Chapter II: Revision of the American Common Prayer.1 (4)

_The Book Annexed_ may be said to hold to the possible standard Common Prayer of 1890 a relation not unlike that of a clay model to the statue which is to be. The material is still in condition to be moulded; the end is not yet. It was in anticipation of this state of things that the friends of revision in 1883 were anxious to carry through the preliminary stage of acceptance as many of their propositions as possible. To revert to our parable, the modeller, in treating the face of his provisional image, must be careful to lay on clay enough, or he may find himself barred at the last moment from giving the features just that finishing touch which is to make them ready for the marble. All the skill in the world will not enable him to secure for the face precisely the expression he would have it wear, if the _materia_ be insufficient. Looked at in this light, the suggestion made by the Joint Committee in the House of Deputies at an early stage of the session of 1883, that the entire Book Annexed, in precisely the form in which it had been submitted, should be passed, and sent down to the dioceses for consideration, instead of being the arbitrary and unreasonable demand it was reckoned by those who lifted their eyebrows at the very mention of such a thing, was really a sensible proposition which the Convention would have done well to heed.

Few, if any, critics of _The Book Annexed as Modified_ have pronounced it an improvement to _The Book Annexed_ as presented. The Book came out of the Convention less admirable than it went in. As a school of Liturgies, the long debate at Philadelphia was doubtless salutary and helpful, but whether the immediate results, as shown in the emendation of the Joint Committee's work, were equally deserving of praise is another question.

Nevertheless, as was argued in the paper of which this one is the continuation, we must take things as we find them, not as we wish they were; and since there is no other method of liturgical revision known to our laws than revision by popular debate, to revision by popular debate we must reconcile ourselves as best we may. Regrets are idle. Let us be thankful that the amicable struggle at Philadelphia had for its outcome so large rather than so small a mass of workable material, and instead of accounting _The Book Annexed_ to be what one of the signers of the Joint Committee's Report has lately called it, "a melancholy production," recognize in it the germ of something exceedingly to be desired. From the first, there has never been any disposition on the part of sober-minded friends of Revision to carry through their scheme with a rush; the delay that is likely to better things they will welcome; the only delay they deprecate is the delay that kills.

The changes enumerated in the "Notification to the Dioceses," and illustrated to the eye in _The Book Annexed_ as Modified, may be broadly classified under the following heads:

(_a_) Clearly desirable alterations, with respect to which there is practically unanimous consent, and for which there is immediate demand, _e_. _g_., shortened offices of week-day prayer.

(_b_) Alterations desirable in the main, but likely to be more cordially acquiesced in, could still further improvement be secured, _e_. _g_., the new versicles introduced into Evening Prayer after the Creed.

(_c_) Alterations generally accounted undesirable on any terms, e. g., the permissive rubrics with respect to the reading of certain psalms during Lent, instead of the regular responds to the First and Second Lessons of the Evening Prayer.

The question arises, Is any course of action possible that will give us without delay the changes which for some fifteen years the whole Church has been laboring to secure; that will give us, with a reasonable delay of three years longer, the confessed improvements a little more improved; while at the same time we are kept from becoming involved in the wretched confusion sure to result from putting into circulation, within a brief period, two authorized but diverse books of Common Prayer? This threefold question it is proposed to meet with a threefold affirmative.

THE STANDARD PRAYER BOOK OF 1890.

The end we ought to have in view is the publication, in the year 1890, of a standard Book of Common Prayer, such as shall embody the ripe results of what will then have been a period of ten years of continuous labor in the work of liturgical revision. To this reckoning of ten years should properly be added the seventeen years that intervened between the presentation of "The Memorial" in 1853 and the passing of the "Enrichment Resolutions" in 1880: so that really our Revision would look back for its historical beginnings, not across a decade merely, but over almost the lifetime of a generation. No single one of the various revisions of the English Book has observed anything like so leisurely a movement.

But by what methods of legislative procedure could such a result as the one indicated be reached? The precedent of the last century does not help us very much. The American Book of Common Prayer was set forth on the sixteenth day of October in the year of our Lord 1789; but with an express statutory provision that the "use" of the book, as so set forth, should not become obligatory till the first day of October, 1790. We cannot copy this line of procedure, for the simple reason that no such undertaking as that of 1789 is in hand. It is not now proposed to legislate into existence a new Liturgy. The task before us is the far humbler one of passing judgment upon certain propositions of change, almost every one of which admits of segregation, has an independent identity of its own, and may be accepted or rejected wholly without reference to what is likely to happen to the other propositions that accompany it.

_The Book Annexed as Modified_ is in no proper sense a _Proposed Book_, nor can it without misrepresentation be called such; it is simply a sample publication[56] illustrative of what the Book of Common Prayer would be, were all the Resolutions of Revision that passed their first stage of approval in 1883 carried into final effect; a result most unlikely to occur.

THE MEANS TO THE END.

