ments, to which were added, as time went on, the Seven Works of Mercy, the Seven Sacraments of Grace, the Two Precepts of the Gospel, and such like1. 8. Its Contents. Springing from such early manuals, the Prymer is commonly mentioned in the fifteenth century as a well-known book of private devotion, containing certain set prayers and offices. Sometimes it was in English, or in English and Latin, and sometimes in Latin with occasional portions in English. The earliest known copy belongs most probably to the latter part of the fourteenth century, and was revised and republished in the reign of Henry VIII., A.D. 15452. 449. See Hardwick's Church History, Middle Age, pp. 448, 2 The following Table exhibits at one view the contents of these two Primers. ii. Contents of the Primer, The Contents of this book. The King's Highness' In- The Prayer of our Lord. The Ten Commandments. The Evensong. The Compline. The seven Psalms. The Litany. The Dirge. The Commendations. The Psalms of the Passion, [Ps. xxii. lxix. lxxxviii. li. and lix.] The Passion of our Lord. Certain godly prayers for sundry purposes. CHAPTER V. REVISION OF CHURCH-BOOKS IN THE REIGN I. OF KING HENRY VIII. A.D. 1509-1547. From Commencement of the Reformation. what has been already said it is clear that for many years preceding the sixteenth century there had been an everincreasing craving for a Service which the people could understand, and that a corresponding number of forms of worship and of private devotions had been put forth in the mother tongue. During the latter years, however, of the reign of Henry VIII. the change that was coming over men's minds was still further perceptible. As early as A.D. 1516 the Sarum Breviary was revised, and in 1533 a carefully edited Missal of the Use of Sarum was printed, with increased clearness of reference to all passages taken from Holy Scripture. In the year 1525 appeared the first edition of Tyndale's New Testament', and in 1534, the second year of Cranmer's archbishopric, the Convocation petitioned the king to authorise an English Version of the whole Bible for general distribution2. 2. Coverdale's Bible. In the following year, 1535, appeared Miles Coverdale's translation of the Bible, dedicated to the king, and two years afterwards the Bible, called Matthew's Bible, translated by Tyndale, Rogers, and perhaps Coverdale, was put forth3. In 1538, appeared, either separately, or attached to the Prymers, the Epistles and Gospels in English, and in the April of 1539 the whole Bible was issued, with an 1 See Hardwick's Middle Age, p. 196, n. 2 See Anderson's Annals of the English Bible; Hardwick's Middle Age, p. 196, n. 3 See Blunt on the Reformation, p. 187. able preface by Cranmer himself, and is therefore called "Cranmer's" or the "Great Bible." Moreover, on the 6th of May, 1541, a proclamation ordered that every parish, which had not yet provided a Bible, should not fail, before the Feast of All Saints, to "buy and provide Bibles of the largest and greatest volume, and cause the same to be set and fixed in the parish church1." 3. Revision of Church-books. While provision was thus made for the distribution of the Scriptures in the vulgar tongue, the revision of the Service-books was not neglected. In 1542 it was proposed in Convocation that the Church-books, Portferies, Missals, and others, should be corrected and reformed, and that the names of Popes and Thomas à Becket should be carefully erased2. At the same time a new edition of the Sarum Breviary was issued, and the House of Bishops decided that its use should be observed throughout the province of Canterbury. 4. The Bible to be read in English. The House of Bishops, however, took a still more important step by ordering that "every Sunday and holiday throughout the year, the Curate of every parish church, after the Te Deum and Magnificat, should openly read to the people one chapter of the New Testament in English, without exposition, and when the New Testament was read over, then to begin the Old." Thus the reading of Scripture in English in the Public Service of the Church was formally authorised, and the way was prepared for the further substitution of English for Latin in the prayers. 5. The English Litany. The first change in this respect was made in the Litany. This peculiar and ancient form of supplication had been in the hands of 1 The price of the Bible was also fixed at 10s. unbound, or 128. "well and sufficiently bound, trimmed and clasped." 2 Wilkins' Concil. 111. 861. 1547.] IN THE REIGN OF KING HENRY VIII. 17 the people in their own tongue in the Primer, certainly for a hundred and fifty years. In the year 1544, however, it was carefully revised by Cranmer, who, besides the old Litanies of the English Church, had also before him the Litany, formed from the same ancient model which had been prepared by Melancthon and Bucer, in 1543, for Hermann, the Archbishop of Cologne1. 6. Common Prayer. The chief alterations he introduced consisted in the omission of a long list of names of saints, which had gradually been inserted in the Western Litanies, though he still retained three clauses, in which the prayers of the Virgin Mary, the angels, and the patriarchs, prophets, and Apostles, were desired. With this exception our English Litany was set forth for public use by command of Henry VIII., on the 11th of June, 1544, in its present form, and very nearly in its present words. In the preface to this Litany occurs the well-known phrase, which distinguishes our Prayer-Book. Cranmer writes:-"It is thought convenient in this Common Prayer of procession to have it set forth and used in the vulgar tongue, for stirring the people to more devotion," and thus shows his desire to make the Public Service of the Church congregational, and so conformable to the custom of primitive times. CHAPTER VI. THE FIRST PRAYER-BOOK OF EDWARD VI. A. D. 1547-1549. 1. Accession of Edward VI. On the accession of 1 See Hardwick's Reformation, p. 206, note 2; and the Three Primers, Ed. Burton. 2 It has been reprinted by the Parker Society in the Appendix to the volume of Private Prayers of the reign of Q. Elizabeth, P.B. 2 Edward VI. (Jan. 28,1547), the first progressive measure towards Reformation was to provide Scriptural instruction for the people. Accordingly the First Book of Homilies1 was published to be read in the Churches on Sunday, and a translation of the Paraphrase of Erasmus on the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles was directed to be studied by the clergy, and to be set up in the Churches, together with the Great Bible. 2. The Epistle and Gospel in English. Injunctions and Articles of Enquiry were also issued with a royal Visitation in September, which renewed the orders of Henry VIII. against superstition and the Pope. Besides this it was directed that on every Sunday or holiday one chapter of the New Testament should be read at Matins, and at Evensong one chapter of the Old Testament, and that the Epistle and Gospel at high mass should be in English3. 3. The Order of the Communion. In issuing these injunctions the royal Council acted under the authority of the late king's will, but further changes were now aimed at. And, first, the Lower House of Convocation turned their attention to reforms in the Church Service, which had been for some time in contemplation, and approved a proposition introduced by the archbishop for administering the Communion in both kinds. The change was accepted by the Parliament, who empowered certain bishops and divines associated with Cranmer to assemble at Windsor, and draw up an English 1 Of these Homilies (twelve in number) three at least, including that Of the Salvation of Mankind, or Justification, appear to have been written by Cranmer himself, while those Of the Misery of all Mankind, and Of Christian Love and Charity, were the work of Bp. Bonner and his chaplain. See Hardwick's Reformation, p. 211, n. 2 See Blunt on the Reformation, pp. 200, 201. 3 Cardwell's Documentary Annals, Vol. I. p. 54. |