Part 1

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RITES AND RITUAL;

A PLEA FOR APOSTOLIC DOCTRINE AND WORSHIP.

BY

PHILIP FREEMAN, M.A.,

VICAR OF THORVERTON, DEVON; ARCHDEACON AND CANON OF EXETER; AUTHOR OF "THE PRINCIPLES OF DIVINE SERVICE."

WITH AN APPENDIX CONTAINING THE OPINIONS, ON CERTAIN POINTS OF DOCTRINE, OF HENRY, LORD BISHOP OF EXETER.

"O Mother dear, Wilt thou forgive thy son one boding sigh? Forgive, if round thy towers he walk in fear, And tell thy jewels o'er with jealous eye?"

_FOURTH EDITION, REVISED._

LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET. 1866.

LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET, AND CHARING CROSS.

PREFACE.

The following pages had been prepared, for the most part, for publication, before it was known that the question of Ritual would be discussed in Convocation, or a Committee of the Lower House appointed, by the direction of the Upper House, to report upon it.

But the suggestions here offered are of so general a character, that it seemed to the writer that they might still without impropriety be put forth as a contribution, of however humble a kind, to the general ventilation of the subject.

It was the writer's hope, as expressed in the original announcement of the Pamphlet, that his Diocesan, the venerable Bishop of Exeter, would have been able to prefix, in an Introduction, his opinion on the leading points, whether of Ritual or Doctrine, involved in the present controversy. And, although that hope has been in part frustrated, he has still been privileged to embody, in an Appendix, his Lordship's deliberate judgment on some of the weightier matters of Eucharistic Doctrine; and to receive an assurance of his warm interest in the subjects dwelt upon in these pages.

The writer has to apologise for having occasionally referred the reader to a larger work of his own. He begs that this may be understood to be merely a guarantee, that detailed proof is forthcoming on points which could only be cursorily treated of in the present publication.

CONTENTS.

RITES.--Importance of them above Ritual--Serious departure of the English Church from primitive practice--Abeyance of Weekly Celebration--Proofs that Weekly Communion is part of the Divine Ordinance--Practical advantages of restoring it--Origin and history of the present unsound practice--Vigorous protest of the English Church against it--Difficulties in the way of a reformation, how to be met--Recent Eucharistic excesses--Worship addressed to Christ as enshrined in the Elements--Proof that this was not the primitive doctrine or practice--Recent origin of it among ourselves--Non-communicating attendance unknown to antiquity.

RITUAL.--Law of the English Church about it, how ascertainable-- Vestments--An alternative recognised--The Vestment Rubric preserved--The Surplice permitted--Ritual advance at the present day--Choral Festivals--Church Decoration--History and rationale of the Eucharistic Vestments, and of the ordinary ones--Position of the Celebrant--Two lights on the Altar--Incense--The "Mixed Chalice"--The Crucifix--Minute ceremonial disallowed by the English Church--Suggestions as to the present controversy--Hopeful circumstances, and grounds of union.

1.--APPENDIX A. Opinions of the BISHOP OF EXETER on certain points of Doctrine Page 101

2.--APPENDIX B. Former judgment of the BISHOP OF EXETER on Vestments 103

3.--APPENDIX C. On Saying and Singing, by the Rev. J. B. DYKES. 105

RITES AND RITUAL,

ETC.

The position of affairs in the English Church, at the present moment, is such as may well call forth from her children such counsel as their affection may prompt, or their experience justify. And, whatever be the intrinsic value, if any, of the suggestions about to be offered here, the writer can at least testify that, though called forth by a particular conjuncture of circumstances, they are not the hasty or immature thoughts of the moment, but rather an outpouring of the anxious musing of years over the condition and prospects of a beloved and honoured Mother.

