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ABOLITION OF STATE SERVICES.

CONSERVATIVE as Englishmen are of old institutions, forms, and commemorations, they do gradually contrive to drop from time to time those that in the lapse of years have become unsuited to the spirit of the age. These observances are first worn out of the hearts and feelings of the people, and after that, though at a long interval, the crowning step is taken, and they are obliterated from the place they held in the records of the country. Such is the case with the special religious services ordered by the Crown to be observed on the anniversaries of the Gunpowder Plot, and the landing of King William III. (Nov. 5); the Martyrdom of Charles I. (Jan. 30); the Restoration of Charles II. (May 29). The services were all but disused, even on occasion of the anniversaries which they were appointed to commemorate, except, indeed, when their commemoration fell on a Sunday; but their very obsoleteness lent them a sanctity in the eyes of ultra-Conservatives and Churchmen of extreme views; especially that one which was devoted to the memory of "King Charles the Martyr." We did not, therefore, expect that the peers would have yielded so readily to the summons of Earl Stanhope to surrender these time-honoured memorials of the theological rancours of a bygone age; or that this surrender would have taken place with the general-we might almost say the unanimousassent of the bench of Bishops. A concession so gracefully made has not, we believe, taken place since the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts went through the House of Lords without a division.

DEFEAT OF THE BILL FOR THE ABOLITION OF CHURCHRATES.

THE Bill for the abolition of Church-rates, which was carried in the Commons, was thrown out of the House of Lords, on the second reading, by an overwhelming majority. There were 187 spiritual and temporal peers who voted against the Bill, while of the thirty-six who voted on the other side there were probably not more than a score who meant more by their vote than that they were desirous to effect a compromise. That which seemed to weigh most with the Prime Minister and the Bishop of Oxford, and, doubtless, with many other peers, in their opposition to the Bill, was the consideration that the majority of Dissenters

who claimed exemption from Church-rates were averse to the Church Establishment altogether. The supporters of the Bill, on the contrary, were loud in their asseverations that the Dissenters as a body were not hostile to the Establishment, and that their opposition was confined to the question at issue. On this point men of candour among the Dissenters would, we think, themselves admit that the Premier and the Bishop take a more correct view of their feelings than those who, on the occasion referred to, professed to speak their sentiments; but it does not therefore follow that they are justified in resisting the demand. For why do the enemies of Church Establishments fasten upon this question of Church-rates? Plainly because it is the vulnerable part of the Church's panoply. Get rid of that, and one main objection to the existence of the Establishment in the eyes of the public is taken away. This is a question on which we have experience to guide us. When Earl Grey brought in his Reform Bill, his opponents declared that all the revolutionists in the country supported it on the plea that it would accomplish their ends. The opponents were right: there was not a demagogue nor revolutionist in the country that did not support the Reform Bill so long as it was in peril; and we may add, there was not one that did not lament when it passed. While it was in agitation, it afforded them the means of exposing the defects of our Constitution; since it has been carried, their occupation is gone. Discontent has ceased; the loyalty of the people has acquired a fresh and new spring of healthy vigour. So it will be with Churchrates the enemies of the Church Establishment espouse the question, because it affords them an opportunity of exposing the Church's weakness; remove that source of irritation, and, we will answer for it, no one will gain more than the Church herself; none will lose more than those who oppose her connexion with the State.

LITURGICAL REVISION.

LORD EBURY'S motion for the appointment of a Royal Commission to inquire into the best means of reforming the Liturgy fell to the ground, mainly in consequence of the decided opposition of the Premier. In ordinary cases, the last question with which a Government would wish to meddle, is one affecting the Church; and it is only under the pressure of an overwhelming necessity that he will grapple with an ecclesiastical difficulty. And to suppose that Lord

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As

Derby, of all Ministers, would interfere on a question where he was sure to encounter an opposition, from which the boldest of his predecessors would have shrunk, shows that Lord Ebury was disposed to regard the Government with an amount of confidence which the Premier, reckless as he is generally considered, was far too prudent to justify. When public opinion is unmistakably pronounced in favour of liturgical reform, Lord Derby may be expected to lead the movement, and probably aid the expectation; but certainly not till then. It is possible, however, that events may work more rapidly for Lord Ebury's proposition than even he himself has any expectation of at the present moment. one indication of this, we may quote a new form of petition which originated in a discussion at a clerical meeting at Matlock. Five-sixths of those present (thirty-seven clergymen composed the meeting) expressed themselves favourable to revision, although, for various reasons, but a few were willing to sign a petition on the subject. From a minority of this meeting the following petition originated, and is now in course of signature. It will be observed that one prayer embodied in this document has been anticipated—that relating to the abolition of the three State services. This petition deserves the widest publicity, and we therefore give it in

66 TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY IN COUNCIL,"The humble Petition of the undersigned Clergy of the Church of England, showeth,

"That your Majesty's petitioners approach the Throne of your Majesty with feelings of fervent loyalty and devotion; and, having had their attention directed to the various proceedings in Parliament and elsewhere, relating to alterations in the Book of Common Prayer, that they respectfully ask permission to bear their testimony to the importance of the subject.