The most expeditious and every way satisfactory means to the end that has now been defined would be the appointment, at an early stage of the session in October, of a Joint Committee of Conference. To this committee should be referred:

(_a_) The question: How many of the Resolutions of 1883, or of the "several recommendations therein contained," is it either practicable or desirable to approve at once?

(_b_) The question: How may such of the Resolutions of 1883 as are too good to be lost, but not in their present form good enough to satisfy the Church, be so remoulded as to make their adoption probable in 1889?

(_c_) All new propositions of improvement that may from time to time during the session be brought to the notice of the Convention, either by individual members or by memorials from Diocesan Conventions. Such a Committee of Conference, holding daily sessions of three or four hours each, would be able in due time to report a carefully digested scheme which could then be intelligently discussed. By this method a flood of frivolous and aimless talk would be cut off without in the slightest degree infringing or limiting the real liberty of debate.

But even if the Convention were to show itself reluctant to give to a select committee so large a power as this of preparing an _agenda_ paper, it still would be possible to refer to such a committee the subject-matter of so many of the resolutions as might chance, when put upon their passage, to fail by a narrow vote.

It is to be remembered that the various recommendations contained in the resolutions of 1883 are to be voted upon _in ipsissimis verbis_. There will be no opportunity for the familiar cry: "Mr. President, I rise to propose an amendment." The resolution, or the section of a resolution, as the case may be, will either be approved just as it stands or condemned just as it stands. In this respect there will be an immense saving of time. Most of the tediousness of debate grows out of the natural disposition of legislators to try each his own hand at bettering the thing proposed; hence "amendments," "amendments to amendments," and substitutes for the amendment to the amendment. Even the makers of parliamentary law (much enduring creatures) lose their patience at this point, and peremptorily lay it down that confusion shall no further go.

But to return to the supposed case of a proposition lost because of some slight defect, which, if only our Medo-Persian law had permitted an amendment, could easily have been remedied. Surely the sensible course in such a case as that would be to refer the subject-matter of the lost resolution to the Committee of Conference, with instructions to report a new resolution to be finally acted upon three years hence. So then, whether there be given to the Committee of Conference either the large power to recommend a carefully thought out way of dealing with all the material _en bloc_, or the lesser function of sitting in judgment on new propositions, and of remoulding rejected ones, in either case there could scarcely fail to result from the appointment of such a committee large and substantial gains.

IMPROVEMENTS.

It follows, from what has been said, that if there are features that admit of improvement in the proposals which the Convention has laid before the Church for scrutiny, now is emphatically the time for suggesting the better thing that might be done. Even the bitterest opponents of _The Book Annexed_ can scarcely be so sanguine as to imagine that nothing at all is coming from this labored movement for revision. A measure which was so far forth acceptable to the accredited representatives of the Church, in council assembled, as to pass its first stage three years ago almost by acclamation, is not destined to experience total collapse. The law of probabilities forbids the supposition. The personal make-up of the next General Convention will be to a great extent identical with that of the last, and of the one before the last. Sober-minded men familiar with the work of legislation are not accustomed to reverse their own well considered decisions without weighty cause. The strong probability is that something in the line of emendation, precisely how much or how little no one can say, will, as a matter of fact, be done. In view of this likelihood, would not those who are dissatisfied with _The Book Annexed_ as it stands be taking the wiser course were they to substitute co-operative for vituperative criticism? So far as the present writer is in any sense authorized to speak for the friends of revision, he can assure the dissidents that such co-operation would be most welcome.

A. B., a scholar thoroughly familiar, we will suppose, with the sources of liturgical material, is dissatisfied with the collects proposed for the successive days of Holy Week. Very well, he has a perfect right to his dissatisfaction and to the expression of it in the strongest terms at his command. He does only his plain duty in seeking to exclude from the Prayer Book anything that seems to him unworthy of a place in it. But seeing that he must needs, as a "liturgical expert," acknowledge that the deficiency which the Joint Committee sought to make good is a real and not a merely fancied deficiency, would not A. B. approve himself a more judicious counsellor if, instead of bending all his energy to the disparagement of the collects proposed, he should devote a portion of it to the discovery and suggestion of prayers more happily worded?

And this remark holds good with reference to whatever new feature is to be found between the covers of The Book Annexed. If betterment be possible, these six months now lying before us afford the time of all times in which to show how, with the least of loss and most of gain, it may be brought about.

The Diocese of Maryland is first in the field with an adequate contribution of this sort. A thoroughly competent committee, appointed in October, 1884, has recently printed its Report, and whether the Diocesan Convention adopt, amend, or reject what is presented to it, there can be little doubt that the mind of the Church at large will be perceptibly affected by what these representative men of Maryland have said.[57] Apart from a certain aroma of omniscience pervading it (with which, by the way, sundry infelicities of language in the text of the Report, only indifferently consort), the document, is a forcible one, and of great practical value.

