I do not believe that the adoption or rejection of distinctive dresses for the celebrant and assistants at the Holy Communion in parish churches, or the adoption of lights (irrespective of their practical need) at the same holy ordinance, can, in the present state of feeling among Churchmen, be left to adjust itself irrespective of some superior and controlling jurisdiction. That jurisdiction would of course act in conformity with the expressed wishes and spiritual advantage of the habitual worshippers and communicants, and would (assuming that these rites were in any way admissible) possess ample powers of meeting the desires both of majorities and of respectable minorities, by possibly prescribing varying rites at different days or hours. I attach particular importance to this consideration. If it could be settled that certain forms of worship should be permitted at certain hours, no one could complain of being taken by surprise.
As to the distinctive dress at the Holy Communion, the question has really been brought within a very narrow compass. A prescription of such dresses applying to all churches is unquestionably found in a rubric of the Prayer Book of 1549, and is, as many contend, re-enacted in the existing ornaments rubric. Another prescription of such dresses (which may either be supplementary to that rubric, and intended to enforce a minimum of compliance with it, or else falling short of it, and intended to supplant it), only mentioning their
