Excerpt from Is "Ritual" Right?

The daily Services, for instance, are stated in the Prayer Book Preface Concerning the Service of the Church to be the main reason why the Prayer Book was drawn up. Read this Preface (the second in the Prayer Book), and you will see that the reason given for the work of the Reformers is that the clergy by reading, and the people by daily hearing of Holy Scripture read in the Church, might be edified. The Old choir Services had become so confused, and, being in Latin, were so unintelligible, that it was necessary to draw up a Common Prayer, in which the Psalter and Bible would be read steadily through day by day. Therefore those who do not have the daily Services are in truth unfaithful to the Reformation. This Preface is followed by a Note ordering the Curate of every parish church to have daily Morning and Evening Prayer in the Church. The daily order is further explained in the two notes after the next Preface, beginning The Psalter Shall be read through once a month. Then follow the Proper Lessons for Sundays and Holy Days, and after that the Kalendar, which gives the week-day lessons. After that come a Table of Feasts (still largely ignored in many lawless churches), and a carefully-detailed Table of Fasting days, which are still SO much disobeyed that a person who fasts is looked upon as extraordinarily High Church by people who fancy themselves to be quite loyal to the Prayer Book and the Reformation.' Then comes the Services of Morning and Evening Prayer described in their title as daily to be said and used throughout the year.

If you reckon up the Table of Vigils and Fasts in the Tables and Rules of the Prayer Book, you will find that we are ordered to keep 103 Fast-days in 1908 (40 days of Lent, 3 Rogation days, 13 remaining Vigils, 7 remaining Ember Days, and also the 40 remaining Fridays). Who obeys the Prayer Book in this its hardest rule? The High Churchman.

Who, do you think, are the lawless clergy - those who obey these orders thus heaped upon us in the Prayer Book, or those who disobey them?

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.