The Committee have gone over the entire field covered by the "Notification to the Dioceses," taking up the Resolutions one by one, and not only noting in connection with each whatever is in itself objectionable, but also (a far more difficult task) suggesting in what respect this or that proposition might be better put. The _apparatus criticus_ thus provided, while not infallible, is eminently helpful, sets a wholesome pattern, and if supplemented by others of like tenor and scope, will go far to lighten the labor of whatever committee may have the final recension of the whole work put into its hands.[58]

It would be a poor self-conceit in the framers of _The Book Annexed_, that should prompt them to resent as intrusive any criticism whatsoever. What we all have at heart is the bringing of our manual of worship as nearly as possible to such a pitch of perfectness as the nature of things human will allow. The thing we seek is a Liturgy which shall draw to itself everything that is best and most devout within our national borders, a Common Prayer suited to the common wants of all Americans. Whatever truly makes for this end, it will be our wisdom to welcome, whether those who bring it forward are popularly labelled as belonging to this, that, or the other school of Churchmanship. To allow party jealousies to mar the symmetry and fulness of a work in which all Churchmen ought to have an equal inheritance would be the worst of blunders. By all means let the raiment of needlework and the clothing of wrought gold be what they should be for such sacred uses as hers who is the daughter of the great King, but let us not fall to wrangling about the vats in which the thread was dyed or the river bed from which the gold was gathered.

In a later paper the present writer intends to venture upon a task similar to that undertaken by the Maryland Committee. He will do this largely in the hope of encouraging by example other and more competent critics to busy themselves in the same way. Meanwhile a few observations may not be amiss with respect to the sources of liturgical material, and the methods by which they can be drawn upon to the best advantage.

There has been, first and last, a deal of ill considered talk about the boundlessness of the liturgical treasures lying unused in the pre-Reformation formularies of the English Church, as well as in the old sacramentaries and office-books of the East and the West. Wonder is expressed that with such limitless wealth at its command, an "Enrichment Committee" should have brought in so poverty-stricken a Report. Have we not Muratori and Mabillon? it is asked: Daniel and Assemani, Renaudot and Goar? Are there not Missals Roman, Ambrosian, and Mozarabic? Breviaries Anglican, Gallican, and Quignonian? Has Maskell delved and Neale translated and Littledale compiled in vain? To all of which there are two replies, namely: first, It is inexpedient to overload a Prayer Book, even if the material be of the best; and secondly, This best material is by no means so abundant as the volume of our resources would seem to suggest. It was for the very purpose of escaping redundancy and getting rid of surplusage that the Anglican Reformers condensed Missal, Breviary, and Rituale into the one small and handy volume known as the First Prayer Book of Edward VI. It was a bold stroke, doubtless denounced as perilously radical at the time; but experience has justified Cranmer and his friends. In the whole history of liturgies there is no record of a wiser step. It is scarcely possible so grievously to sin against a people's Prayer Book as by making it more complicated in arrangement and more bulky in volume than need actually requires. It was ground of justifiable pride with the "Enrichment Committee" that the Book which they brought in, despite the many additions it contained, was no thicker by a single page than the Prayer Book as it is. To be sure, the General Convention spoiled all this by insisting on retaining certain duplicated formularies which the Committee had very properly dropped in order to find room for fresh material. But of the Book as first presented, it was possible to say that in no degree was it more cumbrous than that to which the people were already accustomed. Doubtless it would have been still more to the Committee's credit could they have brought in an enriched Book smaller by a third than the Book in use; but this their conservatism forbade.

Of even greater moment is the other point, which concerns the quality of the available material. It is the greatest mistake in the world to suppose that simply because a given prayer exists, say in an Oriental liturgy, and has been translated into English by an eminent scholar, it is therefore proper material to be worked into our services. As a matter of fact, a great deal of devotional language of which the Oriental liturgies is made up is prolix and tedious to a degree simply insufferable. Moreover in the case of prayers in themselves admirable in the original tongue in which they were composed, all is often lost through lack of a verbal felicity in the translation. If anyone questions this judgment, let him toil through Neale's and Littledale's _Translations of the Primitive Liturgies_ and see whether he can find six, nay, three, consecutive lines which he would be willing to see introduced into our own Communion Office. Or, as respects translations from the Latin office-books of the Church of England, let him scrupulously search the pages of the "Sarum Hours," as done into the vernacular by the Recorder of Salisbury, and see how many of the Collects strike him as good enough to be transplanted into the Book of Common Prayer. The result of this latter voyage of discovery will be an increased wonder at the affluence of the mediaeval devotions, combined with amazement at the poverty and unsatisfactoriness of the existing translations. It is with a Latin collect as with a Greek ode or an Italian sonnet: no matter how wonderful the diction, the charm of it is as a locked secret until the thing has been Englished by genius akin to his who first made it out of his own heart. Of others besides the many brave men who lived before Agamemnon might it be written:

sed omnes illacrumabiles
Urgentur, ignotique larga
Nocte, carent quia vate sacro.

