note that the debates in the Church of England over liturgical innovations in the 1840s and 50s concerned what were, by the standards of later decades, modest practices: bowing to the altar and turning east in parish churches, the occasional stole, chanting of services, the introduction in a few places of candles on the altar. Herring and Nockles both describe this as following what was regarded as "Laudian precedent", "a Laudian pattern". 'Puseyite innovations' tended to be a combination of this and "a restoration of obsolete rubrics". Alongside this was campaign by Old High bishops, such as Blomfield of London, to encourage preaching in the surplice.
Modest though such practices may have been when contrasted with the Anglo-Catholicism of coming decades, they did provoke intense debate and controversy, so much so that the Archbishop of Canterbury, William Howley, issued A Letter Addressed to the Clergy and Laity of his Province in 1845. In a previous post, laudable Practice praised Howley as embodying the wisdom, decency, and sobriety of the Old High tradition. His 1845 Letter exemplifies this.
He began by recognising that breaches of rubrics in parish worship - the "obsolete rubrics" mentioned by Nockles - had the sanction of long established practice:
It has long been observed that, in the performance of Divine Service in the generality of our parochial churches, there has been a deviation, in certain particulars, from the express directions of the Rubric, and that, in some cases, a difference in respect to the sense of the Rubric has led to a diversity in practice. In regard to such points, in themselves non-essential, the most conscientious clergymen have felt themselves justified in treading in the steps of their predecessors.
While also accepting that those clergy who were now imposing the rubrical directions in their fullness were "not less conscientious", Howley warned that such a determination - in things "non-essential" - disrupted the Church's peace and unity:
[it] is sometimes associated in the minds of the people with peculiarities of doctrine, and gives birth to suspicions and jealousies destructive of the confidence which should always subsist between the flock and their pastor.
He went on to give an significant defence of the laity's unease with such innovations:
In fairness to them we must allow, that this dislike of alterations in the manner of worship to which they have been accustomed from their infancy, proceeding, as it does, from attachment to the ordinances of the Church, ought not to be visited with unkindly censure; and we can hardly be surprised at any change being regarded with suspicion when so many attempts have been made to introduce innovations which are really objectionable, and tend, as far as they go, to alter the character of our Church.
What is more, a concern to impose and uphold all rubrics in parishes sat uneasily beside the Prayer Book's commitment to "the mean between two extremes, of too much stiffness in refusing, and of too much easiness in admitting any variation":
In such cases it may with some show of reason be said, that, as the eminent men to whom the several revisions of the Liturgy were successively entrusted, did not see the necessity of giving directions so precise as to ensure a rigid conformity in every particular, we may be contented to acquiesce in slight deviations from rule, suggested by convenience, and sanctioned by long usage.
Howley then returned to the fact that rubrics and ceremonies were non-essentials and - in an important rebuttal of Tractarian and Ecclesiologist depictions of the 'Deformation' of Anglican worship during the 'long 18th century' - affirmed the sufficiency of Prayer Book worship in the ordinary parish church:
The matters in controversy, considered in themselves, are not of vital importance: the service in our Churches has in general been conducted in conformity to the Apostle's direction, with order and decency; and, whether performed with exact regard to the letter of the Rubric, or with the variations established by general usage, will still be decent and orderly. I therefore entreat you to consider, whether the peace of the Church should be hazarded by prolonging an unprofitable controversy.
The lack of wisdom in pursuing rubrical and ceremonial stances which disrupted and disordered parish life particularly concerned Howley:
But all parties will concur in regarding these points as of far less importance than the maintenance of that mutual confidence which, next to support from above, forms the main strength of the Church, producing the harmonious co-operation of its several members, and disposing the people to look up with reverence to their pastor as their spiritual instructor and guide. In whatever degree, or by whatever means, the tie of affection is loosened, a proportionate diminution will follow of that moral influence on which the efficiency of the Clergyman's teaching will always depend.
In his conclusion, Howley provided a summary of the Old High critique trends that would lead to the disorders and divisions occasioned by Ritualism and its assault on conformity and uniformity:
All change in the performance of the Service, affecting the doctrine of the Church, by alteration, addition, or omission, I regard with unqualified disapprobation. I may further remark, that the danger to the Church would be great, if clergymen, not having due respect either to episcopal authority or established usage, should interpret the Rubric for themselves, should introduce or curtail ceremonies at pleasure, or make Divine Service in any way the means of expressing their own theological opinions or party views.
To some extent, Howley's Letter stands as a reminder of what Victorian Anglicanism could have been: less divided and distracted by the Ritualist controversies; building upon rather than rejecting the strengths of Anglicanism during the 'long' 18th century; and more likely to preserve liturgical coherence and a generous but explicitly Protestant Episcopalian doctrinal identity.
Howley's Letter also continues to resonate. Its pastoral wisdom continues to have application. We might particularly note how it understands the concerns of the laity regarding liturgical changes imposed by clergy and points to the dangers posed by the ruptures which can accompany liturgical revision.
Finally, we might also see Howley as here demonstrating how Old High could become 'New Low', the ordinary Prayer Book worship of the ordinary parish, inherited from 18th century Anglicanism, captured by William Teulon Blandford Fletcher in his 1897 painting 'Sacrament Sunday'. The contrast with the Ritualist manual
Directorium Anglicanum (1858) was, to the say the least, stark. Howley (who died in 1848) would have been appalled by
Directorium Anglicanum and its rejection of the quiet order and modest decency of Prayer Book worship, which had been long known in parishes, nurturing, sustaining, guiding, and comforting generations in the Faith. It was that quiet order and modest decency, the 'New Low', and the peace and concord which it expressed, which Howley wisely and thoughtfully defended, even as the first stirrings of Ritualism brought controversy and division.
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