This volume professes to be "A Familiar Analysis of the Calendar of
the Church of England," by explaining and illustrating its Fasts and
Festivals, &c., in the form of Question and Answer. The reader will
not look for novelty in such a work. The editors of Time's Telescope,
Clavis Calendaria, the Every-day Book, &c., have been too long and too
laboriously employed in illustrating every point of the year's history,
to lead us to expect any new attraction. Indeed, the preface of the
present work does not profess to furnish any such inducement, the editor
resting his claim on the cheapness of his book in comparison with
the Every-day Book. This is rather an ungracious recommendation: the
"Analysis" consists of less than three hundred pages, and is sold
for five or six shillings; but these three hundred pages only equal
seventy-five pages of the Every-day Book, or less than five sheets,
which the public know may be purchased for fifteen-pence. One of the
pretensions of the "Analysis" is its condensed form, but we suspect
Mr. Valpy's _Epitomizing_ press would reduce the editor's three hundred
pages to seventy-five. It is a thankless office to be obliged to speak
thus of a book on which some pains have been bestowed. Now, had it
been printed within the compass of an eighteen-penny or two shilling
catechism, the desired object would have been obtained; but, as it
appears, in the type of a large church prayer-book, what may have been
gained in arrangement, must be paid for in paper and print, so that no
good purpose is ultimately effected.
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