Rites and Ritual

Vain then, and necessarily erroneous, because utterly devoid of countenance from the ancient Apostolic Rites, are the inferences by which this belief is supported. Though, indeed, the fallacy of the inferences themselves is sufficiently apparent. It is said that Christ's Body, wherever it is, and under whatsoever conditions existing, must demand and draw Divine Worship towards it. Is it so indeed? Then why, I would ask, do we not pay Divine Worship to the Church? for the Church certainly is "His Body, His Flesh, and His Bones." Nay, why do we not worship the individual communicant? for he, certainly, has received not only Christ's Body, but Christ's very Self, to dwell within him. The truth is, that inferences, in matters of this mysterious nature, are perfectly untrustworthy, unless supported and countersigned by apostolic practice.

I am aware that this doctrine has been embraced, of late years, by some of the most devout and eminent of our divines. But the history of their adoption of it is such, that we may allege themselves, in the exercise of their own earlier and unbiassed judgment, against their present opinions. The names of those divines are named with reverence and affection, and justly so, wherever the English language is spoken. But the works, on which that estimate was first founded, upheld, explicitly or tacitly, the opposite of that to which they now lend the high sanction of their adhesion. A sermon on the Catholic doctrine of the Holy Eucharist was called forth from one of them by a sentence of suspension from preaching in the University pulpit at Oxford. But this full exposition of his eucharistic views at that time is absolutely devoid of any claim for Divine Adoration as due to the Body and Blood of Christ, or to Christ Himself as present under the Eucharistic Elements. Again, in a well-known stanza of the 'Christian Year,' another honoured divine has said, —

"O come to our Communion Feast;There present in the heart,Not in the hands, th' eternal PriestWill His true self impart."15

And it is believed that the first appearance in a modern days of the former doctrine, viz. that worship is due to the Body and Blood of Christ, was in the year 1856, in the case of Ditcher v. Denison.16 It was through a chivalrous desire to uphold a cause, with the main aspects of which they naturally felt a deep sympathy, that the writers referred to were drawn into countenancing a doctrine, then new to their theology, but of the truth of which, on examination, they seem to have satisfied themselves. Surely we may believe that it was not without misgiving that they thus abandoned the doctrines which they once taught us. They cannot have felt altogether satisfied thus to break with the Church of the First Ages in a matter so momentous as that of the Object of worship, and of the nature and purpose of the Holy Eucharist.

Closely connected with this doctrine, is a practice not merely defended of late, but strongly urged as being of the very essence of exalted Eucharistic duty: – that of being present at the Rite without receiving; for the purpose, it is alleged, of adoring Christ as present under the Elements. But here again the Early Church furnishes thorough condemnation of the practice. In an exhaustive treatise,17 it has been shown that, except as a deeply penitential act, she knew of no such practice; making no account whatever of attendance on the rite apart from reception: rightly viewing it as a Sacrifice indeed, but a Sacrifice of that class or kind in which partaking was an essential and indispensable feature. And the English Church, it is almost unnecessary to add, though a faint endeavour has been made to disprove it, has given no more countenance than the Church of old to this practice. Contenting herself, at first, at the Reformation, with forbidding non-communicants to remain in the choir, she afterwards so effectually discouraged and disallowed their presence at all, that it became unmeaning to retain the prohibition any longer.18

And in truth it is, as might be expected, to the later and corrupt ages of the Church that we owe both of these positions which it is now attempted to revive among us: viz. that in the language of the decrees of Trent,19 "our Lord Jesus Christ, God and Man, is truly, really, and substantially contained in the Sacrament of the Eucharist," i. e. in the Elements, "and is to be adored" as contained therein: and again, that the faithful may be present merely to adore, and may communicate spiritually,20 though, as has been well said, "they purposely neglect the only mode of doing so ordained by Christ."

