Notes for a Short History of the Book of Common Prayer

[1] First printed in the American Church Review, April, 1881.

[2] Much confusion of thought and speech in connection with our ecclesiastical legislation grows out of not keeping in mind the fact that here in America the organic genetic law of the Church, as well as of the State, is in writing, and compacted into definite propositions. We draw, that is to say, a far sharper distinction than it is possible to do in England between what is constitutional and what is simply statutory. There is no function of our General Convention that answers to the "omnipotence of Parliament." This creative faculty was vacated once for all at the adoption of the Constitution.

[3] Conferences, p. 461.

[4] Principles of Divine Service, vol. i. p. 390.

[5] Church Quarterly Review, London, October, 1876.

[6] The votes of the House of Bishops are not reported numerically. In the House of Clerical and Lay Deputies the vote stood as follows: "Of the Clergy there were 43 Dioceses represented—Ayes, 33; nays, 9; divided, 1. Of the Laity there were 35 Dioceses represented—Ayes, 20; nays, 11; divided, 4."—Journal of Convention of 1880, p. 152.

[7] Church Eclectic for November, 1880.

[8] Remembering the deluge of "centennial" rhetoric let loose upon the country five years ago, another critic may well feel justified in finding in the language of the resolution what he considers "an unnecessary raison d'etre." But it is just possible that centennial changes rest on a basis of genuine cause and effect quite independent of the decimal system. A century covers the range of three generations, and the generation is a natural, not an arbitrary division of time. What the grandfather practises the son criticises and the grandson amends. This at least ought to commend itself to the consideration of the lovers of mystical numbers and "periodic laws."

[9] The real argument against the "driblet method" (by which is meant the concession of improvement only as it is actually conquered inch by inch) lies in what has been already said about the undesirability of frequent changes in widely used formularies of worship.

It may be true, as some allege, that a revision of the Prayer Book would shake the Church, but it is more likely that half a dozen patchings at triennial intervals would shatter it. After twenty years of this sort of piecemeal revision, a variorum edition of the Prayer Book would be a requisite of every well furnished pew.

The late Convention has been twitted with inconsistency on the score of having negatived outright the proposal for a Commission to overhaul the Constitution of the Church while consenting to send the Prayer Book to a committee for review. Discernment would be a better word than inconsistency, for although on grounds of pure theory the Constitution and the Prayer Book seem to stand in corresponding attitudes as respects methods of amendment, in practice the difference between the two is very wide. Triennial changes in the letter of the Constitution (and these have often been made) involve no inconvenience to anybody, for the simple reason that that document must of necessity be reprinted with every fresh issue of the Journal. Old copies do not continue in use, except as books of reference, but old Prayer Books do hold their place in parish churches, and the spectacle of congregations trying to worship in unison with books some of which contained the reading of 1880, others that of 1883, and still others that of 1886 would scarcely edify. Theoretically, let it be freely granted, the "driblet method" of amendment is the proper one for both Prayer Book and Constitution, but the fact that the Convention had eyes to see that this was a case to which the maxims of pure mathematics did not apply should be set down to its credit, rather than its discredit.

[10] Reprinted together with a supplementary Letter in the Journal of the Convention of 1868.

[11] Dr. Coit's Letter of 1868, also reprinted in Journal of that year.

[12] See Book of Common Prayer according to the use of King's Chapel, Boston. Among the rhetorical crudities of this emasculated Prayer Book (from the title-page of which, by the way, the definite article has been with praiseworthy truthfulness omitted) few things are worse than the following from the form for the Burial of Children, a piece of writing which in point of style would seem to savor more of the Lodge than of the Church: "My brethren, what is our life? It is as the early dew of morning that glittereth for a short time, and then is exhaled to heaven. Where is the beauty of childhood? Where is [sic] the light of those eyes and the bloom of that countenance?" . . . "Who is young and who is old? Whither are we going and what shall we become?" And yet the author of this mawkish verbiage probably fancied that he was improving upon the stately English of the Common Prayer. It is a warning to all would-be enrichers.

[13] A list of the more noticeable Anglican works on Liturgies published during the period named, arranged in the order of their appearance, will serve to illustrate the accuracy of the statement made above, and may also be of value to the general reader for purposes of reference.

