The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1855-09-04 00:00:00

LITITRe

WE havr-

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no advocate

:ayer, some do
contains false
.t its doctrines are
i'be misunderstood ;
evidently anxious to
,ral rules the second is
view. It declares the
,Lety to be, " the Revision of the
Allmon Prayer, in order to remove from it
~essions really or apparently- at variance with
Principles of the Reformation, and with the
written word of GOD." Really or apparently !
Would it not be much more honest and straight-
forward if the Society would point out the expressions
which come under these heads respectively ?—if they
would say at once what they regard as false, and
what as only seemingly so ? It would, perhaps,
puzzle the heterogeneous collection of clergy and laity
—lawyers, sailors, and soldiers—of which the Society
is composed, to agree upon a definite answer to these
questions. Old chronicles relate how that, once upon
a time, a little urchin, who had paid his penny to the
proprietor of a peripatetic peep-show, and was dili-
gently flattening his nose against one of the glasses
thereof, ventured timidly to inquire of the proprietor
Aforesaid, " Please, sir, which is Daniel ? and which
is the lions ?" and that the answer which he received
was the very indefinite one, " Whichever you please,
my little dear ; you pay your money, and take your
choice." Now, bearing in mind the Society's fourth
rule, " That every member be a contributor of not
less than ten shillings annually, or of a donation of
five pounds"—bearing this in mind, we say, let us
suppose the case of a member thirsting for informa-
tion, and writing to the secretary in order to obtain it
—proposing, in fact, the very reasonable questions
above propounded. We fancy that he would find it
the pursuit of knowledge under difficulties ; and that
the answer, however worded, would, in fact, be iden-
tical with that returned by the showman to the
inquiring juvenile—" All that the Society wants of
you is your assistance in bringing about an alteration
of the Prayer Book ; and this assistance you may
router' upon any ground you please. Far be it from
t
ciii!a4,,te-Wilat passages you are to oppose
the ----Soc—ieiy-to
.as unsound, and what as loosely expressed ! You have
paid your money, and you have a perfect right to
exercise your own private judgment upon thesq
points,"

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But who is to decide what parts of the Book, if any,
are really or apparently at variance with the Principles
of the Reformation, and with the written word of
God ? who to decide what the Principles of the Re-
formation were P Whether in all points they agree
with the Word ? and what is the true meaning of the
Word ? for all these are questions which may be
raised ; and will be raised, and fiercely disputed too,
if indeed the Society should succeed in making any
real progress. The only Principle of the Reformation
which We could ever succeed in apprehending and
identifying is this, that the Church was to be brought
back in doctrine, and as far as possible in dicipline, to
the primitive pattern. To this principle CRA.NMEB
gave his adherence just before his death, however he
may have vacillated previously ; and, tried strictly by
this principle, we maintain that the Prayer Book is
sound, not only in the main, but, in every particular.
If people will fancy, that because the Reformation
gave them the blessed privilege of reading for them-
selves the Word of GOD, therefore it was a principle
of the Reformation that every one should put his own
interpretation upon that word, then, doubtless, there
are many things in the Prayer Book with• which they
will 'be dissatisfied. Indeed we have no doubt but
that, if a number of such people were requested to
score out the portion to which they objected, there
would be none of it left. Not even those parts which
are extracts from Scripture could entirely escape, for
we have heard several of the Psalms decidedly objected
to. Now" let us suppose the practice of infant baptism
objected to, as we have ourselves known it to be, by
nominal members of the Church. Here we have a
thing which the Church believes may be proved by
Scripture ; but which, confessedly, is not read in
Scripture. How could the Society have such a ques-
tion decided ? True it is that their third rule de-
clares, that all their members must be members of
the Church of England ; and, consequently, they
might reply, that such objectors were not bond fide
members, and that therefore they were not bound to
entertain their question at all. This would be fair
enough : but, unfortunately, every member of the
Society stands in a position which renders him liable
to receive the same reply, i.e., professing to be a
member of the Church, he either objects to usages, or
doctrines, or both, which she has retained as primitive
and scriptural.
But there is one most important part of the Society's
second rule which we have not yet noticed, in which
" the Repeal or Modification of all such Acts of Par-
liament as are found unduly to abridge the lirty of
Christian action within the Church as Established by
Law," is declared to be one of the objects which the
Society has in view. It would be more satisfactory,
perhaps, if the Society would indicate those Acts, or
portions of Acts, which it would desire to see repealed ;
but this would be a difficult matter. Some would
support such a measure as that lately advocated by
Lord SHAFTESBURY ; while others would oppose it, as I
going too far, and others would only accept it as an
instalment of some more sweeping measure. Some
there are, who would only allow power to the Bishops
of the Church, provided it were always to be exer-
cised in one direction; and others who would have
but the name of Episcopacy, reducing the Bishops to
mere machines, and, indeed, we may add the Clergy
generally. Witness the language used in a paper
upon-" Liturgical Reform," one of those of which we
have already spoken as not apparently emanating
from the Society, but circulated with its papers, and
evidently penned by one who generally agrees with,
if he do not belong to, it. " The absurd attempt of
the Evangelical Clergy to reconcile the Liturgy to
the Scriptures by a non-natural or hypothetical inter-
pretation, is repudiated by the laity. It is equally
impotent to appeal to ecclesiastical canons : laymen
heed them no more than they do the laws of the
Medes and Persians. Canons may terrify the clergy
they do not convince the laity." It is a common say-
ing that there is no tyrant like your liberty-boy,—a
saying which, we believe, will be found to hold as true
in the Church as it does in the world. We feel con-
vinced that the above passage is, in fact,, a most foul
.libel upon the laity, taken as a body ; but its author
would evidently deny all liberty of conscience, all
right of private judgment to the great bulk of the
bishops and clergy—to all, in fact, except the few who
are prepared to condemn the Prayer Book as unsound.
• HighChurchmen,toi man,receive its sentiments as true
in their literal sense,--the vast majority of Low Church-
men as true in a non-natural sense ; but all these must
, give way, all yield their convictions to a tyrant mino-
rity, who please to take a different view. This minority
may also be honest in their convictions; but, their con-
Victious being that the Church is unsound, they are
bound, either for peace and order's sake to submit to
the Church, or, if they think that their salvation is
endangered by so doing, to leave it.
Such of our readers as have not seen the papers
issued by the Society may, perhaps, be curious to
know how, i. e., by what instrumentality, it proposes
to effect the objects which it has in view. In the first
place, then, it makes no allusion to Convocation,