The latter position – respecting non-communicating attendance – has been lately discountenanced21 by one of those eminent divines who are generally claimed as sanctioning the entire system to which it belongs. And though the number of those among the clergy who have embraced these views is not inconsiderable, while their piety and devotedness are unquestionable, yet I cannot doubt that at least an equal number, in no way their inferiors in learning or devotion, deeply deplore these departures from the primitive faith. And it is not too much to hope, that, as the English Church has witnessed a school of postmediæval or unsacramental divinity, which, notwithstanding its piety and earnestness, has ceased to exercise much influence among us, even so it may be with the mediæval and ultra-sacramental school which has lately risen up. Defend their views how they will, what they are seeking to introduce is a new cultus, and a new religion, as purely the device of the middle ages, as non-sacramentalism was the device of Calvin and Zwingle. And the one doctrine as distinctly demands a new Prayer-book as the other does. What the English Church, on her very front, professes, is neither postmediævalism nor mediævalism, but apostolicity. Since choose she must, (for the two are utterly irreconcilable) between symbolising with the mediævalising Churches of the West, and symbolising with the Church of the first ages, she has taken her part, and her deliberate mind is "Sit Anima Mea cum Apostolis."

From Rites, I turn to Ritual, which claims at this moment the larger share of attention.

How, then, are the Services of the English Church to be performed, so as to be in accordance with her mind and principles? It will be answered, that the Services ought to be conducted according to "the Book of Common Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments, according to the use of the Church of England."22 But this, though at first sight the true and sufficient answer, is not, in reality, either true or sufficient. The duty in question, that of conducting the Services of the Church, is laid upon particular persons: and it is by recurring to the exact terms of the obligation laid on those persons, when they are solemnly commissioned to their office, that we must seek for an answer. Now the engagement exacted by the Bishop from candidates for the priesthood, at their Ordination, is, in exact terms, this: "Will you give your faithful diligence always so to minister the Doctrine and Sacraments, and the Discipline of Christ, as the Lord hath commanded, and as this Church and Realm hath received the same?" The italicised words contain the gist of the whole matter. By the interpretation we put upon them must our standard of Ritual be determined.

What then "hath this Church and Realm received," at the present moment, in the matter of Ritual? Not the Prayer-book standing absolutely, and alone, without any comment or addition whatsoever: but that Book, as interpreted and modified, in certain respects, by subsequent enactments, which have in various ways obtained, practically, the Church's recognition. The truth is, that this country has taken a certain line, and the same line, in her ecclesiastical and in her civil polity. In civil matters, Magna Charta is the broad basis and general draught of her free constitution. But the particulars of that constitution have been from time to time regulated and modified, not by interlining the original document, but by separate statutes. And the Prayer-book, in like manner, is the ecclesiastical Magna Charta of the Church and Realm. For upwards of two centuries – since 1662 – it has received no authoritative interlineation whatever; and but few and slight ones (subsequently to its first settlement in 1549-1559) for another century before that. The differences which are found at the present moment in any two copies of the Prayer-book are purely unauthorised. They are merely editions for convenience. The Sealed Book, settled in 1662 – that, and no other – is the English Prayer-book. For more than three centuries, then, we may say that a policy of non-interlineation, so to call it – that is, of leaving intact the original document – has been very markedly adhered to. Such alterations or modifications as have, practically, been made and accepted by the Church and Realm, have been effected by enactments external to the Prayer-book. Injunctions, canons, statutes, judicial decisions, have from time to time been allowed, nemine contradicente, to interpret or even contravene particular provisions of the Book. And, not least of all, custom itself has, in not a few particulars, acquired the force of law, and though not as yet engrossed in any legal document, has long been, in practice, part and parcel of our ecclesiastical polity.