1832. Origines Liturgicae, William Palmer. 1833-41. Tracts for
the Times. 1840. Conferences on the Book of Common Prayer, Edward
Cardwell. 1843. The Choral Service of the Churches of England and
Ireland, John Jebb. 1844. The Ancient Liturgy of the Church of
England, William Maskell. 1845. Pickering's Reprints of the Prayer
Books of 1549, 1552, 1559, 1603, and 1662. 1846. Monumenta
Ritualia, William Maskell. 1847. Reliquiae Liturgicae, Peter
Hall. 1848. Fragmenta Liturgica, Peter Hall. 1849. Book of Common
Prayer with Notes legal and historical, A. J. Stephens. Manuscript
Book of Common Prayer for Ireland, A. J. Stephens. Tetralogia
Liturgica, John Mason Neale. 1853. Two Liturgies of Edward VI.,
Edward Cardwell. 1855. Principles of Divine Service, Philip
Freeman. History of the Book of Common Prayer, F. Proctor. 1858.
History of the Book of Common Prayer, T. Lathbury. 1859.
Directorium Anglicanum, J. Purchas. 1861. Ancient Collects,
William Bright. 1865. Liber Precum Publicarum, Bright and Medd.
1865. The Priest's Prayer Book. 1865. History of the Book of Common
Prayer, R. P. Blakeney. 1866. The Prayer Book Interleaved, Campion
and Beaumont. 1866. The Annotated Book of Common Prayer, J. H.
Blunt. 1870. The Liturgy of the Church of Sarum, Translated,
Charles Walker. 1870. The First Prayer Book of Edward VI. with
the Ordinal, Walton and Medd. 1872. Psalms and Litanies, Rowland
Williams. 1872. Notitia Eucharistica, W. E. Scudamore. 1875-80.
Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, Smith and Cheetham. 1876.
First Prayer Book of Edward VI., compared with the successive
Revisions, James Parker. 1877. Introduction to the History of the
successive Revisions of the Book of Common Prayer, James Parker.
1878. Liturgies—Eastern and Western, C. E. Hammond. 1880. The
Convocation Prayer Book.

[14] Tract No. 3. Thoughts respectfully addressed to the Clergy on alterations in the Liturgy.

[15] One of the most curious illustrations of the spread of Anglican ideas about worship now in progress is to be found in the upspringing in the very bosom of Scottish Presbyterianism of a CHURCH SERVICE SOCIETY. Two of the publications of this Society have lately fallen in the present writer's way. They bear the imprint of Wm. Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh, and are entitled respectively, A Book of Common Order, and Home Prayer. With questionable good taste the compilers have given to the former work a Greek and to the latter a Latin sub-title (Evxolioyiov and Suspiria Domestica). Both books have many admirable points, although, in view of the facts of history, there is a ludicrous side to this attempt to commend English viands to Northern palates under a thin garniture of Scottish herbs which probably has not wholly escaped the notice of the compilers themselves.

[16] See The Guardian (London), February 9, 1881.

[17] Unless "finally to beat down Satan under our feet," be reckoned an exception.

[18] Lectures on Justification, p 380.

[19] The rationale of this curious lapse is simple. The American revisers, instead of transferring the Commination Office in toto to the new book, wisely decided to engraft certain features of it upon the Morning Prayer for Ash-Wednesday. In the process, the fifty-first Psalm, which has a recognized place in the Commination, dropped out, instead of being transferred, as it should have been, to the proper psalms.

[20] See the Convocation Prayer Book.

[21] Prayer Book Interleaved, p. 65.