It was the peculiar felicity of Schiller that he had Coleridge for a translator, and the shades of Gregory and Leo owe it to a living Anglican divine that we English-speaking Christians can think their thoughts after them, and pray their prayers.

Such being the facts in the case, it is evident that the range of choice open to American revisers is far narrower than half-informed persons imagine it to be.

The very best sources of liturgical material are the following:

(_a_) King James's Bible, including the Apocrypha, and supplemented by the Prayer Book version of the Psalms;

(_b_) The old Sacramentaries, Leonine, Gregorian, and Gelasian, chiefly as illustrated by the genius of Dr. Bright;

(_c_) The Breviary in its various forms;

(_d_) The Primers and other like _fragmenta_ of the era of the English Reformation;[59]

(_e_) The devotional writings of the great Anglican divines of the school of Andrews, Ken, and Taylor;[60] and last and least,

(_f_) The various manuals of prayer, of which the past twenty years have shown themselves so prolific.[61]

Of the Anglican writers, Jeremy Taylor would be by far the most helpful, were it not for the efflorescence of his style. As it is, the best use that can be made of his exuberant devotions is to cull from them here and there a telling phrase or a musical cadence. The "General Intercession," for example, on page 50 of _The Book Annexed_, is a cento to which Taylor is the chief contributor.

That the Enrichment Committee made the best possible use of the various quarries to which they had access is unlikely. Even if they credited themselves with having done so, it would be immodest of them to say it. Better material than any that their researches brought to light may still be lying near the surface, somewhere close at hand, waiting to be unearthed. Certainly this paper will not have been written in vain if it serves the purpose of provoking to the good work of discovery some of those who on the score both of quality and of quantity account what has been thus far done in the line of revision inadequate and meagre.

III.

It is next proposed to take up the Philadelphia Resolutions of Revision (1883) one by one, and to consider in what measure, if in any, the subject-matter of each of them lies open to improvement.

Should the method of procedure recommended in the previous paper, or any method resembling it, find favor at the approaching Convention, and a Conference Committee of the two Houses be appointed to remould the work with reference to final action three years hence, criticism of this sort, even though inadequate, can scarcely fail of being in some measure helpful.

RESOLUTION I.

_The Title-page _.

The proposals under this head are two in number: (_a _) that the words, "together with the Psalter or Psalms of David," be dropped from the title-page as superfluous, and (_b _) that a general title, "THE BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER," be printed on the first page of the leaf preceding the title-page.

Neither of these suggestions is of any great importance, and the interest attaching to them is mainly bibliographical. Whenever any addition has been made to the Prayer Book of the Church of England, the rule has been to note it invariably in the Table of Contents, and sometimes also on the title-page.

Until 1662 the Psalter formed no part of the Prayer Book; it was a volume by itself, and was cited as such. In fact, it was a sort of "Hymnal Companion to the Book of Common Prayer." In the revision of 1662 the Psalter was incorporated, and immediately there appeared upon the title-page of the Common Prayer, in addition to what had been there before, the words, "together with the Psalter or Psalms of David printed as they are to be sung or read in the churches." The present title-page of the English Book has a singularly crowded and awkward look, contrasting most unfavorably in this regard with those of 1559, 1552, and 1549.[62] But if the needless mention of the Psalter on our present title-page gives pleasure to any considerable number of people, it would be foolish to press the suggestion of a change. Let it pass.

Of a more serious character would be the omission, which some urge, of the words "Protestant Episcopal" from the title-page. Should anything of this sort be done, which is most unlikely, Dr. Egar's suggestion to drop the words, "of the Protestant Episcopal Church," leaving it to read, "according to the use in the United States of America," would carry the better note of catholicity.

But, after all, the remonstrants have only to turn the page to find the obnoxious "Protestant Episcopal" so fast riveted into the _Ratification_ that nothing short of an act of violence done to history could accomplish the excision of it.[63]

RESOLUTION II.

_The Introductory Portion_.

(a) _Table of Contents_.--The suggestion[64] that all entries after "The Psalter" should be printed in italics, is a good one.

(b) _Concerning the Service of the Church_.--This substitute for the present "Order how the Psalter is appointed to be read" and "Order how the rest of the Holy Scripture is appointed to be read" is largely based on the provisions of the so-called "Shortened Services Act" of 1872. The second paragraph relating to the use of the Litany appears to be superfluous.

The enlarged Table of Proper Psalms and the Table of Selections of Psalms, which come under this same general heading, would be a very great gain. Why the Maryland Committee should have pronounced the latter Table "practically useless, since the psalms are not to be printed," it is hard, in the face of the existing usage with respect to "Proper Psalms," to understand; nor is there any special felicity in the proposal emanating from the same source that the number of the Selections be cut down to three, one for feasts and one for fasts and one for an extra service on Sunday nights.

