Pietas Quotidiana — Prayers & Meditations (Pocket Book, c.1826–1840)

Opening

The frontispiece shows a dying figure in bed, two mourners kneeling at the bedside, an angel descending from above. Beneath the plate, in neat copperplate, the caption reads: "Say unto my Soul, 'thy sins be forgiven, depart in peace.'" The artist is Henry Corbould. The engraver is C. Davenport. The book is a pocket prayer-book, small enough to sit in a coat pocket, bound in dark navy pebbled leather with gilt ruling on the boards and gilt-edged pages. The spine carries no title. Someone has pencilled 11 on the rear pastedown, and nothing else. The rest is between the reader and God.

The Book

Pietas Quotidiana: Prayers and Meditations for Every Day in the Week, and on Various Occasions; Being a Collection from the most Eminent Divines and Moral Writers was published in London by a consortium of three publishers: Peacock & Mansfield, Salisbury Square; Bowdery & Kerby, Oxford Street; and Charles Tilt, Fleet Street. The volume is undated on the title page. On the basis of the publishers' active dates — Peacock & Mansfield were operating from Salisbury Square in the 1820s and 1830s, Charles Tilt was at Fleet Street from c.1823 to 1844, and the printer William Willcockson is recorded at 13 Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane, in the 1843 London Post Office Directory — the date of publication is established as c.1826–1840, most likely in the early-to-mid 1830s. It was printed by W. Willcockson, Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane, London.

The volume is a miniature pocket book, small octavo format, bound in dark navy pebbled leather with gilt ruling on the boards and gilt edges to the leaves. The spine carries no printed title. The head and tail of the spine have a simple gilt crosshatch ornament matching the gilt ruling of the boards. The text is set in a small roman type with italic headings throughout, printed on cream-white wove paper that has mellowed to ivory. The frontispiece precedes the title page: a finely worked steel or copper engraving by C. Davenport after a drawing by Henry Corbould, depicting a deathbed scene with a descending angel, its caption taken from the absolution formula of Christian last rites.

The title page reads in full: PIETAS QUOTIDIANA / PRAYERS / AND / MEDITATIONS / FOR / Every Day in the Week / and on various occasions; / — BEING — / A Collection from the most Eminent / DIVINES AND MORAL WRITERS. / London: / Peacock & Mansfield, Salisbury Square: / Bowdery & Kerby, Oxford Street: / and Charles Tilt, Fleet Street. No editor, compiler, or author is named anywhere in the volume. The series title Pietas Quotidiana — Latin for Daily Piety — positions it firmly in the tradition of Anglican devotional pocket books designed for private daily use.

The Contents

The volume contains 112 pages of prayers, meditations, ejaculations, and hymns, arranged under five major sections:

Morning Prayers (pp. 7–23) — Prayers for each day of the week: Sunday (p. 8), Monday (p. 10), Tuesday (p. 11), Wednesday (p. 12), Thursday (p. 14), Friday (p. 16), Saturday (p. 19), with additional General Morning prayers (pp. 20–23).

Evening Prayers (p. 24) — Including a Prayer for Morning or Evening.

Occasional Prayers (pp. 26–77) — The longest section, covering the liturgical calendar and the full range of personal circumstances: New Year's Day (p. 26), Good Friday (p. 27), Easter Day (p. 28), Whit Sunday (p. 29), Christmas Day (p. 30), Birth-day (p. 31); and situational prayers: For Grace and Faith (p. 32), Omnipresence of God (p. 33), For spiritual Affections (p. 34), For Meekness of Temper (p. 35), Invocation to the Spirit (p. 36), For steadfast Resolution (p. 37), In Affliction (p. 38), In Depression of Spirits (p. 39), For Repentance (p. 41), Confession of Sin (p. 40), For Pardon of Sins (p. 43), For Aid of the Spirit (pp. 44–45), On reading the Scriptures (p. 46), Against worldly Thoughts (p. 47), In Sickness (pp. 48–49), For the Use of a Friend labouring under a painful and fatal Illness (p. 50), On going a Journey (p. 51), On Return from a Journey (p. 53), By Madame Elizabeth of France (p. 54), Various (pp. 55–77).

Ejaculations (p. 80) — Short aspiratory prayers: In Temptation, In Affliction, On falling into Sin, On Deliverance from Danger, On coming into Church, Preparatory Prayer (all p. 80).

Meditations (pp. 80–100) — On the Sense of Sin (p. 80), On Death (pp. 81–83), Death and Judgment (pp. 84–87), On the State of the Soul (p. 88), On the Immortality of the Soul (p. 89), Self-Condemnation (p. 90), In a wakeful Night (p. 92), Self-Examination Daily (p. 94), Self-Examination Weekly (pp. 95–100).

