assailed by Romanists, may be, and doubtless have been, overcome and converted by arguments which reach far short of the Roman doctrine in dispute.

It may serve as a suitable ending to this Paper, to present the reader with an account of the circumstances under which the Commemoration of the Dead was omitted from our own Liturgy. Some information on the general subject of the Primitive Commemoration will be found in No. 63 of these Tracts.

...

In 1548, the second year of King Edward, it was determined by the King in Council to draw up a public liturgy. "This Service Book," says Collier, (History, vol. ii. page 252,)" when confirmed in Parliament, it was supposed would effect a more general compliance. For then the pretences of defective authority in a Privy Council, would be all out of doors. To this purpose the Committee of Bishops and Divines.. were ordered to attend the king on the first of September." "This Committee of Bishops and Divines," he proceeds, "set down this (as is very well observed) for a general rule, not to change any thing for the sake of novelty. In this performance they resolved to govern themselves by the word of God and the precedent of the Primitive Church. . . . . . Their business was only to brighten what had been rusted by time, to discharge the innovations of latter ages, and bring things up to the primitive standard. To this purpose, it was very prudently agreed to make use of none but English help. When Calvin heard of the farther advances of Reformation, he offered Cranmer his assistance, but was happily refused by the Archbishop. It is true he gave Martin Bucer and Peter Martyr, two eminent divines, an invitation to our Universities; but the Liturgy, as Heylin proves, was finished before their arrival."

.....

The compilation which was the subject of these deliberations is called the First Book of King Edward, and in it the Burial Service proceeded as follows, to use the words of the same author. "In the office for the Burial of the Dead, when the priest throws earth upon the corpse, he says,

'I commend thy soul to GOD the Father Almighty, and thy body to the ground,' &c.

“ And the next prayer begins thus:

'We commend into thy hands of Mercy, most merciful Father, the soul of this our brother departed: . . . that when the judgment shall come which Thou hast committed to Thy well beloved Son, both this our brother and we may be found acceptable in Thy sight, and we may receive Thy blessing,' &c.

"The next prayer stands thus:

" Almighty GOD, we give Thee hearty thanks for this Thy servant, whom Thou hast delivered from the miseries of this wretched world, from the body of death and all temptation; and as we trust, hast brought his soul, which he committed into Thy holy hands, into sure consolation and rest. Grant, we beseech Thee, that at the day of judgment, his soul and all the souls of thy elect, departed out of this life, may with us and we with them fully receive Thy promises, and be made perfect altogether, through the glorious resurrection of thy Son, JESUS CHRIST our LORD.'

"After the second Lesson, 'Lord, have mercy upon us,' &c. and the Lord's Prayer, the Priest says,

'Enter not, O Lord, into judgment with Thy servant:

'Ans. For in Thy sight no living creature shall be justified.

'Pr. From the gates of hell,

'Ans. Deliver their souls, O Lord.

'Pr. I believe to see the goodness of the Lord,

، Ans. In the land of the living.

'Pr. O Lord, graciously hear my prayer,

'Ans. And let my cry come unto Thee.'

"Then follows this prayer:

'O Lord, with whom do live the spirits of them that be dead, and in whom the souls of them that be elected after they be delivered from the burden of the flesh, be in joy and felicity: grant unto this Thy servant that the sins which he committed in this world be not imputed unto him, but that he, escaping the gates of hell, and pains of eternal darkness, may ever dwell in the regions of light, with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in the place where is no weeping, sorrow, nor heaviness; and when that dreadful day of the resurrection shall come, make him to rise also with the just and righteous, and receive this body again to glory, then made pure and incorruptible. Set him on the right hand of Thy Son JESUS' CHRIST, among Thy holy and elect, that there he may hear with them these most sweet and comfortable words, Come to me, ye blessed,' &c. . . .

"At the Burial of the Dead, there is an order for the Communion, I shall only mention what is particular to the occasion. First, the 42nd Psalm is said by way of introduction. The Collect is now used at burials : it begins thus : ‘O merciful Gon, the Father,' &c. The epistle is taken out of 1 Thess. [iv. ?] 13, and

the Gospel is John vi. 37-40. Receiving the holy Eucharist is not without precedent in the Primitive Church, as appears by Canon 44th of the Council of Carthage.

.. Upon this Canon

the learned Bishop Beveridge cites a passage of St. Austin, to prove the custom of recommending the dead to GOD ALMIGHTY upon such occasions."

So much for King Edward's first Book; now let us pass to the transactions of 1551.

