A church dictionary

by Walter Farquhar Hook

“It is, however, contended also, that with this doctrine, found to be involved in the substance of its histories, and harmonizing with the end of its great provisions, Scripture commends itself, in a peculiar manner, to our belief and acceptation, as a record which, while it extends to the very root of our disease, and so alone points out the true method of recovery from it, falls in thereby with the observations of our own personal experience.

“But such involvement of a general truth by no means necessarily fixes or defines the measure or degree of sin in individuals acting in various stages of moral responsibility, and subject to the influences, not only of rational motives, but (as would seem, more or less even from the beginning) to those of an infused grace! And it may confidently be maintained, that the two several propositions now affirmed of Holy Writ, viz. that it gives a most humiliating view of man, and yet not one of unmixed evil, are not only not inconsistent, but explanatory one of the other. The one is specially profitable for ‘doctrine,’ the other for ‘instruction in righteousness.’ For Scripture not to have discovered a full and intimate acquaintance with the extent and quality of evil itself, would have substracted from our sure persuasion of its perfect insight into truth. Upon the other hand, to have displayed the operation of that evil otherwise than as it is seen practically existing in its effects, would not have been to give that real likeness of ourselves, which we have a claim to look for in a record offering itself to be our faithful guide. Hence, in the first case, without the darker lineaments of the Bible, how could we rightly have arrived at that true doctrinal statement, which now affirms the general existence of an extreme unsoundness in the constitution of human nature, if that which is in man can only be developed adequately, or inferred correctly, through scrutiny of the worst deeds which man has done? How, in the second—while we consent entirely to the truth of this broad abstract statement of the nature of man—could we consent with willing minds to take our sole or only chief instruction in the ways of righteousness, from guidance which should represent us all as being just alike, at any or at every moment of our lives, when we are certain that the practical appearances of evil show very many gradations, and put on very different aspects, in the condition of different individuals? * * * If Scripture does indeed thus show us to ourselves, and we cannot deny the truth of the resemblance; if it neither conceals deformity to tempt us, nor yet drives us into extremity, so as to overwhelm us; if it neither threatens nor promises too much, could it have proceeded either from one that did not know us, or from one that did not love us?”

SEALED BOOKS. By the Act 13 & 14 Car. II. (which ratified the last revision of the Prayer Book,) c. 4, sect. 28, it was enacted that the dean and chapter of every cathedral and collegiate church, should obtain under the great seal of England a true and perfect printed copy of the above-mentioned Act and Prayer Book, to be kept by them in safety for ever, and to be produced in any court of record when required; and that like copies should be delivered into the respective courts of Westminster, and the Tower of London: which books so to be exemplified under the great seal, were to be examined by persons appointed by the king, and compared with the original book annexed to the Act: these persons having power to correct and amend in writing any error; certifying the examination and collation under their hands and seals: “which said books, and every one of them, shall be taken, adjudged, and expounded to be good, and available in the law to all intents and purposes whatsoever, and shall be accounted as good records as this book itself heretofore annexed,” &c.

Mr. Stephens, in his late edition of the Common Prayer Book, with notes, has given a fac-simile text of the original black letter Prayer Books, published after the last Review, with all the corrections of the commissioners carefully marked. The sealed books which he collated for this purpose, are those for the Chancery, Queen’s Bench, Common Pleas, Exchequer, St. Paul’s, Christ Church Oxford, Ely, and the Tower of London.

SECONDARIES. A general name for the inferior members of cathedrals, as vicars choral, &c.: the clerici secundæ formæ, that is, of the second or lower range of stalls, called the bas chœur in France. The priest vicars and minor canons were sometimes included in the superior form. Some of the lay singers at Exeter are so called. Sometimes the term was applied to the assistant priest in course, even though not of the second form. At Hereford the second vicar who assists in chanting the Litany is the “secondary.”

SECT. (From seco, Lat., to cut; being analogous to the word schism, derived from the Greek σχίζω, which has the same meaning.) A religious community following some particular master, instead of adhering to the teaching of the Catholic Church. Thus Calvinists are the sect following Calvin; Wesleyans the sect following Wesley. We are to remember that we are expressly forbidden in Scripture thus to call any man master: one is our master, Jesus Christ, the righteous.

SECULAR CLERGY. In those Churches in which there are monasteries, the clergy attached to those monasteries are called Regulars, the other clergy are styled Seculars. In our Church, before the Reformation, the number of Regulars was very great; but, since the Reformation, we have only had Secular clergy. The canons of such cathedrals of the old foundation as were not monastic, were called Secular.

SEDILIA. Seats near an altar, almost universally on the south side, for the ministers officiating at the holy eucharist. They are generally three in number, for the celebrant, epistoler, and gospeller, but vary from one to five.

SEE. (Latin, sedes.) The seat of episcopal dignity and jurisdiction where the bishop has his throne, or cathedra.

SELAH. An untranslated Hebrew word, recurring several times in the Psalms, and in Habakkuk iii., on the meaning of which there are many opinions. It is most probably a direction to raise the voice, or make some change in the instrumental performance at certain passages, and is merely a musical notation, connected however, as all proper musical expression must be, with the sense.