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APPENDIX I.

The Services for the State Holy-days.

APPENDIX FOUR Special Services1 were 'annexed to' the Book of Common Prayer, until the year 1859, by the authority of a proclamation customarily issued at the commencement of each reign. Thus the authority for using them, instead of the Service enjoined by the Act of Uniformity, was the same which appoints any special Service on the occasion of a fast, or thanksgiving day. This is indeed the only authority for the The Queen's Special Service on the anniversary of the Sovereign's Accession,

Accession.

as that

or for observing the day itself. The observance of the three days (Nov. 5, Jan. 30, May 29) rested upon Acts of Parliament. The 5th of November was kept in memory of the GunpowderTreason, or Papists' Conspiracy3; the 29th of May, in memory of the birth and return of the king, Charles II.4; and the 30th of January, as a fasting day, in memory of the murder of king Charles I.5 and the Convocation provided a Service for each Offices for the of these occasions. While the Convocation (1661) was engaged sanctioned by upon the revision of the Prayer-Book, the Service for the 5th

three days

Convocation,

:

1 See The Original Services for the State Holy-days, with Documents relating to the same, by the Rev. A. P. Percival (1838).

2 There is no Act of Parliament enjoining the observance of this day; but it has been observed with special prayers in every reign since the Reformation. The Service (1576, 1578) is printed in Elizabethan Liturgical Services (Park. Soc.) pp. 548 sqq. Canon 11. (1640) enjoined the observance of the day, and recognised 'the particular form of prayer appointed by authority for that day and purpose' (Cardwell, Synodalia, I. p. 392; Percival, p. 25); but a later statute

(1661, 13 Car. II. c. 12) forbad the enforcement of these canons (Percival, p. 8). A new form was com piled by command of James II.; some considerable alterations were made in the time of Queen Anne; at the accession of George I. the Prayer for Unity was added, and the First Lesson, Josh. i. 1-9, was substituted for Prov. viii. 13 -36. Cardwell, Conferences, p. 385, note; Lathbury, Hist. of Con voc. pp. 387 sq.

3 Stat. 3 Jac. I. c. 1; Percival,

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of November (1605) was revised, and the Offices for the 29th APPENDIX of May and the 30th of January 1 were sanctioned. But these Offices were not sent with the Prayer-Book to the Parliament. Hence there were special Services for these days, which had what might be considered sufficient authority, although not the force of law; viz. the sanction of Convocation and the Crown. In process of time, however, changes were introduced into these Offices. James II. ordered the 29th of May to be observed in a altered by more general memory of the Restoration of the Royal Family, Royal authoand accordingly altered the Service which had been provided by Convocation for that day2. And William III. ordered the 5th of November to be observed also in memory of his landing in England, and altered that Service accordingly3. Hence these Offices, in the shape in which they were annexed to the PrayerBook, had only the authority of the Crown; exercised, too, in times when such dispensing power was certain to be disputed, when James II. was introducing Popery, and William III. was favouring the Presbyterians.

of the

These Services are all constructed upon one model. They Construction commence with proper sentences of Scripture: a Canticle is Services. appointed instead of Venite, compiled of single verses from the Psalms 5: Proper Psalms, and Lessons: additional suffrages after

1 Two Offices for the 30th of January were published in 1661. One of these contained a petition in allusion to the martyrs: 'that we may be made worthy to receive benefit by their prayers, which they, in communion with the Church Catholic, offer up unto thee for that part of it here militant.' This was laid aside, and another form published, which was again altered, as well as that for the 29th of May, by the Convocation in 1662. Lathbury, Hist. of Convoc. pp. 305 sq., and Hist. of Prayer-Book p. 334.

2Some alterations were made in the Services for the 30th of January and the 29th of May by the Bishops, by authority of the Crown, neither the Convocation nor the Parliament being con

sulted.' Lathbury, Hist. of Convoc.
p. 313.

3 Percival, p. 15. It was revised
by Patrick. See Lathbury, pp.
333 sq.

The particulars of the extensive changes introduced into these Offices may be seen in Mr. Percival's comparative arrangement of them, as sanctioned by Convocation, and as commonly printed.

5 Some of these adaptations appear to be of very questionable propriety, when expressions referring to the Lord Jesus Christ, in His suffering manhood, and in His kingly triumph, are applied to the human, though royal, subject of the special Service. Thus Ps. ii. 2, is referred to the royal martyr in the crown Service for the 30th of January; and Ps. lxxx. 17 (see

I.

APPENDIX the Creed: long proper Collects instead of the Collect for the day: a long Prayer to be inserted at the end of the Litany: and a proper Collect, Epistle, and Gospel', in the Communion Office.

The wisdom of retaining such commemorations of political events need not be discussed here; since the only special Service, now retained, is that for the day of the Sovereign's Accession: the same authority, which annexed the other three Forms to the Prayer-Book, has caused them to be removed from it, by a Royal Warrant, dated the seventeenth day of January, 1859.

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APPENDIX II.

I. A Tabular View of the Order of Morning and Evening Prayer, compared with the Morning and Evening Offices of the Medieval English Church', and also with the proposed Revision of the Roman Offices in the 16th century.

II. A Tabular View of the Arrangement of the several parts of the Communion Office, compared with the Order of the Primitive and Mediaval Offices, and with that now used in the Scottish and American Churches.

III. A Table of Dates of Events connected with the History of the Book of Common Prayer.

1 Compare Mr. Freeman's Tables, exhibiting a comparison of the Revised with the Ancient Eng

lish Offices; Principles of Divine Service, pp. 288 sq.

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