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2. That the experience of your Majesty's petitioners leads them to coincide in the opinion, that abbreviation is an important principle in the work of alteration or revision, and that no new doctrine should be introduced; and if additional services or prayers are contemplated, they desire to leave this, under God, to the wisdom of their superiors in ecclesiastical concerns.

"3. That a change in the Lessons they could desire to see, substituting portions from the Canonical Scriptures for such as are taken from the Apocrypha, and those portions being generally shorter than some which are now appointed to be read; that there are cases, also, in which Lessons called Proper' might well be changed for others more appropriate, and that Proper Second Lessons, as well as First, might be appointed for all Sundays in the year, with good effect.

"4. That a beneficial abbreviation might be found in discontinuing the congregational use of the Athanasian creed; especially as the doctrines of it, (sound as your Majesty's petitioners believe them to be) are too abstrusely expressed for common worship, and are all found in other parts of the Liturgy; also that the other two creeds might be so placed in juxta-position as that one or the other, and not both, might be used in the same service, or combination of services, at the discretion of the minister:' that one of the prayers for the Queen in the Communion Service might be placed in like manner in connexion with that in the Daily Service, and used as an alternative with it,—the other in the Communion Service being put away: and that, in consistency with this arrangement, it would be sufficient if the Lord's Prayer were used twice in the Morning Service with Communion, and once in the Evening Service.

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"5. That the observance of Saints' Days was matter of strong objection in the Conference of 1661, and, though the services appointed for them are not in themselves examples of the idolatrous worship of saints, yet that the observance appears to many to countenance this error; the most distant tendency to which cannot be too jealously kept clear of by the Church of Christ: that Apostolic examples, therefore, should be made edifying by ministerial teaching, and the only days for which permanent special services are reserved should be those which have special reference to the great events of our blessed Saviour's life and death, the coming of the Holy Ghost, and the commemoration of the Holy Trinity.

"6. That the Burial Service should be so cleared of passages inapplicable to some deceased persons as to remove the just scruples already expressed under the signatures of nearly four thousand of our clergy, many of them still hoping for relief in relation to this subject with anxious expectation.

7. That it would also be a great relief, if the Absolution in the Visitation of the Sick, which seems, as some think, to be more than mere declarative, were delivered from all appearance of being an absolution by priestly authority, giving it the semblance of a dangerous error.

"8. That similar ideas and sensations suggest themselves respecting the expressions in our Consecration and Ordination Services, which appear to imply (however they may be otherwise explained) the giving of the Holy Ghost by human hands.

9. That the like regret is felt by many on the subject of the communication of the Holy Ghost by the administration of holy Baptism, as our ritual seems to express it: that the unhappy divisions which prevail in our Church on this subject might be closed for ever by an alteration of the Baptismal Service, which should exclude the sponsorial element and such portions as seem to imply regeneration or the birth of the Spirit in or by baptism :-that very beautiful services would remain ; and, the Form of Baptism, given in charge by our Lord to his Apostles, having no such implication, they may be perfectly scriptural without it.

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10. That it results from the judgment of your Majesty's highest tribunal in matters ecclesiastical, (however that judgment may be viewed), that the Churchmanship of those who, like your Majesty's petitioners, do not hold baptismal regeneration in the absolute sense, is no less good than that of those who do; and that, therefore, your Majesty's petitioners are honest and consistent Churchmen in using the Baptismal Ritual in a sense which avoids that view, according to the Judgment.

"11. That they wish, therefore, only for what is just and reasonable, in desiring a ritual clear in terms from what they are authorised to eschew in fact; and that they humbly ask, why language occasioning continued dissension, without the palm of superior Churchmanship to one party more than another, should remain in a formulary which might be complete without it? And your Majesty's petitioners are the more solicitious upon this subject, because it is notoriously the chief occasion of disturbance to the peace of the Church, so ardently to be desired for her efficiency, and a cause (as your petitioners believe) of keeping many out of her communion who would otherwise be glad to join it.

"12. That it remains to be observed, in connexion with what has been said, that the Office for Confirmation would of course require to be conformed to that of Infant Baptism: that the Catechism also would require the same conformity as well as other corrections: and that in fact the adoption or construction of another in agreement, for the most part, with the original Catechism of King Edward VI., but more concise and brief in its questions and answers, would be a most valuable acquisition.

"13. That other alterations might be alluded to, both in the body and the rubrics of the Liturgy, which must readily suggest themselves as the work proceeds. The Litany, for instance, on Sunday mornings might be appointed only for the second and fourth Sundays of the month, a proportionate quantity of the Daily Prayers from and after the Jubilate being disused for that. time, as also when the Litany is used on week-days; and that the effect would be that of orderly variety, as well as of abbreviation: -that the Forms also for the Fifth of November, the Twentyninth of May, and the Thirtieth of January, might be relinquished; and generally all obsolete terms be exchanged for others now more appropriate.

"14. That, on these grounds, your petitioners most humbly pray that your Majesty, by and with the advice of your Privy Council, will be graciously pleased to take the premises into your Royal consideration, and to appoint a Commission for the Revision of the Book of Common Prayer, in harmony with the views hereby most respectfully submitted to your Majesty and if it become law that persons hereafter to be ordained, on being instituted or licensed to any benefice with cure of souls, shall therein use the New Form only-nevertheless that it may be lawful for those who have been already ordained, and have subscribed the Second Article of the

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