Now for a few moments only let us meditate on this service. I have already referred to the lamentable practice of substituting biographical legends for the word of God. And what is the tendency of this service? What impression was it likely to make, and to leave on minds of ordinary powers and instruction? Must it not, of necessity, tend to withdraw them from contemplating Christ, and to fix their thoughts on the powers, the glory, the exaltation, the merits of a fellow-sinner? It will be said, that they will look beyond the martyr, and trace the blessings, here enumerated, to Christ, as their primary cause, and will think of the merits of Thomas as efficacious only through the merits of their Saviour; that in their invocation of Thomas they will implore him only to pray for them. But can this be so? Does not the ascription of miracles to him and to his power; does not the very form of enumerating those miracles tend much to exalt the servant to an equality with the Master?

Whilst Thomas by being thus, in words at least, presented to the people as working those miracles by his own power, (for there is throughout a lamentable absence of immediate ascription of glory to God,) is raised to an equality with Christ our Lord; many passages in this service have the tendency also of withdrawing the minds of the worshippers from an implicit and exclusive dependence on the merits of Christ alone, and of tempting them to admit the merits of Thomas to share at least with Christ in the work of grace and salvation. Let us place some texts of Scripture and some passages of this service side by side.

[Transcriber's note: They are shown here one after the other.]

Scripture.

But after that the kindness and love of God towards man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us.—Titus iii. 4, 5.

He who spared not his own Son, but gave him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?—Rom. viii. 32.

The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin.—1 John i. 7.

One Mediator.—1 Tim. ii. 5.

Who also maketh intercession for us.—Rom. viii. 34.

He ever liveth to make intercession for them.—Heb. vii. 25.

Service of Thomas Becket.

O Christ Jesus, by the wounds of Thomas loosen the sins which bind us.

O blessed Jesus, BY THE MERITS OF THOMAS, forgive us our debts, raise us from the threefold death, and restore what has been lost with thy accustomed pity.

Do thou, O Christ, by the blood of Thomas, which he shed for thee, make us ascend whither Thomas has ascended.

Holy Thomas, pray for us.

And if this service thus seems to mingle the merits of Christ, the merits of his blood and of his death, with the merits of a mortal man, the immediate address to that mortal as the giver of good things temporal and spiritual, very awfully trespasses on that high, exclusive, and incommunicable prerogative of the one Lord God Omnipotent, which his Spirit hath proclaimed solemnly and repeatedly, and which he has fenced around against all invasion with so many warnings and denunciations.

Scripture. Service of Becket
1. O thou that hearest prayer, unto thee shall all flesh come.— Ps. lxv. [vulg. lxiv.] 2.1. For they sake, O Thomas, let the right hand of God embrace us.
By prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.—Phil. iv. 6.
2. Lord, be thou my helper.—Ps. xxx. [xxix.] 10.2. Send help to us, O Thomas;
3. Thou shalt guide me by thy counsel.—Ps. lxxiii. [lxxii.] 24.3. Guide thou those who stand;
He, The Holy Spirit, shall guide you into all truth.—John xvi. 13.
4. The Lord upholdeth all that fall, and raiseth up all those that be bowed down.—Psalm cxlv. [cxliv.] 14.4. Raise up those who fall;
5. Create in me a clean heart, O God.—Ps. li. [l.] 10.5. Correct our morals, actions and life;
6. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down, for the Lord upholdeth him.—Ps. xxxvii. [xxxvi.] 23.6. And guide us into the way of peace.
The day-spring from on high hath visited us, to guide our feet into the way of peace.—Luke i. 78, 79.

And then again, in celebrating the praises of a mortal man, recourse is had to language which can fitly be used only in our hymns and praises to the supreme Lord of our destinies, the eternal Creator, Redeemer, and Comforter, the only wise God our Saviour.

Address to Thomas.Language of Scripture.
1. Hail, Thomas, Rod of Justice!1. There shall come a rod out of the stem of Jesse. Ye denied the Holy One, and the Just—Isaiah xi. 1. Acts iii. 14.
2. The brightness of the world.2. The brightness of his glory. I am the light of the world—Heb. i. 3. John viii. 12.
3. The strength of the Church.3. I can do all things through Christ, that strengthened me. Christ loved the Church, and gave himself for it.—Phil. iv. 13. Eph. v. 25.
4. The love of the people: the delight of the Clergy.4. Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity. Delight thyself in the Lord.—Eph. vi. 24. Ps. xxxvii. 4.
5. Hail, glorious Guardian of the Flock. Save those who rejoice in thy glory.5. Our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep. Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel; come and save us. He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.—Heb. xiii. 20. Psalm lxxx. [lxxix.] 1. 1 Cor. i. 31.

Can that worship become the disciples of the Gospel and the Cross, which addresses such prayers and such praises to the spirit of a mortal man? Every prayer, and every form of praise here used in honour of Thomas Becket, it would well become Christians to offer to the Giver of all good, trusting solely and exclusively to the mediation of Christ Jesus our Lord for acceptance; and pleading-only the merits of his most precious blood. And yet I am bound to confess, that in principle, in spirit, and in fact, I can find no substantial difference between this service of Thomas of Canterbury, and the service which all in communion with the Church of Rome are under an obligation to use even at the present hour.

This point remains next for our inquiry, and we will draw from the well-head. I would, however, first suggest the application of a general test for ascertaining the real bona-fide nature of these prayers and praises. The test I would apply is, to try with the change only of the name, substituting the holiest name ever named in heaven or in earth for the name of Thomas of Canterbury—whether these prayers and praises should not be offered to the Supreme Being alone through the atoning merits of his Blessed Son; whether they are not exclusively appropriate to HIM.