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Church Politics and Church Prospects.

spiration) has never in so many words confessed that the age of general literature had antiquated the earlier and more lengthy worship. But in its practice Rome has made brief work with the Breviary, by the allowance of anticipation, lumping, private recitation, and so forth; while the modern counterparts of the old orders, such as the Society of the Jesuits and the Congregation of the Oratory, enjoy immunity from the formal and continued use of the Breviary. We can, therefore, call it nothing short of absurdity for a set of self-willed youths to revive such usages in the English Church, and then go out begging for help because the English alleys are surging with vice and ignorance.

We are not talking without book in our description of Mr. Lyne's ritual observances. We have before us two newspapers, one of which contains a programme by the 'Brother' himself, the other a long description of the life and services in 'S. Mary and S. Dunstan's Priory,' by an enthusiastic visitor, fenced by a somewhat faint disclaimer of responsibility from the editor. Mr. Lyne puts down the 'Convent Mass' for 9.15 a.m. which the visitor describes as 'celebrated in the prescribed vestments, and with every possible ritual adjunct' It will be noted that this is not the daily Communion of Mr. Hillyard's church of S. Lawrence, by inhibiting which the Bishop of Norwich put himself so thoroughly in the wrong, but a daily Eucharist celebrated in Mr, Lyne's own chapel, but open to the world, under, we conclude, the ordinary jurisdiction of the 'Superior' himself, certainly under no other. Mr. Lyne, it must not be forgotten, is only a deacon, his companions laymen; where, then, does he find the celebrant? This the papers keep prudently in the dark, and if we could we should not attempt to find it out. It is sufficient for us to know that Mr. Lyne himself publishes to the world, through the newspapers, the fact of the daily 'mass,' and on that we have no hesitation in saying that somebody or somebodies of higher order than the diaconate must have very eccentric ideas on the subject of mission and of canonical obedience. We confess to considerable pleasure at having seen in the papers the other day that Deacon Marchmont, if he is a Deacon, was had up before a London magistrate for conducting a very ritualistic and elaborate service, without holding the licence either of an Anglican clergyman or of a dissenting minister. To be sure, Mr. Marchmont added the profanity, of which we do not believe Mr, Lyne could be capable, of himself pretending to consecrate the Holy Eucharist. But, as a matter of Church order, we do not see how the public but unauthorized services of Deacon Lyne are one whit more defensible than those of Deacon Marchmont, who himself, be it noted, takes up the ritualistic side, although, we gather, confining himself to the Prayer-book