A church dictionary

by Walter Farquhar Hook

The fact that we find this injunction in Scripture, renders probable the universal tradition of the universal Church, which traces to the apostles, or apostolic men, the four great liturgies, (which have, in all parts of the Church, afforded the model according to which all others have been framed,) and which affirms that the apostles instituted a form of worship wherever they established a Church. It would be easy, if the occasion required it, to show, from a variety of passages in holy writ, that while much can be adduced in corroboration of this tradition, nothing but conjecture can be cited against it. With respect to those passages which, referring prayer to the influence of the Holy Spirit upon the soul of man, are sometimes brought forward as militating against the adoption of a form, they cannot have fallen under the notice of our reformers, since the application of them to this purpose was never dreamt of till about 200 years ago, when men, having determined in their wilfulness to reject the liturgy, searched for every possible authority which might, by constructions the most forced, support their determination; and the new interpretation they thus put upon Scripture, may be considered as rather the plea of their wishes than the verdict of their conviction. The adduction, indeed, of such passages for such a purpose is a gratuitous assumption of the question in dispute, and will not for a moment hold weight in the balance of the sanctuary. According to the interpretation of those ancients, whose judgment is the more valuable because (living before any controversy was raised on the subject) they were little likely to be warped, or their opinions determined, by the prejudices of sect, or the subtleties of system, what these passages of Scripture mean is this, and simply this: that the Holy Ghost, who is the author and giver of every good and perfect gift, must stir up in our hearts that spirit of devotion and holiness of temper, without which the service we render is but the service of the lips, and is useless, if not profane.

It is, then, to the mind with which we pray, not to the words which we adopt, that those passages of Scripture refer, in which we are exhorted to pray in the Spirit. But admitting, for the sake of argument, that where we are told that the Spirit will teach us to pray, the promise is applicable to the very expressions, even this cannot be produced as an argument against a form of prayer. For, whatever may be a man’s imaginary gift of prayer, this is quite certain, that his thoughts must precede his tongue; that before he speaks he must think. And not less clear is it, that after he has conceived a thought, he may, for a moment, restrain his tongue, and set down that thought upon paper. To suppose that the intervention of the materials for committing his thoughts to writing must, of necessity, drive away the Holy Spirit, would not only in itself be absurd, but it would be tantamount to a denial of the inspiration of the written Scriptures. If the first conceptions were of God and God’s Spirit, then, of course, they are so still, even after they have been written;—the mere writing of them, the mere committing of them to paper, can have nothing whatever to do with the question of inspiration, either one way or the other. If a man, therefore, asserts that his extemporary prayers are to be attributed to the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, we can at once reply that our prayers, in our Prayer Book, are, on his own principles, quite as much so, with this further advantage, that they have been carefully compared with Scripture, and tested thereby. No Scriptural Christian, no one not mad with folly, will contend that, on that account, they are less spiritual; though, on the other hand, we may fairly doubt whether an extemporiser is not acting in direct opposition to Scripture, for Scripture says, (Eccles. v. 2,) “Be not rash with thy mouth to utter anything before God, for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth:” and who in the world is hasty to utter anything before God, if it be not the man who prays to him extemporally?

Again, the bishops and divines, by whom our Church was reformed, recognised it as the duty of the Church to excite emotions of solemnity rather than of enthusiasm, when she leads her children to the footstool of that throne which, if a throne of grace, is also a throne of glory. And, therefore, when discarding those ceremonies which, not of primitive usage, had been abused, and might be abused again, to the purposes of superstition, they still made ample provision that the services of the sanctuary should be conducted with decent ceremony, and orderly form, and impressive solemnity, and in our cathedrals and the royal chapels with magnificence and grandeur. They sought not to annihilate; they received with the profoundest respect those ancient ceremonials and forms of prayer which had been used in their Church from the first planting of Christianity in this island. These ancient forms, however, had been used in many respects, though gradually corrupted. In every age, men had made the attempt to render them more and more conformable to the spirit of the age, and (in ages of darkness) superstitions in practice, and novelties, and therefore errors, in doctrine, had crept in. Our wise-hearted reformers, intent, not on pleasing the people, nor regaining popularity, nor on consulting the spirit of the age, but simply and solely on ascertaining and maintaining the truth as it is in Jesus, having obtained a commission from the Crown, first of all compared the existing forms of worship with the inspired word of God, being determined at once to reject what was plainly and palpably at variance therewith. For example, the prayers before the Reformation had been offered in the Latin language, a language no longer intelligible to the mass of the people; but to pray in a tongue not understood by the people, is plainly and palpably at variance with Scripture; and, consequently, the first thing they did was to have the liturgy translated into English. Having taken care that nothing should remain in the forms of worship contrary to Scripture, they proceeded (by comparing them with the most ancient rituals) to renounce all usages not clearly primitive; and, diligently consulting the works of the Fathers, they embodied the doctrines universally received by the early Church in that book which was the result and glory of their labours, the Book of Common Prayer. The work of these commissioned divines was submitted to the convocation of the other bishops and clergy, and being approved by them, and authorized by the Crown, was laid before the two houses of parliament, and was accepted by the laity, who respectfully thanked the bishops for their labour. And thus it is seen, that the English Prayer Book was not composed in a few years, or by a few men; it has descended to us from the first ages of Christianity. It has been shown by Palmer, that there is scarcely a portion of our Prayer Book which cannot, in some way, be traced to ancient offices. And this it is important to note; first, because it shows that as the Papist in England is not justified in calling his the old Church, since ours is the old Church reformed, his a sect, in this country, comparatively new; so neither may he produce his in opposition to ours as the old liturgy. All that is really ancient we retained, when the bishops and divines who reformed our old Church corrected, from Scripture and antiquity, our old liturgy. What they rejected, and the Papists adhered to, were innovations and novelties introduced during the middle ages. And it is important to observe this, in the next place, since it is this fact which constitutes the value of the Prayer Book, regarded, as we do regard it, not only as a manual of devotion, but also as an interpreter of Scripture. It embodies the doctrines and observances which the early Christians (having received them from the apostles themselves) preserved with reverential care, and handed down as a sacred deposit to their posterity.