[22] A curious illustration of the sensitiveness of the Protestant Episcopal mind to anything that can be supposed even remotely to endanger our doctrinal settlement was afforded at the late General Convention, when the House of Deputies was thrown into something very like a panic by a most harmless suggestion with reference to the opening sentences of the Litany. A venerable and thoroughly conservative deputy from South Carolina had ventured to say that it would be doctrinally an improvement if the tenet of the double procession of the Holy Ghost were to be removed from the third of the invocations, and a devotional improvement if the language of the fourth were to be phrased in words more literally Scriptural and less markedly theological than those at present in use. Eager defenders of the faith instantly leaped to their feet in various parts of the House, persuaded that a deadly thrust had been aimed at the doctrine of the Trinity. Never was there a more gratuitous misconception. The real intrenchment of the doctrine of the Trinity, so far as the Litany is concerned, lies in the four opening words of the second and the five opening words of the third of the invocations, and these it had not been proposed to touch. In confirmation of this view of the matter, it is pertinent to instance the Book of Family Prayers lately put forth by a Committee of the Upper House of the Convocation of Canterbury. This manual provides no fewer than six different Litanies, all of them opening with addresses to the three Persons of the adorable Trinity, and yet in no one instance is the principle advocated by the deputy from South Carolina unrecognized. Every one of the six Litanies begins with language similar to that which he recommended. [See also in witness of the mediaeval use, which partially bears out Mr. McCrady's thought, the ancient Litany reprinted by Maskell from The Prymer in English. Mon. Hit. ii. p. 95.] If the Upper House of the Convocation of Canterbury, fondly supposed by us Anglicans to be the very citadel of sound doctrine, be thus tainted with heresy, upon what can we depend?

Polemical considerations aside, probably even the most orthodox would allow that the invocations of the Litany might gain in devotional power, while losing nothing in august majesty, were the third to run—O God the Holy Ghost, Sanctifier of the faithful, have mercy upon us miserable sinners. And the fourth as in Bishop Heber's glorious hymn, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, have mercy upon us miserable sinners. But all this is doctrinal and plainly ultra vires.

[23] A very natural explanation, by the way, of the fact, often noticed, that there is no petition in the Litany for an increase of the ministry.

[24] Here, i. e., in connection with Saints' Day services, would be an admirable opportunity for the introduction into liturgical use of the Beatitudes. What could possibly be more appropriate? And yet these much loved words of Christ have seldom been given the place in worship they deserve.

They do find recognition as an antiphon in the Liturgy of St. Chrysostom. To reassert a usage associated in the history of liturgies with the name of this Father of the Church and with his name only, would be to pay him better honor than we now show by three times inserting in our Prayer Book the collect conjecturally his—a thing the Golden-mouthed himself, when in the flesh, would not have dreamed of doing. "Once," he would have said, "is enough."

[25] The Priest's Prayer Book has 688 (!!) mostly juiceless.

[26] In connection with this clause there sprang up an animated and interesting debate in the House of Deputies as to the wisdom of thus seeming to cut off every opportunity for extemporary prayer in our public services. Up to this time, it was alleged, a liberty had existed of using after sermon, if the preacher were disposed to do so, the "free prayer" which before sermon it was confessedly not permitted him to have—why thus cut off peremptorily an ancient privilege? why thus sharply annul a traditional if not a chartered right?

At first sight this distinction between before and after sermon looks both arbitrary and artificial, but when examined there is found to be a reason in it. The sermon, especially in the case of emotional preachers, is a sort of bridge of transition from what we may call the liturgical to the spontaneous mood of mind, and if the speaker has carried his listeners with him they are across the bridge at the same moment with himself. The thing that would have been incongruous before, becomes natural after the minister has been for some time speaking less in his priestly than in his personal character.

The notion that the points at issue between the advocates of liturgical and the advocates of extemporaneous worship can be settled by a promiscuous jumbling together of the two modes, is a fond conceit, as the Reformed Episcopalians will doubtless confess when they shall have had time enough to make full trial of the following rubrics in their Prayer-book:

Then shall the Minister say the Collects and Prayers following in whole or in part, or others at his discretion.

Here may be used any of the occasional Prayers, or extemporaneous Prayer.

This is bad philosophy. It need not be said that such directions are undevotional—for doubtless they were piously meant; but it must be said that they are inartistic (if the word may be allowed), at variance with the fitness of things and counter to the instinct of purity. Formality and informality are two things that cannot be mingled to advantage. There is place and time for each. The secret of the power of liturgical worship is wrapped up with the principle of order. A certain majesty lies in the movement which is without break. On the other hand the charm of extemporaneous devotion, and it is sometimes a very real charm, is traceable to our natural interest in whatever is irregular, fresh, and spontaneous.

