mutatis mutandis, might be applied to the very ceremonial brought under censure by the Commissioners; such as, that whilst some derided it, others valued it and were edified by it; that it brought into sight and kept in men’s minds certain great truths of the Gospel; that it had the weight and authority of wide-spread and Catholic use; that not all which was of Roman belief or practice was to be condemned, &c., &c.  So the Canon says “it is to be observed that although the Jews and Ethnics derided both the Apostles and the rest of the Christians for preaching and believing in Him Who was crucified upon the Cross; yet all, both Apostles and Christians, were so far from being discouraged from their profession by the ignominy of the Cross, as they rather rejoiced and triumphed in it.”  Again, that “the honour and dignity of the name of the Cross begat a reverend estimation even in the Apostles’ times (for aught that is known to the contrary) of the sign of the Cross, which the Christians shortly after used in all their actions.”  And although the Synod goes on to “confess that in process of time the sign of the Cross was greatly abused in the Church of Rome,” yet it affirms in the plainest and most unhesitating manner the great principle, that “the abuse of a thing doth not take away the lawful use of it;” and adds, even further, “Nay, so far was it from the purpose of the Church of England to forsake and reject the Churches of Italy, France, Spain, Germany, or any such like Churches, in all things which they held and practised, that, as the Apology of the Church of England confesseth, it doth with reverence retain those ceremonies which doth (do) neither endamage the Church of God nor offend the minds of sober men; and only departed from them in those particular points, wherein they were fallen both from themselves in their ancient integrity, and from the Apostolical Churches which were their first founders; in which respect, amongst some other very ancient ceremonies, the sign of the Cross in Baptism hath been retained in this Church.”  Now, all this seems to me not irrelevant to many other ceremonies besides the sign of the Cross, and indeed to have a very close bearing upon the principles on which a high Ritual may be defended.  But this is not all.  We come next to a point especially and peculiarly to our purpose, for the Canon, going on to say that the sign of the Cross is retained “with such sufficient cautions and exceptions against . . . superstition and error as in the like cases are either fit or convenient,” proceeds to instance some of these cautions and guards; and the very first in the list is this, that the ceremony in question is unessential.  The “vestments are by none regarded as essential,” and therefore abolish them, says the Report.  The sign of the Cross is unessential, and therefore retain it, says the Canon.

Mark this a little more fully, for what can be more aptly illustrative of the Commissioners’ argument?  The Canon does not merely confess and admit, but claims has an advantage and reason for the retention of the usage, that it is not in any way essential to the Sacrament of Baptism.  So it says, “First, the Church of England, since the abolishing of Papery, hath ever held and taught, and so doth hold and teach still, that the sign of the Cross used in Baptism is no part of the substance of that Sacrament: for when the Minister, dipping the infant in water, or laying water upon the face of it, (as the manner also is,) hath pronounced these words, I baptize thee in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, the infant is fully and perfectly baptized.  So as the sign of the Cross, being afterwards used, doth neither add any thing to the virtue and perfection of Baptism, nor being omitted, doth detract any thing from the effect and substance thereof.”  Nor is this all.  Another paragraph follows, insisting upon the same thing with a second reason, shewing forth still the value of the ceremony, though unessential.  “Secondly, it is apparent in the Communion Book, that the infant baptized is, by virtue of Baptism, before it is signed with the sign of the Cross, &c., received into the congregation of Christ’s flock, as a perfect member thereof, and not by any power ascribed unto the power of the Cross.  So that, for the very remembrance of the Cross, which is very precious unto all them who rightly believe in Jesus Christ, and in the other respects mentioned, the Church of England hath retained still the sign of it in Baptism; following therein the primitive and Apostolical Churches, and accounting it a lawful outward ceremony and honourable badge, whereby the Infant is dedicated to the Service of Him that died upon the Cross, as by the words used in the Book of Common Prayer it may appear.”  This very confession, then, of its being, first, no essential part of the Sacrament; nor, secondly, essential to any one’s being received as a perfect member of Christ’s flock;—is a safeguard and security, it is argued, against any error or superstitious veneration of the sign of the Cross, and so it ought, for its other values to be retained.  How near is this to what the Commissioners, upon the evidence before them, might justly have said in relation to the vestments; where in the indifferency of the ceremonial in question they can only find an argument for restraint or abolition.  Surely they might not have been far wrong, on the ground both of reason and Scriptural authority, had they, after the pattern of the Canon, asserted the vesture in question to be “a lawful outward ceremony and honourable badge, whereby” more honour is intended and done “unto the Service of Him,” and the blessed Sacrament of His Body and Blood, “that died upon the Cross.”

But the Canon has yet another argument bearing upon the duty of using (not abolishing) things indifferent (nonessentials in other words) when ordered by the law of the Church.  “Lastly,” it says, “the use of the sign of the Cross in Baptism being thus purged from all Popish superstition and error, and reduced in the Church of England to the primary institution of it, upon those true rules of doctrine concerning things indifferent, which are consonant to the Word of God and the judgment of all the ancient Fathers, we hold it the part of every private man and other reverently to retain the true use of it prescribed by public authority: considering that things indifferent do in some sort alter their natures, when they are either commanded or forbidden by a lawful magistrate; and may not be omitted at every man’s pleasure contrary to the law when they be commanded, nor used, when they are prohibited.”  Is there nothing here to justify such as simply obey the authority of the Rubric?

There is a passage in the answers of the Bishops to the Nonconformist divines at the Savoy Conference, which aptly illustrates this statement of the Canon, and is of the more moment because it shews that the mind of those who managed that controversy in 1661 was entirely in harmony with that of the framers of the Canons in 1603; and as the Savoy Conference was the immediate precursor of the Convocation of the next year, which in substance ratified and adopted its recommendations in the last revision of our Prayer Book, those Episcopalian divines may well be taken as the exponents of the mind of the very Convocation which passed the Rubric upon ornaments.

We find the following among their replies to the objections of the Nonconformists in relation to things indifferent in themselves.  “Whereas the Nonconformists plead that they cannot obey the commands of the Church for fear of violating the precept which forbids adding to the Word of God (Deut. xii. 32): We answer, those Ministers do