FRANCISCANS, or MINORITES. (Fratres Minores, as they were called by their founder.) An order of friars in the Romish Church, and so denominated from him they call St. Francis, their first founder in 1206, who prescribed the following rules to them: That the rule and life of the brother minors (for so he would have those of his order called) was to observe the gospel under obedience, possessing nothing as their own, and live in charity; then he showed how they should receive novices after a year’s noviciate, after which it was not allowed them to leave the order; he would have his friars make use of the Roman breviary, and the converts or lay-brethren to write every day, for their office, seventy-six Paternosters; besides Lent, he ordered them to fast from All-saints to Christmas, and to begin Lent on twelfthtide; he forbade them to ride on horseback, without some urgent necessity; and would have them in their journeys to eat of whatsoever was laid before them: they were to receive no money, neither directly nor indirectly; that they ought to get their livelihood by the labour of their hands, receiving for it anything but money; that they ought to possess nothing of their own, and when their labour was not sufficient to maintain them, they ought to go a begging, and, with the alms so collected, to help one another; that they ought to confess to their provincial ministers those sins, the absolution of which was reserved to them, that they might receive from them charitable corrections; that the election of their general ministers, superiors, &c. ought to be in a general assembly; that they ought not to preach without leave of the ordinaries of each diocese, and of their superiors. Then he prescribed the manner of admonition and correction; how that they ought not to enter into any nunnery, to be godfathers to any child, nor to undertake to go into any foreign countries to convert infidels, without leave of their provincial ministers; and then he bids them ask of the pope a cardinal for governor, protector, and corrector of the whole order.

Francis, their founder, was born in 1182, at Assisi, in the province of Umbria, in Italy, of noble parentage, but much more renowned for his holy life. His baptismal name was John, but he assumed that of Francis, from having learned the French language. He renounced a considerable estate, with all the pleasures of the world, to embrace a voluntary poverty, and live in the practice of the greatest austerities. Going barefoot, and embracing an apostolical life, he performed the office of preacher on Sundays and other festivals, in the parish churches. In the year 1206, or 1209, designing to establish a religious order, he presented to Pope Innocent III. a copy of the rules he had conceived, praying that his institute might be confirmed by the holy see. The pope, considering his despicable appearance, and the extreme rigour of his rules, bid him go find out swine, and deliver them the rule he had composed, as being fitter for such animals than for men. Francis, being withdrawn, went and rolled himself in the mire with some swine, and, in that filthy condition, again presented himself before the pope, beseeching him to grant his request. The pope, moved hereby, granted his petition, and confirmed his order.

From this time Francis became famous throughout all Italy, and many persons of birth, following his example, forsook the world, and put themselves under his direction. Thus this order of friars, called Minors, spread all over Europe; who, living in cities and towns, by tens and sevens, preached in the villages and parish churches, and instructed the rude country people. Some of them likewise went among the Saracens, and into Pagan countries, many of whom obtained the crown of martyrdom. Francis died at Assisi in 1226. He never received higher orders than the diaconate.

It is pretended that, a little before the death of St. Francis, there appeared wounds in his hands and feet, like those of our Saviour, continually bleeding, of which, after his death, there appeared not the least token. He was buried in his own oratory at Rome, and his name was inserted in the catalogue of saints.

The first monastery of this order was at Assisi, in Italy, where the Benedictines of that place gave St. Francis the church of St. Mary, called Portiuncula. Soon after, convents were erected in other places; and afterwards St. Francis founded others in Spain and Portugal. In the year 1215, this order was approved in the general Lateran council. Then St. Francis, returning to Assisi, held a general chapter, and sent missions into France, Germany, England, and other parts. This order made so great a progress in a short time, that, at the general chapter held at Assisi, in 1219, there met 5000 friars, who were only deputies from a much greater number. There were in the middle of the last century above 7000 houses of this order, and in them above 115,000 monks: there are also above 900 monasteries of Franciscan nuns. This order has produced four popes, forty-five cardinals, and an infinite number of patriarchs, archbishops, and two electors of the empire; besides a great number of learned men and missionaries.

The Franciscans came into England during the life of their founder, in the reign of King Henry III. Their first establishment was at Canterbury. They zealously opposed King Henry VIII., in the affair of his divorce; for which reason, at the suppression of the monasteries, they were expelled before all others, and above 200 of them thrown into gaols; thirty-two of them coupled in chains like dogs, and sent to distant prisons; others banished, and others condemned to death. Whilst this order flourished in England, this province was divided into seven parts or districts, called custodies, because each of them was governed by a provincial, or superior, called the custos, or guardian of the district. The seven custodies were, that of London, consisting of nine monasteries; that of York, consisting of seven monasteries; that of Cambridge, containing nine monasteries; that of Bristol, containing nine monasteries; that of Oxford, in which were eight monasteries; that of Newcastle, in which were nine monasteries; and that of Worcester, in which were nine monasteries; in all, sixty monasteries.

The first establishment of Franciscans in London was begun by four friars, who hired for themselves a certain house in Cornhill, of John Travers, then sheriff of London, and made it into little cells; where they lived till the summer following, when they were removed, by John Iwyn, citizen and mercer of London, to the parish of St. Nicholas in the shambles. There he assigned them land for the building of a monastery, and entered himself into the order.