On the other hand, the Maryland Committee does well in recommending that permission be given to the minister to shorten the Lessons at his discretion, though the hard and fast condition, "provided he read not less than fifteen consecutive verses," apart from the questionable English in which it is phrased, smacks more of the drill-room than of the sanctuary. Far better would it be (if the suggestion may be ventured) to allow no liberty of abridgment whatever in the case of Proper Lessons, while giving entire freedom of choice on all occasions for which no proper lessons have been appointed. So far as "ferial" days are concerned, it would be much wiser to let the Table of Lessons be regarded as suggestive and not mandatory. The half-way recognition of this principle in the new Lectionary, in which such a freedom is allowed, _provided_ the Lesson taken be one of those appointed for "some day in the same week," seems open to a suspicion of childishness.

The rubrical direction entitled "Hymns and Anthems" requires verbal correction, but embodies a wholesome principle.

Under this same general head of "The Introductory Portion" come the new Lectionary and the new Tables for finding Easter. Of these, the former is law already, except so far as respects the Lessons appointed for the proposed Feast of the Transfiguration. The Easter Tables are a monument to the erudition and accuracy of the late Dr. Francis Harison. The Tables in our present Standard run to the year 1899. Perhaps a "wholesome conservatism" ought to discover a tincture of impiety in any proposal to disturb them before the century has expired.

RESOLUTION III.

_The Morning Prayer_.

(a) _The First Rubric_.--The Maryland Committee is quite right in remarking that the language of this important rubric, as set forth by the Convention of 1883, is "inelegant and inaccurate," but another diocese has called attention to the fact that the substitute which Maryland offers would, if adopted, enable any rector who might be so minded to withhold entirely from the non-communicating portion of his flock all opportunity for _public_ confession and absolution from year's end to year's end. It is not for a moment to be supposed that there was any covert intention here, but the incident illustrates the value to rubric-makers of the Horatian warning--_Brevis esse labor o, obscurus fio_.

Passing by the Proper Sentences for special Days and Seasons, against which no serious complaint has been entered,[65] we come to the proposed short alternative for the Declaration of Absolution. As it stood in the Sarum Use this Absolution ran as follows:

"The Almighty and Merciful Lord grant you Absolution and Remission of all your sins, space for true penitence, amendment of life, and the grace and consolation of the Holy Spirit. Amen."[66]

With the single change of the word "penitence" to "repentance" this is the form in which the Absolution stood in the original _Book Annexed_. The Convention thought that it detected a "Romanizing germ" in the place assigned to "penitence," and an archaism in the temporal sense assigned to "space," and accordingly rearranged the whole sentence. But in their effort to mend the language, our legislators assuredly marred the music.[67]

(e) _The Benedictus es, Domine_.--The insertion of this Canticle as an alternate to the _Te Deum_ was in the interest of shortened services for week-day use, as has been already explained. The same purpose could be served equally well, and the always objectionable expedient of a second alternate avoided, by spacing off the last six verses of the _Benedicite_, which have an integrity of their own, and prefixing a rubric similar to those that stand before the _Venite_ and the _Benedictus_ in "_The Book Annexed_"; e. g.:

_On week-days, it shall suffice if only the latter portion of this Canticle be said or sung_.

(n) _The Benedictus_.--With reference to the restoration of the last portion of this Hymn, it has been very properly remarked by one of the critics of _The Book Annexed_, that the line of division between the required and the optional portions would more properly come after the eighth than after the fourth verse. This would make the portion reserved for Advent begin with the reference to John the Baptist, as undoubtedly it ought to do: "And thou, child, shalt be called the Prophet of the Highest."

(o) _De Profundis_.--There will probably be general consent to the omission of this alternate, as being what the Maryland Committee _naively_ call it, "too mournful a psalm" for this purpose.[68]

RESOLUTION IV.

_Daily Evening Prayer_.

(c) The proposed words, "Let us humbly confess our sins unto Almighty God," are justly thought by many to be inferior both in rhythm and in dignity to "Let us make humble confession to Almighty God."

(i)-(l) There seems to be absolute unanimity in the judgment that _Magnificat_ and _Nunc Dimittis_ ought, as Gospel Hymns, to have the prior places after the Lessons which they follow. In the interest of simplicity of arrangement a like general consent to omit altogether _Bonum est confiteri_ and _Benedic anima mea_ would be most fortunate, but this point has been already enlarged upon in a previous paper.[69]

The "Notes," permitting the use of Psalms xlii. and xliii. after the Lessons during Lent, seem to have found no favor in any quarter, and ought undoubtedly to be dropped.

(n) If the lost versicles are to be restored after the Creed, as all who have learned to love them in the service of the Church of England must earnestly desire, some better substitute for "God save the queen," than "O Lord, save our rulers," ought surely to be found.[70] Moreover, the order of the versicles, as Prof. Gold has clearly pointed out,[71] is open to improvement.

RESOLUTION V.

_The Beatitudes of the Gospel_.

This is the one feature of _The Book Annexed_ against which the fire of hostile criticism has been the most persistently directed. Whether the strictures passed upon the Office have been in all cases as intelligent as they have been severe, may be open to question, but there can be no doubt whatever that, in its present form, Resolution V. would, if put to the vote, be rejected.