It will be conjectured, from what has now been said, that the writer is not among the number of those who perceive, in the present condition of the English Church, or in her rate of improvement of late years, any grounds for satisfaction, much less for complacency or congratulation. On the contrary, he very humbly conceives--and his reasons for that opinion shall be given presently--that to the spiritual eye, used to rest either on what the Church of God was _intended to be_, or on what once, for a few centuries, she _was_, there is, in the practical condition of the English Church one defect of so radical a character, and which has eaten so extensively into her entire system, that until this is, at least in a very great measure, remedied, all else is little better than a palliative, and little else than an illusion. There is surely something deeply saddening in the spectacle (if it indeed be so) of a Church busying herself with "many things"--making much show of practical activity, of self-reparation, of improvement in services and ministries, of extension abroad,--when all the while the "one thing," namely, _soundness and perfectness in Apostolic faith and practice_, is in any serious degree wanting to her. If, while she is manifesting a feverish anxiety about the more or less of RITUAL, there is in her RITES (of which Ritual is but the outward clothing) that which demands repair and readjustment on an extensive scale; then it is surely needful to press upon her, in the first instance, the redress of such essentials, before proceeding to speak of the accessories.

And this is what the present writer, with all humility, undertakes to make good. He is indeed far from denying that, "by the good Hand of our God upon us," great things, of a certain kind, have been accomplished in our day.

"Stately thy walls, and holy are the prayers That day and night before thine altar rise."

Our churches have grown to be, to a great extent, the perfection of earthly sanctuaries. Our Services are nobler and heartier. Our church music is more worthy of the name. Better still than this, and more to the present purpose, our communicants have increased in numbers, our Communions in frequency. Our clergy, as a rule, are devoted, beyond the example of former times, to their duty, according to their conception of it. Schools are diligently cared for, and are fairly efficient; foreign missions grow; the home circle of charities is daily widened and rendered more effectual. And this is "progress," or "improvement," undoubtedly. And, were the Church a mere Machine, or a mere System, it would be perfectly reasonable to point with satisfaction to such progress or improvement. But the Church is neither the one nor the other. She is a Divine Body. And what if, while some operations of that Body are being performed with a certain increase of vigour, her very constitution, as divinely organised by God Himself, is being suffered to fall into habitual and chronic unsoundness?

Surely, as it is the first duty of man to do _right_, and only his second to do _good_;--as health is the highest of bodily blessings, so that activity, apart from it, is but spurious and imperfect;--so is it the Church's _first_ duty to be _sound_,--_primum valere_,--and only her second to be, if God enables her, active and prosperous.

And the Church being, as I have said, a Divine Body--the Body of Christ--it is plain that the first condition of her soundness is _full_ as well as vital union with Christ through the appointed medium, the Sacraments. Upon these are absolutely suspended her existence in the first instance, and her preservation and growth afterwards. What then, I would ask, can possibly be of more importance than that these sacred and wonderful ministries should be performed, _in all respects_, according to the Ordinance of Christ, such as he delivered it to the apostles?

And if it be asked, How are we to _know_ what it was that Christ delivered to the apostles on this subject, seeing that Holy Scripture is confessedly brief and unsystematic in its teaching respecting it? the answer manifestly is, By looking at the universal practice of the Church in the time of the apostles, and during the earliest ages after them. We know, with sufficient accuracy, what that practice was. Their customs as to the administration of Baptism are known to us; their Liturgies or Communion Offices are in our hands. And, though diversities of practice, _outside_ of certain limits, are found existing in those ages, _within_ certain limits there is none.

Now, among the points thus defined for us by universal early usage, is the ordained _frequency of celebration_ of both Sacraments. The law of Holy Baptism, viz. that it should be administered once only, was universally received. This is confessed on all hands.

And when we come to the Holy Eucharist, here, too, _the degree of frequency_, as a law and as a _minimum_, of celebration, is defined for us no less certainly. That this was, by universal consent and practice, _weekly_,--namely, on every Lord's Day or Sunday--cannot be gainsaid. That it was on occasion administered more frequently still; that in some churches it became, we will not define how early, even daily; that, according to some, the apostles, at the very first, used it daily,--is beside the present question. The point before us is, that there was no Church throughout the world which failed, for the first three or four hundred years, to have _everywhere a weekly celebration on the Sunday_, and to expect the attendance of all Christians at that ordinance. Of this, I say, there is no doubt. The custom of apostolic days is perfectly clear from Acts xx. 7, and other passages. The testimony of Pliny, at the beginning of the second century, is that the first Christians met "on a stated day" for the Eucharist; while Justin Martyr (an. 150) makes it certain that that day was Sunday. And the testimony of various subsequent writers proves that the practice continued unbroken for three centuries. The Council of Elvira,[1] A.D. 305, first inflicted the penalty of suspension from church privileges on all who failed to be present for three successive Sundays; and we know from our own Archbishop Theodore of Tarsus, A.D. 668, that in the East that rule was still adhered to, though in the West the penalty had ceased to be inflicted.

