ready you ought to be, both to conceive full hope of God's gracious pardon of him, as who is always ready to prevent and meet us in our turning to Him, and also to profess your forgiveness of him for so much as concerneth his offence toward you, and charitably to embrace him with the arms of tender pity and compassion, as a true Christian convert to his SAVIOUR, and gladly to welcome him into that holy communion which his sinful fear and frailty caused him to forsake. Now therefore I do earnestly beseech you, in the bowels of JESUS CHRIST our blessed SAVIOUR, to pass by the great offence of this sorrowful penitent, as well considering the weakness of our frail nature, when it is overpressed with violence and extremity of torments, and both to commiserate his fearful apostacy, and to encourage and comfort him in this happy return to CHRIST and His Church.' VII. Here let the penitent kneel down again eastward, and, bowing to the very pavement, let him say thus, either by himself, if he be able to read it, or else after the minister :— 'O my soul, bless the LORD! Blessed be the FATHER of mercies, and the GOD of all consolation; blessed be the LORD JESUS the SON of GOD, the SAVIOUR of the world; blessed be Thy HOLY SPIRIT, GOD the HOLY GHOST; blessed be the Holy TRINITY, one GOD everlasting; blessed be the Holy Catholic Church, and all you the servants of the LORD JESUS CHRIST; the Name of GOD be blessed evermore for the assembly of His Saints, and for the Divine ordinances of His holy Word and Sacraments, and of His heavenly power committed to His holy priests in His Church, for the reconciliation of sinners unto Himself, and the absolving of them from all their iniquity. Lo, here I, upon the bended knees of my body and soul, most humbly beg the assistance of all your Christian prayers, and the benefit of that His holy ordinance; and I meekly beseech you, sir, as my ghostly father, a priest of GOD, and the Church's deputy, to receive me unto that grace, and into the bosom of the Church, and by loosing me from the bands of my grievous sins, to make me partaker of that inestimable benefit, and so to reconcile me unto the mystical Body of CHRIST JESUS my LORD and SAVIOUR.' Then let the priest come forth to him, and stand over him, and laying his hand on his head, say, as is prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer, thus: The LORD JESUS CHRIST, who hath left power to His Church to absolve all sinners, which truly repent and believe in Him, of His great mercy forgive thee thine offences; and by His authority committed to me, I absolve thee from this thy heinous crime of renegation, and from all other thy sins, in the name of the FATHER, of the Son, and of the HOLY GHOST.' Then let the priest, turning himself eastward, kneel down in the same place, the penitent kneeling behind him, and say the collect which stands after the absolution in the Visitation of the Sick, but changing the latter part of it thus :— 'O most merciful GOD, who according to the multitude of Thy mercies dost so put away the sins of those which truly repent, that Thou rememberest them no more; open Thy eye of mercy upon this Thy servant, who most earnestly desireth pardon and forgiveness; renew in him, most loving FATHER, whatsoever hath been decayed by the fraud and malice of the devil, or by his own carnal will and frailness; preserve and continue him in the unity of the Church, consider his contrition, and accept his humiliation; and forasmuch as he putteth his full trust only in Thy mercy, impute not unto him his former abnegation of Thee, but receive him into Thy favour, through the merits of Thy most dearly beloved SON JESUS CHRIST our SAVIOUR. Amen.' After that, let the minister take him up, and take away his white sheet and wand, and, taking him by the hand, say unto him :'Dear brother (for so we all now acknowledge you to be), let me here advise you, with what care and diligence every day of your life you ought to consider how much you are bound to the infinite goodness of GOD, who hath called you out of that woful condition whereinto you had cast yourself, and how much it concerneth you ever hereafter to walk worthy of so great a mercy, being so much more careful to approve yourself in all holy obedience to God, by how much you have more dishonoured and provoked Him by this your shameful revolt from Him, which the same GOD the FATHER of mercies vouchsafe to enable you unto, for the sake of the dear SON of His love, JESUS CHRIST the righteous. Amen.' After this, let him be openly promised that, upon any Communion-day following, he shall be admitted to the holy Sacrament; for which let him be directed to prepare himself, and when he receives let him make a solemn oblation according to his ability, after the order set down in the Service-book."