Passing by the more violent utterances of those whose language almost suggests that they find something objectionable in the very BEATITUDES themselves,[72] it will suffice to consider and weigh what has been said in various quarters, first, about the unprecedented character of the Office, and secondly, concerning the infelicity of the appointed response, "Lord, have mercy upon us, and be it unto thy servants according to thy word."

So far as concerns precedent, it ought to be enough to say that the words are our Lord's words, and that they were thrown by him into a form which readily lends itself to antiphonal use. The very same characteristics of parallelism and antithesis, that make the Psalms so amenable to the purposes of worship, are conspicuous in the BEATITUDES. If the Church of England, for three hundred years, has been willing to give place in her devotions to the Curses of the Old Testament,[73] we of America need not to be afraid, precedent or no precedent, to make room among our formularies for the Blessings of the New.

Those who allow themselves to characterize the liturgical use of these memorable sayings of the Son of Man as "fancy ritual" and "sentimentalism" may well pause to ask themselves what manner of spirit they are of. The BEATITUDES are the charter of the kingdom of heaven. If they are "sentimental," the kingdom is "sentimental"; but if, on the other hand, they constitute the organic law of the People of God, they have at least as fair a right as the Ten Commandments to be published from the altar, and answered by the great congregation.

But is the complaint of "no precedent" a valid one, even supposing considerations of intrinsic fitness to have been ruled out?

The Liturgy of St. Chrysostom provides that the Beatitudes shall be sung on Sundays in room of the third antiphon.[74]

The learned Bishop of Haiti, in a paper warmly commending the liturgical use of the BEATITUDES,[75] calls attention to the further fact that the Eight Sayings have a place in some of the service-books of the Eastern Church in the Office for the Sixth and Ninth Hours, and notes the suggestive and touching circumstances that, as there used, they have for a response the words of the penitent thief upon the cross. We might all of us well pray to be "remembered" in that kingdom to which these Blessings give the law.

In _The Primer set forth by the King's Majesty and his Clergy_ in 1545, a sort of stepping-stone to the later "Book of Common Prayer," we find the BEATITUDES very ingeniously worked into the Office of The Hours, as anthems; beginning with Prime and ending with Evensong. Appropriate Collects are interwoven, some of them so beautiful as to be well worth preserving.[76]

But the most interesting precedent of all remains still to be studied. In the first year of the reign of William and Mary, a Royal Commission was appointed to revise the Book of Common Prayer. The most eminent Anglican divines of the day, including Tillotson, Stillingfleet, Patrick, and Beveridge, were among the members. To all outward appearance the movement came to naught; for the proposed revision was not even put into print, until in 1854, the House of Commons, in response to a motion of Mr. Heywood, ordered it to be published as a Blue-book. And yet in some way our American revisers of 1789 must have found access to the original volume as it lay hidden in the archbishop's library at Lambeth; for not only does their work show probable evidence of such consultation, but in their Preface they distinctly refer to the effort of King William's Commission as a "great and good work,"[77] a thing they would scarcely have done had they possessed no real knowledge of the facts. Macaulay's sneering reference to the work of the Commission is well known, but, strangely enough, the justice which a Whig reviewer withholds, a high Anglican divine concedes, for no less exacting a critic than Dr. Neale, while manifesting, as was to be expected, a general dislike of the Commissioners of 1689, and of their work, does yet find something to praise in what they recommended.[78]

Among the real improvements suggested by the Commission was the liturgical use of the BEATITUDES, and this in two places, once in "The Order for the Administration of the Lord's Supper," as an alternate to the Ten Commandments; and again in the Commination Office as a proper balance to the Anathemas of the Law.

But the Commission, like the late Joint Committee on the Book of Common Prayer, was unfortunate in its choice of a response; and no wonder, for the task of finding the proper one is difficult.[79]

A Beatitude differs from a Commandment in that while the latter enjoins the former only declares. The one therefore simply calls for assent, or, at most, assent coupled with petition, while the other peremptorily demands a cry for mercy. The immemorial form of the cry for mercy in the devotions of Christendom is the "Kyrie eleison," _Lord, have mercy upon us_; the immemorial form of assent the word _Amen_. Can we do better, therefore, in adapting the BEATITUDES to liturgical use than to treat them precisely as the Curses are treated in the Commination Office of the Church of England, namely, by inserting after each one of them a plain _Amen_.

This recommendation has the great merit of simplicity. Two or three strikingly ingenious schemes for supplying each of the Eight Sayings with a proper response of its own have been suggested;[80] but the objection to them is that, beautiful though they are, their complexity would embarrass and distress the kneeling worshipper. In these matters, practical drawbacks have to be taken into account as well as abstract excellencies, and no matter how felicitous the antiphonal responses, they would be worse than useless were a puzzled congregation to refuse to join in them.