[1] Can. 21. It is referred to by Hosius at the Council of Sardica, A.D. 347.

Now the ground which I venture to take up, as absolutely irrefragable, is that it must needs be of most dangerous consequence to depart from the apostolic and primitive eucharistic practice, in _any_ of those things which were ancient and universal, and, as such, we cannot doubt, ordained features of the Ordinance. Thus, we rightly view with the utmost repugnance, and even sickness of heart, the practice of the Western Church in later ages in respect of the Elements; viz. her refusing to the laity, and to all but the Celebrant himself, one half of the Holy Eucharist. We pity or marvel at the flimsy pretences by which the fearful and cruel decree, originating in the bestowal of exclusive privileges upon the higher clergy,[2] is attempted to be justified, and its effects to be explained away. The Western Church, we feel, must answer for that to God as she can. But what right have we, I would ask, to choose, among the essentials of the mysterious Ordinance, one which, as we conceive, _we_ may dispense with, while we condemn others who select for themselves another? And yet, what do we? what is our practice? the practice so universally adopted throughout our Church, that the exceptions are few, and but of yesterday; so that those who contend for and practise the contrary are deemed visionary and righteous over much? Alas! our practice may be stated in few and fatally condemnatory words. The number of clergy in England may be roundly stated at 20,000. Now, it was lately affirmed in a Church Review of high standing, that the number who celebrate the Holy Communion weekly in England is 200: that is to say, if this estimate be correct, that _one in a hundred_ of our clergy conforms to the apostolic and ecclesiastical law of the first centuries. This statement, it is true, proves to be somewhat of an exaggeration. But to what extent? The real number of churches where there is Holy Communion every Sunday is, by recent returns, about 430.[3] The number of churches in England is at least 12,000. That is to say, that there are in England at this moment more than _eleven thousand_ parishes which, judged by the rule of the apostles, are false to their Lord's dying command in a particular from which He left no dispensation. It will be said, the Holy Eucharist is celebrated in these parishes from time to time, only less _frequently_ than of old. But who has told us that we may safely celebrate it less frequently? How can we possibly know but that such infrequency is direfully injurious? Take the analogy of the human body, which ever serves to illustrate so well the nature of the Church's life. Take pulsation, take respiration, or even food. Is not the _frequency_ of every one of these mysterious conditions of life as certainly fixed, as their necessity to life at all? Let pulsation or respiration be suspended for a few minutes, or food for a few days, and what follows but death, or trance at the best? And what know we, I ask, of the appointed intervals for the awful _systole_ and _diastole_ of the Church's heart--of the appointed times of her inbreathing and expiration of the _afflatus_ of the Divine Spirit--of the laws regulating the frequency of her mysterious nourishment? What know we, I say, of these things, but what we learn from the wondrous Twelve, who taught us all we know of the kingdom of God?

[2] See Mabillon, referred to in Introduction to vol. ii. of 'The Principles of Divine Service.'--P. 79, note _z_.

[3] See the 'Churchman's Diary' (Masters). Another return makes the number only 328. See the 'Kalendar of the English Church.'

What may be the exact injury of such intermittent celebration of the Divine Mysteries--of such scanty and self-chosen measures of obedience to the commands of Christ,--I pretend not by these analogies to decide. But surely it may well be that continuous and unbroken weekly Eucharist is as a ring of magic power, if I may use the comparison, binding in and rendering safe the Church's mysterious life; and that _any_ rupture in that continuity is exceedingly dangerous to her.

Or if it be contended, as not unnaturally it may, that this particular circumstance of _frequency_, and of _weekly_ recurrence may, notwithstanding the apostolic testimony to its importance, be subject to variation, then I would desire to put the matter from another point of view. One way of judging of the degree of importance to be attached by us to any given religious element or feature, is to observe what degree of divine care Almighty God has bestowed in inculcating it upon the world. Thus, the Unity of God, and again the necessity of sacrifice to atone for sin, or procure admission to His favour, were attested throughout the whole pre-evangelic history by special training, imparted, in the one instance, to the Jews, in the other to all mankind.