—Wilkins' Concilia, vol. iv. pp. 522-524, fol. 1737. The Healing. [409] 1662.] "A proclamation lately set forth, For the better ordering of those who repair to the court for cure of the disease called the king's evil,' wherein his majesty, being as ready and willing to relieve the necessities and diseases of his good subjects by his sacred touch, which shall come for cure, as any of his royal predecessors, in which by the grace and blessing of GOD he hath in an extraordinary measure had good success; and yet in his princely wisdom foreseeing that fit times are necessary for the performing of that great work of charity, doth declare his royal pleasure to be, that from henceforth the usual times for presenting such persons shall be from the Feast of All Saints to a week before Christmas, and in the month before Easter. That none presume to repair to court for cure of the said disease but within the limits appointed; and that all bring certificates under the hands of the minister and churchwardens, that they have not before been touched by the king. PRAYERS AT THE HEALING. The holy Gospel written in the 16th chapter of S. Mark, beginning at the 14th verse. 'JESUS appeared unto the eleven,' &c. At the words 'They shall lay their hands on the sick, and they shall recover,' is this rubrick direction: Here the infirm persons are presented to the king upon their knees, and the king lays his hands upon them.' The holy Gospel written in the 1st chapter of S. John, beginning at the 1st verse. 'In the beginning was the Word,' &c. At these words, That light was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,' is this rubrick :-'Here they are again presented to the king upon their knees, and the king puts his gold about their necks.' Rubr. healed.' These answers are to be made by them that come to be The Prayers. LORD, have mercy upon us. LORD, have mercy upon us. LORD, have mercy upon us. Our FATHER which art in heaven, &c. Help us, O GOD our SAVIOUR, And for the glory of Thy name deliver us. Be merciful to us sinners for Thy Name sake. And let our cry come unto Thee. "O Almighty GOD, who art the giver of all health and the aid of them that seek to Thee for succour, we call upon Thee for Thy help and goodness mercifully to be shewed unto these Thy servants, that they, being healed of their infirmities, may give thanks unto Thee in Thy holy Church, through JESUS CHRIST our LORD. Amen. The grace of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, and the love of GOD, and the fellowship of the HOLY GHOST, be with us all evermore. Amen.”” -Kennet's Register, p. 731. Position of the Celebrating Priest. "But now while to their consecration [our Prelates] will add a clause of the minister's posture in this act, commanding him during the time of consecration to leave the former stance he was enjoined in the first rubricks to keep at the north end of the Table, to come to such a part of the Table where he may with more ease and decency use both his hands, the world will not get them cleared of a vile and wicked purpose. The Papists will have their consecration kept altogether close from the ears of the people, for many reasons The Reformed Church counts the secret murmuration of their Canon and words of consecration a very vile and wicked practice against nature, reason, and all antiquity; so that we must take it in very evil part to be brought towards it by our Book [of Common Prayer]; for when our Table is brought to the east end of the quire, so near the wall as it can stand, and the minister brought from the end of it to the bread-side, with his face to the east, and his back to the people, what he speaks may be Hebrew, for them; he may speak so low as he will, or what he will, for were his face to the people and his voice never so extended, yet so great is the distance he could not be heard; but now, being set in the furthest distance that is possible, and being commanded not only to turn his shoulder, as he was by his north stance in all the former action, but his very back by his new change of place, and not being enjoined to extend his voice as somewhere he is, what can we conceive but it is their plain mind to have the consecration made in that silence which the Romish rubrick in this place enjoins ?........This injunction we are directed to keep, while we are not only enjoined to go so far from the people as the remotest wall and Table will permit, but to use such a posture that our back must be turned to them, that so our speech may be directed to the elements alone, and that in what language you please; and no ways to the people from whom we have gone away, and on whom we have turned our back.)....We reprove in the Papists their folly to course from one nook of their altar to the other, from the north to the south, from the right horn to the left, from the end to the midst, and from it to the end again; for these mysterious reasons we may read in the Rationalists. What other thing does our rubrick import, bidding us leave our north-standing, where we were in our Preface, and come to another part of the altar during the time of consecration, that when it is ended we may return again to the north end? Also that the end of our coming to another place in the consecration is the more ease to use both our hands, what use here of both hands is possible, but that which the Romish rubricks at this place do enjoin,-the multiplication of crosses, whiles with the right, whiles with the left hand, whiles with both the arms extended so far as they may be? This could not be done if we stood at the north end of the Table, for then the east wall of the church would hinder us to extend our left arm, and so to make the image of CHRIST's extension on the cross perfectly. The Papists, to recompense the want which the people have in their ear by the priest's silence, and turning his back upon them during the time of consecration (as our Book speaks), they think mete to |