To suppose that we can secure at any given time the good effects of both methods by some trick of combination is an error—as well attempt to arrange on the same plot of ground a French and an English garden. If indeed Christian people could bring themselves to acknowledge frankly the legitimacy of both methods and provide amicably for their separate use, a great step forward in the direction of Church unity would have been achieved; but for a catholicity so catholic as this, public opinion is not yet ripe, and perhaps may not be ripe for centuries to come. Those who believe in the excellency of liturgies, while not believing in them as jure divino, would be well content in such a case to wait the working of the principle of the survival of the fittest.

[27] The able and fair-minded jurist who first hit upon this ingenious scheme for patching the Ratification has lately, with characteristic frankness, said substantially this under his own signature.

"The proper place for the amendment," he writes, "is at the end of the first rubric preceding the sentences of Scripture for both Morning and Evening Prayer, after the word Scripture, as everyone can see by looking." He adds: "This, however, is only a question of form, and ought not to interfere with the adoption of the amendment at the next Convention. It is to be hoped that the resolution for enrichment, so called, will present a variety of additions out of which an acceptable selection can be made; and when they are finally carried that the Book of Common Prayer will be not only the standard book, but a sealed book, so to speak, for as many generations as have passed since the present book was adopted."—Letter of the Hon. J. B. Howe of Indiana in The Churchman for January 29, 1881.

[28] See page 578 of Evangelical Catholic Papers. A collection of Essays, Letters, and Tractates from "Writings of Rev. Wm. Augustus Muhlenberg, D. D." during the last forty years.

The failure of this devout and venerated man to secure sundry much desired liturgical improvements (although it yet remains to be seen whether the failure has been total) was perhaps due to a certain vagueness inherent in his plans of reform. A clear vision of the very thing desired seems to have been lacking, or at least the gift of imparting it to others. But even as no man has deserved better of the American Episcopal Church than he, so it is no more than right that his deeply cherished wishes should be had in careful remembrance.

[29] Now a "black-letter day" in the English Calendar.

[30] The Convocation Prayer Book, in loc.

[31] Originally only an explanatory rubric. See Procter, p. 397.

[32] Let us hope that before long there may be devised some better way of providing relief for our Widows and Orphans than that of the indirect taxation of the singers of hymns.

[33] The Greek Office Books, it is said, fill eighteen quartos.

[34] In that naive and racy bit of English (omitted in our American book) entitled Concerning the Service of the Church, one of the very choicest morsels is the following: "Moreover, the number and hardness of the Rules called the Pie, and the manifold changings of the Service, was the cause, that to turn the Book only was so hard and intricate a matter, that many times there was more business to find out what should be read than to read it when it was found out."

[35] It may be wise to buttress the position taken with a quotation out of Dr. Coit.

"We really, however, do not see any necessity for either of these Services in American Books, as with us the Ordinal always, now, makes a part of the Prayer Book in all editions. It would be a saving to expunge them and no change would be necessary, except the introduction of such a litanical petition and suffrage with the Services for Deacons and Priests, as already exists in the Service for Bishops. The Church of England retains the Litany in her Ordinal, for that, until latterly, was printed in a separate book, and was not to be had unless ordered expressly. And yet with even such a practice she has but one Communion Service. We study cheapness and expedition in our day. They can both be consulted here, salvafide et salva ecclesia."—Report of 1844.

[36] First printed in The Church Review, 1886.

[37] The Rev. Dr. Orlando Hutton.

[38] Priest's Prayer Book, Fifth edition, pp. 238, 243, 281.

[39] The Prayer for Imprisoned Debtors is believed to be the only formulary actually dropped.

[40] The Church Quarterly Review for April, 1884, and July, 1884. The Church Times for August 29, 1884; also July 31, August 7, 14, 21, 28, September 4, 1885. The Guardian for July 20, 1885.

[41] Recall the "Additional Hymns" of 1868.