But each of these instances of training is even surpassed by that which God was pleased to impart respecting the mysterious Ordinance of the WEEK. Creation, Redemption, Sanctification--the three great phenomena of man's religious history--were all visibly based upon the Week. About the Creation, and its septenary commemoration as a religious ordinance, there is no real doubt whatever. In the Jewish system the sabbath, or week, is the basis upon which the whole structure rests.[4] And when the awful mystery of Redemption itself was to be consummated, it was once more within the limits of a single _week_ that the mighty drama was wrought out. From the early morning of Palm Sunday, when our Lord entered Jerusalem as the Lamb of God, Incarnate in order that He might suffer, to the early morning of Easter Day, when He rose from the dead, a measured week, rich in divine incident, ran out. Seven weeks, or a week of weeks, again elapses, and the Spirit is sent down from on high for the completion of the Church. All this indicates some deep mystery of blessedness as attaching to the seven-days period in the matter of man's relations to God. It cannot be alleged, indeed, as an absolute _proof_ that the celebration of the Eucharist was also meant to be of weekly recurrence, or that such recurrence would be the proper and indefeasible law of its rightful administration. But it surely renders that conclusion highly probable. For what purpose else, we may ask, was all this training given? Why was the Jewish nation, who were to be the first to receive the Gospel ordinances, and to transmit them to mankind, carefully habituated to a seventh-day rendering up of themselves to God? As regards the general principle involved, it was doubtless because it is good that man should keep with God these "short reckonings," which "make long" and eternal "friends." But besides this, it was, as the ancient Jewish services testify,[5] that they might keep in remembrance _two_ very wonderful weeks of divine operation on their behalf, the week of Creation, and the week of their own deliverance out of Egypt. What more likely than that a seventh-day observance was to be perpetuated still, only with reference to that antitypical Redemption, which itself also was ordained to take place, as if for this very purpose, within the compass of a week?

[4] See this admirably worked out in Dr. Moberly's Sermons on the Decalogue.

[5] See this proved at large in 'Principles of Divine Service,' vol. ii., pp. 284, _sqq._

In this point of view, the Christian Eucharist is the gathering up of the memories of that wonderful week, called of old the "Great Week," the "Week of Weeks." That such was its purpose might be gathered even from the accustomed Day, no doubt appointed by Christ Himself, for its celebration. This is not, as might perhaps have been expected, the Thursday, the day of the Institution; not a day in the middle of the week, but at the close of one week and the beginning of another: that so it may look back on the marvels of the Great Week, ever renewed in memory, and with deepest thankfulness commemorate them. The original time of celebration in apostolic days was at first, as it should seem, on the evening of the old Sabbath; that is, according to the then reckoning, on the overnight commencement, or eve, of the Sunday, on which the whole mystery was consummated by the Resurrection. In the account of the celebration at Troas, we find it to have been, from particular causes, already past midnight when the celebration took place. By the time of Pliny, in the first century, it had passed on to the morning hour of Sunday, where it has continued ever since. Surely it is manifest that, in the Divine Intention, the Church ought to pass week by week, in solemn memory and mysterious sympathy, through the great series of redeeming events, and crown her contemplation of them by the great act of Oblation and Reception, which Christ himself ordained for high memorial of these events, and to convey the graces and powers flowing out of them. This is indeed to keep up a "_continual remembrance_ of the Sacrifice of the death of Christ, and of the benefits which we receive thereby." A weekly Eucharist is really a _continual_ Eucharist, because it makes our whole life to be nothing else than a living over again and again, with perpetual application to our own practice, of those events and memories which are the staple of the Ordinance. In this respect the Sunday celebration of the Eucharist, viewed as crowning the week, possesses a fitness, because a close following in the steps of Christ, in his Incarnation and Passion, his Death and Burial and Resurrection, which no other day can lay claim to. This fitness, of course, reaches its height on Easter-Day, but is also realized in a very high degree on our

"Easter Day in every week."

Nor are there wanting more positive and distinct intimations of the Will of God in this matter, over and above the general presumptions which have been adduced hitherto.