Daily Reading for July 17 • William White, Bishop of Pennsylvania, 1836
When we bring before you, Brethren, the subject of public worship, you will of course suppose that it is principally with a view to the devotions, which, with an extraordinary degree of harmony and much previous deliberation, have been constituted our established Liturgy. Independently on the admirable prayer prescribed by our Lord himself, there is no fact equally ancient, of which we are more fully persuaded, than that the having of prescribed devotions is a practice that has prevailed from the earliest origin of our religion. We mean not that there were the same forms of prayer in all Churches; but that every local Church had its rule, according to the suitableness of time and place, and under the sanction of the Episcopacy of the different districts. And, we are further persuaded that the Christian economy in this matter was no other than a continuation of the Jewish, as prevailing in that very worship which was attended on, and joined in, by our blessed Saviour and his Apostles. This is a mode of worship that has been handed down to us through the channel of the Church of England; and we suppose that we may affirm, as a notorious fact, its being acceptable to our communion generally. . . .
But if this feature of our system is to be retained, we cannot but perceive that the order of divine service must be directed, not by individual discretion, but by public counsel: If, on the contrary, this principle is to cease to govern; we know of no plea for deviation tolerated in any Minister, which will not extend to the indulgence of the humour of every member of his congregation. For this is a necessary result of that property of our ecclesiastical system, which contemplates the exercises of prayer and praise as those of a social body, of which the Minister is the leader.
If there should be in any a rage for innovation, it would be the more deplored by us, from the circumstance that it often originates in the affecting of an extravagant degree of animal sensibility. . . . It is impossible that there should be composed forms for public use, and yet that individuals should not perceive instances in which, according to their respective habits of thinking, the matter might have been more judiciously conceived, or more happily expressed. . . . The dissatisfaction alluded to may affect either circumstantials, or the essence of the established Liturgy. If it apply to the former, submission of private opinion is one of the smallest sacrifices which may be exacted for the maintenance of order. But if any should lightly esteem the service, from the opinion, that it is below the dignity of the subjects comprehended in it, and unequal to the uses which prayers and praises point to, we have so much to oppose to such a sentiment, in the sense of wise and holy men of our communion in former ages, still shining as lights to the world in their estimable writings. . . . It is on this ground that we consider every Churchman as possessing a personal right to lift up his voice against the intermixture of foreign matter with the service; rendering it such, as can never be acceptable to the same judgments, or interesting to the same affections.
From “A Pastoral Letter to the Members of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, from the House of Bishops of Said Church Assembled in General Convention at Baltimore, May 1808,” signed by William White, Presiding Bishop. Entire letter found at http://anglicanhistory.org/usa/wwhite/pastoral1808.html.