Instances in point are, – 1. Of an injunction practically recognised as law, that of Queen Elizabeth, permitting the use of "a hymn or such like song in the beginning or in the end of the Common Prayers;" whereas the Prayer-book recognises no such feature or element. It is on this injunction, and on that alone, that the practice, now universal, is based. Other instances, again, of royal injunctions, constantly acted upon, are those by which the names of the sovereign and royal family, pro re natâ, are inserted and altered; a power given indeed, by implication, in the Prayer-book itself, because necessary by the nature of the case; but not expressly there,23 and a departure, speaking literally, from the Sealed Book. Such, again, is the use of prayers or thanksgivings enjoined on special occasions by royal authority. These it has so long been customary to accept and use, that no serious question is now made of their legality.

2. An instance of a canon obtaining recognition by common consent, though irreconcilable with the rubric of the Prayer-book, is that of the 58th of 1604, which orders any minister, when "ministering the sacraments," to wear a surplice; whereas the rubric recognises for the Holy Communion far other "Ornaments of the Church, and of the ministers thereof."

3. A case of statute law being allowed to supplement rubrical provision, by adding an alternative, is that which orders Banns of Marriage to be asked after the Second Lesson at Evening Service, if there be no Morning Service. Such too, as the Dean of Westminster lately pointed out in Convocation, was the Act of Toleration; as is also the Act empowering bishops to require a second sermon on Sundays.

4. Judicial decisions, once more, are from time to time unavoidable. By these a certain interpretation is put upon the rubrics of the Prayer-book; and unless protested against, as sometimes they are, in some weighty and well-grounded manner, they are practically embodied in the standing law of the Church.

5. And lastly, apart from any legal prescription whatever, various usages and practices, especially in matters not expressly provided for in the Prayer-book, have obtained so generally, as to be a part of what may be called the "common law" of the Church, though liable to revision by the proper authority. Such is the alternate recitation, in Churches where it obtains, of the psalms, between the Minister and the people. Such too is, in reality, the use of any other mode of saying the Service than that of reciting it on a musical note; for none other was intended by the Church, nor is recognised in the Prayer-book.24 Such, once more, is the having any sermon beyond the rubrical one.

On the whole, it cannot be gainsaid, that what "this Church and realm hath received," and what her Ministers, therefore, undertake to carry out in their ministrations, is not the Book of Common Prayer, pure and simple, but that Book as their main guide and Magna Charta, yet interpreted and modified here and there, and in some few but not unimportant points, by provisions or considerations external to it. When, therefore, the candidate for Holy Orders, or for admission to a benefice, undertakes, by signing the Thirty-sixth Canon, that "he will use the form in the said Book prescribed in Public Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments, and none other," it cannot be understood that the directions of that Book are, without note, comment, or addition, his guide in every particular. For he is about, if a candidate for Ordination, to promise solemnly before the Church that he will minister "as this Church and Realm hath received;" a formula, as has been shown, of much wider range than the letter of the Prayer-book. And in like manner, if a candidate for a benefice, he has already, at his Ordination, made that larger undertaking, and cannot be understood to narrow it now by subscribing to the Canon. And if it be asked, Why were the terms of the Thirty-sixth Canon made so stringent originally by the addition of the words "and none other;" or why should these words be retained now? the answer is, that originally, as a matter of historical fact, the Canon was directed against wilful depravers and evaders of the Book and its rules; not against such interpretations, or even variations and additions, as had all along obtained on various grounds, and are in fact unavoidable by the nature of things. "No one," says the late Bishop Blomfield, "who reads the history of those times with attention can doubt that the object of the Legislature, who imposed upon the clergy a subscription to the above Declaration, was the substitution of the Book of Common Prayer" (subject, even then, to Injunctions, Canons, and customs already modifying it here and there) "for the Missal of the Roman Catholics, or the Directory of the Puritans." And the present retention of the wording of the Canon stands on the same grounds. It is necessary that a promise, and that of a stringent kind, should be exacted of the clergy of a Church, or licence would be unbounded. But on the other hand, it is perfectly intelligible, and has the advantage of practicability, that the words should be understood to speak of the Book as modified in the way in which it has all along, by universal consent, been held to be modified. If it be replied that this, too, opens a door to endless licence, I answer, No. The modifications are, for the most part, as definite as the document itself, and are in number few, though they cover, on occasion, a considerable range of actions. The Prayer-book, in short, is not unlike a monarch, nominally absolute, and for the most part really such; but on whom a certain degree of pressure has from time to time been brought to bear, and may be brought to bear again. But its actual status is at any given time fairly ascertainable. It might be well, indeed, that all this occasional legislation should be digested by the only proper authority, viz. the conjoint spiritualty and temporalty of the realm, into one harmonious and duly authorised whole. But for the time being the position of things is sufficiently intelligible.