[42] This proposal of arbitration has occasioned so much innocent mirth that, in justice to the maker of it, attention should be called to the ambiguity of the language in which it is couched. The wording of the passage is vague. It is just possible that by "the question" which he would be content to submit to the judgment of the four specified men of letters, he means, not, as he has been understood to mean, the whole subject-matter of The Book Annexed, but only the abstract question whether verbal variations from the English original of the Common Prayer be or be not, on grounds of purity of style, desirable. Even if this be all that he means there is perhaps still room for a smile, but, at all events, he ought to have the benefit of the doubt.

[43] Discussions and Arguments, p. 341.

[44] "The list might be brought down as late as the authorities pleased to bring it, even to include, if they chose, such names as John Keble, James De Koven, and Ferdinand Ewer."—The Church Times for August 14, 1885.

[45] This form of absolution suggested as an alternate in The Book Annexed is taken from the source mentioned.

[46] The paper read by the Dean of Worcester dealt exclusively with the legal aspects of the question as it concerns the Church of England.

[47] The Rev. Edgar Morris Dumbleton (Rector of St. James's, Exeter).

[48] The Rev. George Venables (Hon. Canon of Norwich and Vicar of Great Yarmouth).

[49] The Rev. Arthur James Robinson (Rector of Whitechapel).

[50] See letter of "J. L. W." in The Southern Churchman for August 6, 1885.

[51] See letter of "Ritualist" in The Standard of the Cross for July 2, 1885.

[52] See the "Report of the Committee of the Council of the Diocese of Wisconsin," passim.

[53] The evident intention of the Joint Committee in the introduction of this Canticle was to make it possible to shorten the Morning Prayer on week-days, without spoiling the structure of the office, as is now often done, by leaving out one of the Lessons. It is certainly open to question whether a better alternate might not have been provided, but it is surprising to find so well furnished a scholar as the Wisconsin critic speaking of the Benedictus es Domine as a liturgical novelty, "derived neither from the Anglican or the more ancient service-hooks." As a matter of fact the Benedictus es Domine was sung daily in the Ambrosian Rite at Matins, and is found also in the Mozarabic Breviary.

[54] See Wisconsin Report, p. 5.

[55] See the precautions recommended in The Living Church Annual for 1886, p. 132, art. "Tabernacle."

[56] In this respect The Book Annexed may be compared to The Convocation Prayer Book published by Murray in 1880, for the purpose of showing what the English Book would be like if "amended in conformity with the recommendations of the Convocations of Canterbury and York, contained in reports presented to her Majesty the Queen in the year 1879."

[57] The Report was adopted.

[58] In addition to the Maryland Report we have now a still more admirable one from Central New York.

[59] Strangely enough the Elizabethan period, so rich in genius of every other type, seems to have been almost wholly barren of liturgical power. Men had not ceased to write prayers, as a stout volume in the Parker Society's Library abundantly evidences; but they had ceased to write them with the terseness and melody that give to the style of the great Churchmen of the earlier reigns so singular a charm.

[60] The liturgical manuscripts of Sanderson and Wren, made public only recently by the late Bishop of Chester, ought to be included under this head.

[61] Many of these "Treasuries," "Golden Gates," and the like, have here and there something good, but for the most part they are disfigured by sins against that "sober standard of feeling," than which, as a high authority assures us, nothing except "a sound rule of faith" is more important "in matters of practical religion." Of all of them, Scudamore's unpretentious little "Manual" is, perhaps, the best.

[62] For a conspectus of the various title-pages, see Keeling's Litugiae Britannicae, London, 1842.

[63] The question of a change in the name of the Church is a constitutional, and in no sense a liturgical question. Let it be considered at the proper time, and in a proper way, but why thrust it precipitately into a discussion to which it is thoroughly foreign?

[64] By the Maryland Committee.

[65] This paragraph was written before the author had been privileged to read Prof. Gold's interesting paper in The Seminarian. It is only proper to say that this accomplished writer and very competent critic does object emphatically to the theory that the opening Sentences are designed to give the key-note of the Service. But here he differs with Blunt, as elsewhere in the same paper he dissents from Freeman and from Littledale, admirably illustrating by his proper assertion of an independent judgment, the difficulty of applying the Vicentian rule in liturgical criticism. Such variations of opinion do, indeed, make against "science," but they favor good sense.

[66] Chambers's Translation.