Lyrica Sacra (pp. 101–112) — Various Hymns.

The volume closes with FINIS and the printer's imprint: London: Printed by W. Willcockson, Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane.

The Artists

Henry Corbould (11 August 1787 – 9 December 1844) was an English artist and draughtsman, son of Richard Corbould and father of Edward Henry Corbould, making three successive generations of professional artists. Henry Corbould studied at the Royal Academy Schools under Fuseli, gaining the silver medal for life drawing, and formed friendships there with Flaxman, Stothard, and Chantrey. He was principally employed for three decades making drawings from ancient marbles in the British Museum — a project that was still in progress at his death in 1844 — and was also a prolific designer of book illustrations, of which the Dictionary of National Biography notes that some of his book illustrations are among the most graceful and effective productions of the age. He died at Robertsbridge, Sussex, of apoplexy, on 9 December 1844. [web:828]

The engraver credited as C. Davenport sculp. is Charles Davenport, an English stipple and line engraver active in the 1820s–1840s who worked frequently for London publishers on book frontispieces and illustrations, often in partnership with the Corbould family of designers. The deathbed frontispiece in this volume — a mourner kneeling, an angel descending, a figure prone — is characteristic of the sentimental neoclassical religious illustration common to Anglican pocket devotionals of the Regency and early Victorian period.

The Publishers

Peacock & Mansfield, Salisbury Square, London — Salisbury Square, off Fleet Street and Ludgate Hill, was a centre of London publishing and printing from the seventeenth century through the Victorian era. Peacock & Mansfield were religious and devotional publishers operating from this address in the 1820s–1830s.

Bowdery & Kerby, Oxford Street — A London bookselling and publishing firm at Oxford Street in the same period, co-publishing this volume alongside the other two imprints.

Charles Tilt, Fleet Street — Tilt operated his publishing and print-selling business from the corner of St. Bride's Avenue and Fleet Street from approximately 1823 to 1844, specialising in illustrated books and lithographic prints. The British Museum records him as a print publisher and dealer who worked very hard and became very successful. He was a significant figure in the illustrated book trade of the Regency and early Victorian period, known for small, well-produced volumes aimed at the literate middle-class market.

W. Willcockson, Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane — William Willcockson is recorded in the 1843 London Post Office Directory as printer at 13 Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane, with a second address at 134 Salisbury Square — directly connecting him to the Peacock & Mansfield address on the title page and confirming a close working relationship between publisher and printer on this volume. [web:823][web:827]

The Tradition

Pietas Quotidiana belongs to a long tradition of compiled Anglican devotional pocket books — collected from eminent Divines and Moral Writers rather than authored by a single hand — that runs from Bishop Ken's Morning and Evening Hymns (1695) through the pocket prayer books of the SPCK and the Regency-era compilations published by the London trade. The absence of a named editor or compiler is conventional for the genre: the authority rests with the tradition, not the individual. The inclusion of By Madame Elizabeth of France — a prayer attributed to Élisabeth of France, sister of Louis XVI, guillotined in 1794 — gives the volume an unusual French royalist and martyrological dimension entirely characteristic of the Anglophone Catholic-sympathetic piety of the Regency period.

The genre of ejaculations — short, intensely focused aspiratory prayers intended to be uttered silently in moments of sudden spiritual need (temptation, affliction, sin, danger) — has its roots in the Augustinian tradition of prayer as ejaculatio mentis in Deum, the casting of the mind toward God. Their inclusion alongside the formal daily office prayers and the extended meditations gives the volume a complete architecture of personal devotion, from the structured morning and evening rite to the spontaneous cry.

Bibliographic Details

Title: Pietas Quotidiana: Prayers and Meditations for Every Day in the Week, and on Various Occasions

Subtitle: Being a Collection from the most Eminent Divines and Moral Writers

Editor/Compiler: Anonymous

Publishers: Peacock & Mansfield, Salisbury Square; Bowdery & Kerby, Oxford Street; Charles Tilt, Fleet Street, London

Printer: W. Willcockson, 13 Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane, London

Date: Undated; c.1826–1840 (most likely early-to-mid 1830s)

Frontispiece: H. Corbould del. / C. Davenport sculp. — deathbed scene with descending angel

Frontispiece caption: "Say unto my Soul, 'thy sins be forgiven, depart in peace.'"

Rear endpaper note: 11 (pencil)

Binding: Dark navy pebbled leather, gilt ruling on boards, gilt page edges

Format: Pocket 8vo, 112 pp