There will be found appended to this Paper a plan for recasting the Office of the BEATITUDES in such a way as to make it coincide structurally, as far as it goes, with the introductory portion of the Holy Communion.[81] Were the Office to be thus set forth, it would be possible on week-days, and with singular appropriateness on Saints' Days, to substitute the BEATITUDES for the Commandments, without encumbering the Communion Office with an alternate. Should this suggestion find acceptance, the two Collects in the present Office of BEATITUDES, which are far too good to be lost, one of them being the modified form of a Leonine original, and the other one of the very best of Canon Bright's own compositions, might be transferred to a place among the "Occasional Prayers."

RESOLUTION VI.

_The Litany_.

The rubrics prefixed to the Litany are a gain, but except by the addition of the two new suffrages, the one for the President and the other for the increase of the ministry, it will probably be best to leave the text of this formulary untouched. Even in the case of the new petitions it would be well if they could be grafted upon suffrages already existing, a thing that might easily be done.[82]

It would be a liturgical improvement if the Litany, in its shortened form, were to end at the _Christe_, _audi_, and the minister directed to return, at this point, to the General Thanksgiving in the Morning Prayer. This would divide the Litany symmetrically, instead of arbitrarily, as is now done, and would remove the General Thanksgiving from a place to which it has little claim either by historical precedent or natural congruity.

The greatest improvement of all would be the restoration of the august and massive words of invocation which of old stood at the beginning of the Litany. The modern invocations have a dignity of their own, but they are not to be compared for devotional power and simple majesty with the more ancient ones. But for an "enrichment" so good as this, it is too much to hope.

RESOLUTION VII.

_Prayers and Thanksgivings_.

The Maryland Committee[83] have much to say in criticism of this section, and offer many valuable suggestions, the best of them being a recommendation to print the Prayer entitled, "For Grace to speak the Truth in Love," in Canon Bright's own words. Some of their comments, on the other hand, suggest canons of criticism which, if applied to "The Prayer Book as it is," would make havoc of its choicest treasures.[84]

The Committee of Central New York[85] go much further in the line of destructive criticism than their brethren of Maryland, and after excepting four of the proposed prayers, condemn all the rest to dismissal.

Possibly this is just judgment, but those who have searched diligently the storehouses of devotional English, will think twice before they consent to it. No doubt the phraseology of some of the proposed prayers might be improved. In view of the searching criticism to which for three years it has been exposed, it would be strange indeed if such were not found to be the case. But the collection as a whole, instead of suffering loss, ought to receive increment. At least three or four more prayers for the work of missions in its various aspects ought to be added, also a Prayer for the furtherance of Christian Education in Schools and Colleges. As Br. Dowden shrewdly asks, in speaking of spiritual needs which we postpone expressing for lack of language sufficiently artistic in form, "What is the measure of our faith in the efficacy of united prayer, when we are content to go on, year after year, and never come together to ask God to supply those needs?"[86]

There is one consideration connected with this supply of special prayers too frequently lost out of sight. While it is perfectly true that the Book of Common Prayer was never designed to be a _Treasury of Devotion_ for individuals, it is equally true that for thousands and hundreds of thousands of our fellow-countrymen who live remote from "Church book-stores," or lack the means of patronizing them, the Prayer Book is, as a matter of fact, their only devotional help. In countless households, moreover, many of them beyond "Protestant Episcopal" borders altogether, the Prayer Book is doing a work only less beneficent than it might do, were we to concede a very little more to that outwardly illogical but spiritually self-consistent policy which, breaking away, a century ago, from the chain of precedent, inserted in the American Book "The Forms of Prayer to be used in Families."

RESOLUTION VIII.

_Penitential Office for Ash-Wednesday_.

This is the English Commination Office, with the introductory portion omitted. It would add to the merit of the formulary, especially when used as a separate office, were it to be prefaced by the versicle and response, similarly employed in the Hereford Breviary:

_V_. Let us confess unto the Lord, for he is gracious.

_R_. And his mercy endureth forever.

In view of the great length of the Morning Service on Ash-Wednesday, and the close similarity between the closing portion of the Litany and the intermediate portion of this Office, the following emendation of the first Rubric is suggested, a change which would carry with it the omission of the Rubric after psalm li. a little further on.

_On the_ First Day of Lent, _at_ Morning Prayer, _the Office ensuing shall be read immediately after the words_, Have mercy upon us, _in the Litany, and in place of what there followeth_.

In the third Rubric it might be well to add to "_shall be said_" the words, "_or sung_."

The blessing at the end of the office should stand, as in the English Book, in the precatory form; otherwise we might have the anomaly of a benediction pronounced before the end of the service.

RESOLUTION IX.

_Thanksgiving-day or Harvest-home_.

