A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer Part 17

[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 pa.s.sage 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," _pa.s.sim_.

[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 ma.n.u.scripts 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 a.s.sures 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 t.i.tle-pages, see Keeling's _Litugiae Britannicae_, London, 1842.

[63] The question of a change in the name of the Church is a const.i.tutional, 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 ill.u.s.trating by his proper a.s.sertion 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 "s.p.a.ce" 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 a.s.signed, 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 subst.i.tute.

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 ill.u.s.tration 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 Beat.i.tudes 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 BEAt.i.tUDES of the Gospel.

[75] _Church Eclectic_ for April, 1884.

[76] The following will serve as an ill.u.s.tration:

_The Anthem_;

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

_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 G.o.d, 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 a.s.serts historical continuity with the Church of England.