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CHAPTER IX.

RITUALISM.

What the House and the country understand by Ritualism is practices by a portion of the clergy avowedly symbolic of doctrines which the same clergy are bound in the most solemn manner to refute and repudiate. . . . So long as those doctrines are held by Roman Catholics I am prepared to treat them with reverence; but what I object to is, that they should be held by ministers of our Church who, when they enter the Church, enter it at the same time with a solemn contract with the nation that they will oppose those doctrines and utterly resist them. What I do object to is mass in masquerade.-Speech of Mr. Disraeli on Public Worship Regulation Act, July 15, 1874.

'WHEREAS it has been represented unto Us that differences of practice have arisen from varying interpretations put upon the rubrics, orders, and directions for regulating the course and conduct of public worship, the administration of the Sacraments and the other services contained in the Book of Common Prayer according to the use of the United Church of England and Ireland, and more especially with reference to the ornaments used in the churches and chapels of the said United Church, and the vestments worn by the ministers thereof at the time of their ministration. And whereas it is expedient that a full and impartial inquiry should be made into the matters aforesaid,

with the view of explaining or amending the said rubrics, orders, and directions so as to secure general uniformity of practice in such matters as may be deemed essential, now know ye that We, reposing great confidence in your ability and discretion, have nominated, constituted, and appointed '- [Then followed the names of those directed to serve on the Commission.]

Such were the opening words of what was briefly termed the Ritual Commission, a board composed of men of all shades of thought in the Church, under the presidency of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Of these commissioners Sir Joseph Napier was one. The first meeting of the Commission was held in the Jerusalem Chamber, Westminster, June 17, 1867.

The appointment of this board of inquiry was not before it was urgently needed. The innovations introduced by the Ritualists in their mode of celebrating divine service had now reached such a height that, unless the authority of the law intervened, the distinctive features stamped upon the Anglican Church by the Reformation would in many quarters be effaced. Vestments of various shapes and colours,— green, red, white, and violet,-considered to have an emblematic character, had been freely adopted by the ceremonialists and deemed to be specially appropriate to particular services and seasons.

Lighted candles were placed upon the altar' and incense swung in front of it. When the Holy Communion was administered, the celebrating' priest'

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wore the chasuble,' whilst the deacon and sub-deacon wore the 'dalmatic' and 'tunicle'; boys dressed in surplices and cassocks also assisted. At the time of the celebration of the Holy Communion various gestures were used with regard to the sacramental elements; water was also mixed with wine in the chalice. Before service on great occasions a procession was formed, headed by a youth bearing a large cross, who was followed by the choristers and clergy singing a hymn. Upon the altar' was a cross -or, if the vicar or incumbent was afraid of the law, upon a ledge behind the altar, giving the same appearance at a distance as if on the altar. Confessional boxes were placed in the aisles, and the necessity of confessing to a priest inculcated. The Holy Communion was distinctly proclaimed to be 'a sacrifice,' and for that reason the celebrating priest was to have a distinctive dress to mark him off from the rest of the ministers, as being the principal priest in office offering the sacrifice at the time.' Details of a minor nature were also introduced, all undisguisedly tending to overthrow what of Protestantism there was in the Church of England.

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Nor had remonstrances from high quarters any

effect upon the vagaries of these refractory clergy. Admonitions from the bishops they had vowed to obey were calmly ignored, whilst anything approaching to an episcopal threat was replied to by a solicitor's letter. Every gnat of the rubrics was strained out, whilst the camel of open and systematic disobedience was unblushingly swallowed.

We are told (said the present eloquent Bishop of Peterborough, on the passing of the Public Worship Regulation Bill) that we should govern the Church by fatherliness. Now I must be allowed to say that there is something very one-sided in this cry for fatherliness from the Bishops, when they meet with no filialness, and I should like to have some reciprocity. When a monition is to be flung back in my face, and I am told that I am neither a gentleman nor a divine, and that my conversion to Christianity is to be prayed for, I must say I should like to see a little filialness on the part of those who are demanding the fatherliness. I honestly desire, as far as I can, to be fatherly towards these men; but when I hear this advice given to us, I am reminded of the solitary instance in which a ruler attempted to govern in this fatherly fashion, and that his name was Eli whilst his sons were Hophni and Phinehas.

Nor were the Ritualists consistent in their opposition. When the common law of the land condemned their proceedings they declined to acknowledge its validity; when however it sanctioned their conduct, they availed themselves to the full of its power and arguments. Thus at one time they were seen

appealing to the ruling of a layman judge, whilst at another they contemptuously refused to recognise his authority. They would, they said, only be governed by the ecclesiastical law and by ecclesiastical judges. We have seen how they obeyed their bishops.

The commissioners appointed to inquire into these disturbing matters were twenty-six in number. Of this body the most prominent were the Archbishops of Canterbury and Armagh; the Bishops of London, Oxford, St. David's, and Gloucester and Bristol; the Deans of Westminster, Ely, and Lincoln; Lords Stanhope, Harrowby, Beauchamp, and Ebury; Sir Robert Phillimore and Sir Joseph Napier; and Messrs. Spencer Walpole, Beresford Hope, and J. D. Coleridge.

Though Sir Joseph was a sincere and prominent member of the Evangelical body, he had nothing of the intolerance and narrow-mindedness which is often associated in the public mind with that community. His culture and judicial training preserved him from that common fault-a fault especially apparent in the so-called religious world-of considering all in, the wrong who hold opinions contrary to our own. The views he had arrived at upon theological and Church matters were the result of much thought and extensive reading, still he was perfectly prepared that others should draw very different deductions from the same premisses. Therefore, though he had no sympathy

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