[67] This is not to be understood as an acknowledgment that the doctrinal and philological objections to the formulary as it originally stood were sound and sufficient. On the lips of a Church which declares "repentance" to be an act whereby we "forsake sin," a prayer for time does not seem wholly inappropriate, while as for this use of the word "space" of which complaint was made, it should be noticed that King James's Bible gives us nineteen precedents for it; and the Prayer Book itself one.

[68] In The Book Annexed, as originally presented, there stood in this place the beautiful and appropriate psalm, Levavi oculos. But the experts declared that this would never do, since from time immemorial Levavi oculos had been a Vesper Psalm, and it would be little less than sacrilege to insert it in a morning service, however congruous to such a use the wording of it might, to an unscientific mind, appear. Accordingly the excision was made; but upon inquiry it turned out that the monks had possessed a larger measure of good sense, as well as a better exegesis, than the Convention had attributed to them, for Levavi oculos, it appears, besides being a Vesper psalm, stood assigned, in the Sarum Breviary, to Prime as well; the fact being that the psalm is alike adapted to morning and to evening use, and singularly appropriate both to the "going out" and the "coming in" of the daily life of man.

[69] See p. 6.

[70] "O Lord, bow thine ear," has been suggested as a substitute. It is in the words of Holy Scripture, it is the precise metrical equivalent of "O Lord, save the queen," and it is directly antiphonal to the versicle which follows.

There being no Established Church in the United States, it is doubtful whether any prayers for "rulers" are desirable, over and above those we already have. And if this point be conceded, the other considerations mentioned may be allowed to have weight in favor of "O Lord, bow thine ear."

[71] The Seminarian, 1886, pp. 29, 30.

[72] It may be well to throw, into a foot-note a single illustration of what might otherwise be thought an extravagant statement. The Rev. W. C. Bishop, writing in The Church Eclectic for February, 1884, says:

"The service of the Beatitudes proposed by the Committee is just one of 'fancy-liturgy making,' which ought to be summarily rejected. We have more than enough of this sort of thing already; the commandments, comfortable words, et hoc genus omne, are anything but 'unique glories' of our Liturgy. Anything of which we have exclusive possession is nearly certain to be a 'unique blunder,' instead of anything better, because the chances are a thousand to one that anything really beautiful or edifying would have been discovered by, and have commended itself to, some other Christians in the last two thousand years." If such is to be the nomenclature of our new "science," Devotion may well stand aghast in the face of Liturgies.

[73] See the Commination Office in the Prayer Book of the Church of England.

[74] Daniel's Codex Liturgicus, vol. iv. p. 343. Quoted in Dictionary of Christian Antiquities. The translation of makapismoi has been doubted; but Dr. Neale and Prof. Cheetham agree that the reference is to the BEATITUDES of the Gospel.

[75] Church Eclectic for April, 1884.

[76] The following will serve as an illustration:

The Anthem;

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall get mercy; blessed are the clean in the heart, for they shall see God.

The Versicle:

Lord hear my prayer.

The Answer:

And let my cry come to thee.

Let us pray.

Lord Jesu Christ, whose property is to be merciful, which art alway pure and clean without spot of sin; Grant us the grace to follow thee in mercifulness toward our neighbors, and always to bear a pure heart and a clean conscience toward thee, that we may after this life see thee in thy everlasting glory, which livest and reignest God, world without end. Amen.

[77] It is interesting and suggestive to observe with how much less frequency our attention is called to this paragraph of the Preface than to the later one which asserts historical continuity with the Church of England.

[78] Essays on Liturgiology, p. 226.

[79] The response proposed by the Commissioners ran, "Lord have mercy upon us, and make us partakers of this blessing," a prayer unobjectionable for substance, but painfully pedestrian in style.

[80] Notably one in which the responses are all taken from Psalm li.

[81] See Note at the end of this Paper.

[82] E. g.: "That it may please thee to send forth laborers into thy harvest, and to have mercy upon all men."

[83] See Report, pp. 6-9.

[84] "Strike it out," said the literalist of a certain committee on hymnody, many years ago, as he and his colleagues were sitting in judgment on Watts's noble hymn, "There is a land of pure delight." "Either strike out the whole hymn or alter that word, 'living.'