The only alteration needed in this office is the restoration of the beautiful prayer for unity to its own proper wording as given in the so-called "Accession Service" appended to the English Prayer Book. As it stands in _The Book Annexed_ the language of the prayer is possibly ungrammatical and certainly redundant. A critic, already more than once quoted,[87] protests against the prominence given to this office in _The Book Annexed_, ascribing it to influences born of the associations of New England. But although the motive of the revisers might have had a worse origin than that of which the reviewer complains, the actual fact is that the formulary was placed where it is purely in consideration of the liturgical fitness of things; it having been held that the proper position for an Office of Thanksgiving must be in immediate sequence to an Office of Penitence.

It is with sincere diffidence that the present writer differs with _The Seminarian_, on a point of historical precedent, but he ventures to suggest that to find the prototype of Harvest-home we must go back far beyond New England, and for that matter far beyond Old England, nay, beyond the Christian era itself, even to the day when it was said, "Thou shalt observe the Feast of Tabernacles, seven days, after that thou hast gathered in thy corn and thy wine." Doubtless there is a joy greater than the "joy of harvest," and to this we give expression in the Eucharist; but doubtless also the joy of harvest is in itself a proper joy and one which finds fitting utterance in such forms of prayer and praise as this.

RESOLUTION XI.

_Collects, Epistles, and Gospels_.

No department of liturgical revision calls for a nicer touch than that which includes the Collects. That new collects for certain unsupplied feasts and fasts would be a genuine enrichment of The Book of Common Prayer, has long been generally acknowledged among Anglican scholars. The most weighty fault to be found with the collects added by the revisers is that in too large proportion they are addressed to the second and third Persons of the Holy Trinity. The Eucharist itself, as a whole, is properly conceived of as addressed to the Eternal Father. The Collects, as forming part of the Eucharistic Office, ought, strictly speaking, to be also so addressed. It is true that there are exceptions to this rule, and they are found, some of them, in the Prayer Book as it is. But the revisers ought not to have altered the proportion so markedly as they have done, for whereas in our present Book the collects addressed to the Father are as eighty-three to three compared with those not so addressed, the ratio in _The Book Annexed_ is that of eleven to three.

Moreover, there would seem to be no good reason for reverting to the usage of the First Book of Edward VI., which provides a second Collect, Epistle, and Gospel for the two great feasts of Christmas and Easter. A better way would be to take these additional collects, which are among the most beautiful in the language, and assign them respectively to the Sunday after Christmas, and the Monday in Easter-week.

RESOLUTION XII.

_The Holy Communion_.

To the few changes proposed in this Office, comparatively slight exception has been taken in any quarter. It will probably be wise to leave the language of the Prayer of Consecration wholly untouched, notwithstanding the alleged grammatical error near the end of it.

The Rubric which it has been proposed to append to the Office, touching the number of communicants without which it shall not be lawful to administer the Sacrament, being of a disciplinary rather than of a liturgical character, ought not to be urged. The proposal to transfer the Prayer of Humble Access to a place immediately before the Communion appears to be very generally acceptable.

It would relieve many worshippers who scruple as Christians at responding to the Fourth Commandment on the score of its Judaic character, if the language of the rubric prefixed to the Decalogue could contain, as did the corresponding rubric in Laud's Book for Scotland, a clause indicative of the mystical and spiritual sense in which the Law should be interpreted by those who live under the Gospel. But such a proposal would probably be accounted "of doctrine," and so be self-condemned.

Of the desirability of allowing a week-day use of the BEATITUDES in the room of the COMMANDMENTS enough has been already said.

RESOLUTION XVI.

_Confirmation_.

The permission to use a form of presentation instead of, or in addition to, the Preface is likely to be widely welcomed. The other _addenda_ to this office, being apparently distasteful (for unlike reasons) to all the "schools of thoughts" in the Church, are likely to fail of acceptance; and on the whole may easily be spared.

RESOLUTION XVIII.

_Visitation of the Sick_.

The proposed Commendatory Prayer, though in some of its features strikingly felicitous, is open to formal improvement. The addition of a short _Litany of the Dying_ would be appreciated by those whose ministry is largely exercised among the sick.

RESOLUTION XX.

_Burial of the Dead_.

By far the most important section of this Resolution is the one providing for the insertion of special features when the office is used at the burial of children. The provision, or at least the suggestion, of a more appropriate Lesson would be wise, but for the rest, the office is almost all that could be wished.

A recent critic[88] raises the question, "Why single out infants alone for a special service? Why not forms for rich men and poor men--old men and maidens--widows and orphans?" And yet our Lord Jesus Christ did single out little children in a very striking and wonderful manner, and drew a distinction between them and us which may well justify our treating their obsequies with a peculiar tenderness. Even Rome, _Mater dura infantum_ as she has been sometimes thought, is studious to consult in this point the natural affections of the bereaved, and appoints a funeral mass distinct from that appointed for the dead in general.

Bishop Seabury felt the need of a rite of this sort and prepared one, but whether it was ever in actual use among the clergy of Connecticut the writer is not informed. Many, very many, since Seabury's day, have felt the same need, and it is safe to say that no one feature of _The Book Annexed_ has enjoyed so universal a welcome as this rightful concession to the demands of the parental heart.