66

"Much greater alterations," says Collier, were now coming forward. The Common Prayer Book was to be revised; Calvin, Bucer, and Peter Martyr, by making exceptions against the Service established, had their share in bringing on this change. Calvin, who thought himself wiser than the Ancient Church, and fit to dictate religion to all countries in Christendom, had taken no small pains in this matter," . . . and, "being apprehensive he might not pass altogether for an oracle with the Council and Bishops, [he] tried his interest in other places, and pushed his design by his agents in the court, the country, and the Universities. Bucer was a strong second to Calvin, and what efforts he made has been seen already. Peter Martyr agreed to Bucer's amendments, as appears by his letter, in which there are some remarkable passages. For the purpose, he gives God thanks, for making himself and Bucer instrumental in putting the Bishops in mind of the exceptionable places in the Common Prayer. The Archbishop Cranmer told him they had met about this business, and concluded on a great many alterations, but what those corrections were, Cranmer did not acquaint him, neither durst he take the freedom to inquire. But that which pleases me not a little,' continues Martyr, Sir John Cheek acquaints me, that if the Bishops refuse to consent to the altering what is necessary, the King is resolved to do it himself, and recommend that affair at the next Session of Parliament.' These foreign divines had gained the esteem of some of the English Bishops so far, that in last year's Convocation, there was a contest in the upper house concerning some controverted passages in the Common Prayer Book."

As to the subject before us, Collier observes ;
VOL. III.-72.

F

"The custom"

[of praying for the dead]" seems to have gone upon this principle, that supreme happiness is not to be expected till the resurrection; and that in the interval between death and the end of the world is a state of imperfect bliss. The Church might, therefore, believe her prayers for good people departed might improve their condition, and raise the satisfactions of this period." Bucer's objections to the usage were, according to Collier, as follows He urges this text of St. John, 'He that hears my word, and believes on Him that sent me, has everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation.' He likewise cites a passage from the Romans, where it is said, Whatsoever is not of faith, is sin'. . . . He argues from it thus, that nothing can be done in faith, without an express warrant from Scripture, or that stands upon a conclusion evidently inferred from some inspired text; but Prayer for the Dead stands upon neither of these grounds, and therefore ought to be waved. . . There is another text urged in favour of Bucer's opinion, 'Blessed are the Dead which die in the Lord from henceforth;. yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours, and their works do follow them.' . .

"To proceed, the Common Prayer Book was brought to a review, and altered to the same form in which it stands at present, some little variations for clearing ambiguities excepted. . . The Prayers for persons deceased, in the Communion Service and the Office of Burial, are expunged."

Such is the history of the present state of opinion in the English Church touching Prayers for the Dead. The chief reason against the usage is given by implication, in the third part of the Homily on Prayer, which proceeds on the ground that such Prayers are essentially connected with belief in Purgatory. This argument is well commented on by a recent writer in the following passage :

"In primitive times," says Mr. Palmer, "these Commemorations" [in the Holy Communion] "were accompanied by Prayers for the departed. When the custom of praying for the dead began in the Christian Church, has never been ascertained. We find traces of the practice in the second century, and either then,

or shortly after, it appears to have been customary in all parts of the Church. The first person who objected to such prayers was Aerius, who lived in the fourth century, but his arguments were answered by various writers, and did not produce any effect in altering the immemorial practice of praying for those that rest. Accordingly, from that time all the Liturgies in the world contained such prayers. These facts being certain, it becomes a matter of some interest and importance to ascertain the reasons which justified the omission of these Prayers in the Liturgy of the English Church for the first time in the reign of King Edward VI. Some persons will perhaps say that this sort of prayer is unscriptural; that it infers either the Romish doctrine of Purgatory, or something else which is contrary to the revealed will of God, or the nature of things. But when we reflect that the great divines of the English Church have not taken this ground, and that the Church of England herself has never formally condemned Prayers for the Dead, but only omitted them in her Liturgy, we may perhaps think that there are some other reasons to justify that omission.

"The true justification of the Church of England is to be found in her zeal for the purity of the Christian faith, and for the welfare of all her members. It is too well known that the erroneous doctrine of Purgatory had crept into the Western Church, and was held by many of the clergy and people. Prayers for the departed were represented as an absolute proof that the Church had always held the doctrine of Purgatory. The deceitfulness of this argument can only be estimated by the fact, that many persons at this day, who deny the doctrine of Purgatory, assert positively that the custom of praying for the departed infers a belief in Purgatory. If persons of education are deceived by this argument, which has been a hundred times refuted, how is it possible that the uneducated classes could ever have got rid of the persuasion that their Church held the doctrine of Purgatory, if prayers for the departed had been continued in the Liturgy? Would not this custom, in fact, have rooted the error of Purgatory in their minds? If then the Church of England omitted public Prayer for the departed Saints, it was