And now to apply this view of Prayer-book law, so to call it, to the matter which especially engages attention at this moment, – that of the manner of administering the Holy Communion; and first to the vestments of the clergy.

1. Now, if there be any one point in which the English Church is, what she has most untruly been asserted to be in other points, namely, broad and alternative in her provisions, it is this one of the ornaments or dress of her clergy. While, in the matter of doctrine, Heaven forfend that she should have two minds, and give her children their choice which they should embrace – seeing that so would she forfeit the name and being of a "Church" altogether; – certain it is, that, from peculiar causes, she does, in this matter of officiating vestments, give, by her present and already ancient provisions, a choice and an alternative. With her eyes open, and at periods when she was most carefully scanning, for general adoption, those provisions, has she deliberately left on her statute-book (meaning thereby her entire range of rules), and admitted into her practical system, two diverse rules or practices. We may confine our attention for the moment to the period of the latest revision of the Prayer-book in 1662. On that occasion the Fifty-eighth Canon of 1603, – derived from certain "Advertisements" of Elizabeth, and probably supported by the universal custom of the realm, – was allowed to stand unaltered. This Canon provides, as has been above mentioned, that "Every minister, saying the public prayers, or ministering the sacraments, or other rites of the Church, shall wear a decent and comely surplice with sleeves;" only with a special exception, recognised in another Canon, in the case of Cathedrals. And yet on the same occasion was retained the rubric of Elizabeth (1559), about "the ornaments of the Church, and of the ministers thereof," with only such variation as fully proves that it was not an oversight, but a deliberate perpetuation of the law concerning vestments more especially. For the previous form of it, – dating from 1603, and but slightly altered from that of Elizabeth, – was, that "the minister at the time of the Communion, and at all other times in his ministrations, shall use such ornaments in the Church as were in use by authority of Parliament in the second year of the reign of King Edward VI., according to the Act of Parliament set in the beginning of this Book." But the altered form was, "Such ornaments of the Church, and of the ministers thereof, at all times of their ministrations, shall be retained, and be in use, as were in this Church of England in the second year," &c.; omitting only the mention of the Act of Parliament. It will be observed, that in lieu of "ornaments of the Church," which might have seemed to be irrespective of vestments, was now substituted "ornaments of the Church, and of the ministers thereof." And again, compare the words "shall be retained, and be in use" with "shall use." In truth, the new rubric is a citation from the Act of Elizabeth, only omitting the limitation "until such time, &c.," and it cannot be taken as expressing less than a real desire and earnest hope, on the part of our latest revisers, that the original Edwardian "ornaments" might really be used; that they should – gradually, perhaps, but really – supersede, in the case of the Communion Service, the prevalent surplice.

If it be asked, how it came to pass that the surplice had superseded the proper eucharistic vestments prescribed by Elizabeth's rubric? we can only answer, that the prevailing tendency during her reign was decidedly in favour of simpler ways in the matter of ritual; and that, the Second Book of Edward VI. (1552), having distinctly forbidden those vestments by the words, "the minister at the time of the Communion, and at all other times of his ministration, shall use neither alb, vestment, nor cope, but, being a bishop, a rochet; and being a priest or deacon, he shall have and wear a surplice only: " the Elizabethan clergy would, owing to the reaction after Queen Mary's reign, be inclined to recur to that position rather than to retain the other vestments. Some, indeed, did retain them, as appears by allusions to them as in use in the beginning of Elizabeth's reign;25 but, as a general rule, their use was discouraged, and apparently put down. "For the disuse of these ornaments we may thank them that came from Geneva, and, in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's reign, being set in places of government, suffered every negligent priest to do as he listed." (Bishop Overall.)26