"'Bright fields, beyond the swelling flood,
Stand dressed in living green.'

What sense is there in 'living' green? It is the grass that lives, not the green." Happily the suggestion failed to find a seconder. But revisers, whose work is to be passed upon by ballot, may well be shy of idiomatic English. Take such a phrase as, "Now for the comfortless trouble's sake of the needy"; Lindley Murray, were he consulted, would have no mercy on it: and yet a more beautiful and touching combination of words is not to be found anywhere in the Psalter. It is the utter lack of this idiomatic characteristic that makes "Lambeth prayers" proverbially so insipid.

[85] See Report, p. 12.

[86] Quoted in The Church Eclectic for August, 1886.

[87] Prof. Gold in The Seminarian, p. 34.

[88] The Rev. Dr. Robert in The Churchman for July 17, 1886,

[89] Specious, because our continuity with the Church life of England is inestimably precious; impracticable, because there is no representative body of the English Church authorized to treat with us.

[90] This Prayer has been gathered from the Dirige in The Primer set forth by the King's Majesty and his Clergy, 1545; the same source (it is interesting to note) to which we trace the English form of the Collect for Purity at the beginning of the office.

[91] 1 Cor. iii. 9.

[92] Born into life!—man grows
Forth from his parents' stem,
And blends their bloods, as those
Of theirs are blent in them;
So each new man strikes root into a far foretime.
Born into life!—we bring

A bias with us here,
And, when here, each new thing
Affects us we come near;
To tunes we did not call our being must keep chime.
Empedocles on Etna.

[93] "Parliaments, prelates, convocations, synods may order forms of prayer. They may get speeches to be spoken upward by people on their knees. They may obtain a juxtaposition in space of curiously tessellated pieces of Bible and Prayer Book. But when I speak of the rareness and preciousness of prayers, I mean such prayers as contain three conditions—permanence, capability jot being really prayed, and universality. Such prayers primates and senates can no more command than they can order a new Cologne Cathedral or another epic poem."—The Bishop of Berry's Hampton Lectures, lect iv.

[94] The following catena is curious:

"Salute one another with an holy kiss."—Rom. xvi. 10.

"Greet ye one another with a kiss of charity."—1 Pet. v. 14.

"And let the bishop salute the church, and say: Let the peace of God be with you all.

"And let the people answer, And with thy spirit.

"And let the deacon say to all, Salute one another with a holy kiss.

"And let the clergy kiss the bishop; and of the laity, the men the men, and the women the women, and let the children stand by the Bema. "—The Divine Liturgy of St. Clement (Bretts's Translation, corrected by Neale).

"At Solemn High Mass, the deacon kisses the altar at the same time with the celebrating priest, by whom he is saluted with the kiss of peace, accompanied by these words, PAX TECUM."—Rubric of the Roman Missal.

"PAX OR PAXBREDE. A small plate of gold, or silver, or copper-gilt, enamelled, or piece of carved ivory or wood overlaid with metal, carried round, having been kissed by the priest, after the Agnus Dei in the Mass, to communicate the kiss of peace."—Pugin's Glossary.

St. George's Chapel, Windsor. "Item, a fine PAX, silver and gilt enamelled, with an image of the crucifixion, Mary and John, and having on the top three crosses, with two shields hanging on either side. Item, a ferial PAX, of plate of silver gilt, with the image of the Blessed Virgin."—Dugdale's Monasticon quoted in above Glossary.

"Ye who do truly and earnestly repent you of your sins, and are in love and charity with your neighbors, and intend to lead a new life . . . Draw near with faith, and take this holy sacrament to your comfort."—Shorter Exhortation in the Communion Office of the Prayer Book.

[95] A friend who heard the sermon preached has kindly sent me the following apt illustrations. They do not, indeed, come from history technically so-called, but they report the mind of one to whose eye the whole life of the Middle Ages was as an open book.

"There was now a pause, of which the abbot availed himself by commanding the brotherhood to raise the solemn chant, De profundis clamavi"—The Monastery, chap, xxxvii.

"'To be a guest in the house where I should command?' said the
Templar; 'Never! Chaplains, raise the psalm, Quare fremuerunt
Gentes? Knights, squires, and followers of the Holy Temple, prepare
to follow the banner of Beau-seant!'"—Ivanhoe, chap. xliv.

