And then go for a moment from the Services to the Preface of the Book, and see what the Fathers of our English Liturgy thought and intended about the place of the Holy Scriptures in worship. I hope my Brethren have all read that "Preface" with care; I mean, of course, the whole length of introductory matter which precedes the Tables of Lessons; nothing of it later than 1662, most of it (indeed all but the first section, written by Sanderson) dating in substance from 1549.[26] I hope it has all been read by you; but I am not quite certain of it, so little attention is at present called to those important and authoritative statements of principle. But however well you may already know them, they will repay another reading; and so you will be reminded again that the really first thought in the minds of the men who gave us our Prayer Book in English was to let "_the Word of God_ have free course and be glorified" in all the worship of the people. [2 Thess. iii. 1.] Those men were learned in the past, and they reverenced history and continuity. But they reverenced still more the heavenly Word, and where they found the ample reading and hearing of it impeded by even immemorial usage, the usage had to give way, without reserve, to the Bible.
[26] I do not forget that some modifications in detail, as to the Lectionary, are quite recent.
Yes, the Prayer Book is, whatever else it is, searchingly, overflowingly Scriptural; full of the Bible, full of Christ. Let us drink its principles and its manner in, that they may come out in our life and our preaching.
And now for a few simple practical suggestions on our ministerial use of the Book.