On the other hand, one form of the Edwardian "Ornaments" had survived, even through Elizabeth's reign; viz. the cope (of course with the alb), chiefly in cathedrals. For so it is recognised in the 24th canon of 1603. "In all cathedrals and collegiate churches the Holy Communion shall be administered upon principal feast-days by the Bishop, the Dean, or a Canon or Prebendary, the principal minister [i. e. celebrant] using a decent cope." This was in accordance, as far as it went, with the original rubric of Edward VI.'s First Book. "The priest that shall execute the holy ministry shall put upon him … a vestment, or cope." But during the Elizabethan period two limitations had, practically, been introduced; the cope, only, was used; and chiefly, though not exclusively, in cathedral churches only.27 However, the fact that to this extent the rubric of Edward VI. was still acted upon, might well encourage the revisers of 1662 to contemplate a general return to its provisions.28 It was but a hundred years ago that they had fallen into desuetude; and the devout zeal of Bishop Cosin, and others among the revisers, on behalf of the Eucharist, would lead them to desire the restoration of whatever, in their judgment, would tend to its higher honour and more becoming celebration. Cosin himself was accustomed, as a Prebendary of Durham Cathedral, to wear the cope, and to see it worn by others; and not by the celebrant only, but by the attendant clergy. For in his answer to the articles of impeachment sent to the House of Lords against him in 1640, he says "That the copes used in that Church were brought in thither long before his time. One there was that had the story of the Passion embroidered upon it; but the cope that he used to wear, when at any time he attended the Communion Service, was of plain white satin only, without any embroidery upon it at all."29 The canon of 1603 must not, therefore, be understood as confining the use of the cope to the celebrant, but only as providing that the celebrant, at least, must, in cathedrals, be so apparelled. It may be added, that the copes still preserved in Durham Cathedral, and only disused30 within a century, are a proof that, in this point at any rate, it is but very recently that the Edwardian "ornaments" ceased to be used in the English Church in our cathedrals; while, in a solitary instance, that of the Coronation Service, the use of copes by the Archbishop, the attendant Bishops, and by the Dean and Canons of Westminster, survives to the present day.

The bearing of these facts upon our subject is, that they prove that it was in no merely antiquarian spirit that our latest revisers retained the far-famed rubric of Edward VI. It was as having been accustomed to see a due access of honour and dignity accruing to the Holy Rite, that they wished, not merely to retain what had survived, in practice, of that rubric, but to restore the parts of it which had fallen into disuse; to bring back, everywhere, with the less correct cope, that which in the rubric enjoyed a preference – the "vestment" or chasuble, – and whatever else the rubric involved. They hoped that the day was come, or that it would come ere long, when the surplice would, in respect of the Communion Service, yield to the proper "vestment" its "ancient usual place."31

And the reason why they did not at the same time procure the formal abolition of the Canon of 1603, which recognises the surplice for parish churches, is, we can hardly doubt, that they wished to leave the practical working out of the change to time, and to the voluntary action of the parochial clergy. There had existed ever since the year 1559 a diversity in practice; and, ever since Elizabeth's "Advertisements," an actual alternative in the Church's orders about vestments. That alternative they did not care to remove. It was by desuetude that the irregular habit had first come in, until it obtained recognition by the Canon of 1604: it was to desuetude that they trusted for the removal of it. Meanwhile, those who chose to plead usage and the canon on the one hand, and those who preferred to plead the statute law of the Rubric on the other, were both alike in a fairly defensible position. Two modes, in short, of vesting the clergy for the Holy Communion were practically recognised at the latest settlement of our Offices; and, until some new enactment should supersede the one or the other, must continue to be recognised still.