strong.
Other excitement: Thanks to a reader of this blog, I got to take a trek into the British Library stacks--where I saw many books. Very many books. An overwhelming number of books. Cool, as we Yanks like to say. Clearly, I must come back soon...