[96] So many good things are washed oat of men's memory by the lapse of even a quarter of a century that possibly some even of those who knew all about the "Memorial" in 1852 may be willing to be reminded what its scope and purpose were.

The petition was addressed to the bishops "in council," and prayed for the appointment of a commission to report upon the practicability of making this Church a central bond of union among the Christian people of America, by providing for as much freedom in opinion, discipline, and worship as might be held to be compatible with the essential faith and order of the Gospel.

The desired commission was appointed, Bishops Otey, Doane, A. Potter, Burgess, and Williams being the members of it. Their Report, subsequently edited in book form by Bishop Potter, is one of the most valuable documents of American Church history. The following extract from Bishop Burgess' portion of the Report will be read with interest by all who ever learned to revere that theologian for the largeness of his learning, the calmness of his judgment, and the goodness of his heart. He has been speaking of liturgical changes as contemplated and allowed for by the framers of our ecclesiastical system. Then he says:

"There would seem to be five contingencies in which the changes, thus made possible and thus permitted, become also wise and salutary.

"The first is simply when it is evident that in any respect the liturgy or its application may be rendered more perfect. To hazard for this result the safety or unity of the Church may be inexcusable, and the utmost certainty may be demanded before a change of this kind shall be practically ventured. But should it be once established, beyond the smallest doubt, that any addition or alteration would increase the excellence or the excellent influence of the liturgy in any degree sufficient to compensate or more than compensate for the inconveniences incident to all change, it seems as difficult to say that it should not be adopted by the Church, as to excuse any Christian from adding to his virtues or his usefulness.

"The other 'contingencies' recognized are briefly these:

"(2) When in process of time words or regulations have become obsolete or unsuitable.

"(3) When civil or social changes require ecclesiastical changes.

"(4) When the earnest desire of any respectable number of the members of the Church, or of persons who are without its communion, is urged in behalf of some not wholly unreasonable proposal of alteration.

"(5) When error or superstition has been introduced; when that which was at first good and healthful has been perverted to the nourishment of falsehood or wickedness; or when that which was always evil has found utterance, and is now revealed in its true character."

The Memorial failed for the reason that the promoters of it had not a clearly defined notion in their own minds of what they wanted—the secret of many failures. Out of its ashes there may yet rise, however, "some better thing" that God has kept in store.

[97] Ancient Collects and Other Prayers selected for Devotional Use from Various Rituals. By William Bright, M. A. J. H. & Jas. Parker, Oxford and London.

From the Appendix I take the following illustrations of the statement ventured above:

"For Guidance—O God, by whom the meek are guided in judgment, and light riseth up in darkness for the godly; grant us in all our doubts and uncertainties the grace to ask what thou wouldest have us to do; that the Spirit of wisdom may save us from all false choices, and that in thy light we may see light, and in thy straight path may not stumble: through Jesus Christ our Lord.

"For those who live in sin.—Have mercy, O compassionate Father, on all who are hardened through the deceitfulness of sin; vouchsafe them grace to come to themselves, the will and power to return to thee, and the loving welcome of thy forgiveness through Jesus Christ our Lord.

"For all who do the work of the Church.—O Lord, without whom our labor is but lost, and with whom thy little ones go forth as the mighty, be present to all works in thy Church which are undertaken according to thy will, and grant to thy laborers a pure intention, patient faith, sufficient success upon earth, and the bliss of serving thee in heaven, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

"For grace to speak the Truth in love.—O Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, who earnest not to strive nor cry, but to let thy words fall as the drops that water the earth: grant all who contend for the faith once delivered, never to injure it by clamor and impatience, but speaking thy precious truth in love, so to present it that it may be loved, and that men may see in it thy goodness and thy beauty: who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end."

Both as regards devotional flavor and literary beauty these prayers will, I feel sure, be judged worthy, by such as will read them more than once, to stand by the side certainly of many of the collects already in the Prayer Book.

[98] Preached in Grace Church, N. Y., on the Twentieth Sunday after Trinity, that being the Sunday next following the adjournment of the General Convention of 1892.

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