Page:Hints towards peace in ceremonial matters.djvu/18

14 claim of the post-reformational Church to use them is found in Edward VI.'s Injunction of 1547, which, after forbidding other lights, enjoins "two lights upon the high altar before the Sacrament, which, for the signification that Christ is the very true Light of the world, they shall suffer to remain still;" and the practice is one which can be defended on high grounds of religious congruity, while there is considerable historical evidence as to its continuous existence in the later English Church.

Speaking generally of these two rites, they quite stand the test of being capable of proof, irrespective of Roman usage. Even conceding that the pre-reformational English Church must in ceremonial matters be reckoned as a branch of the Roman communion, vestments are found not only in the Eastern Churches, but in the Protestant Churches of Scandinavia, and altar-lights in the latter, as well as in the Lutheran and "Evangelical" Churches of Germany; while the use of copes has, under certain conditions, been continuous in the Church of England. The number of Churchmen who would deeply deplore a formal abrogation of these rites, as severing a link which binds us to the Universal Church, is incommensurate with that of those who see their own way to adopting them, for the former are, I am convinced, a very large number.

As to extra services and variations in the existing offices, powers of allowing both, hitherto