to assist as spectators rather than as auditors. Here, again, the
Church of England took a middle course. She copied the Roman
Catholic forms of prayer, but translated them into the vulgar
tongue, and invited the illiterate multitude to join its voice to
that of the minister.

In every part of her system the same policy may be traced.
Utterly rejecting the doctrine of transubstantiation, and
condemning as idolatrous all adoration paid to the sacramental
bread and wine, she yet, to the disgust of the Puritan, required
her children to receive the memorials of divine love, meekly
kneeling upon their knees. Discarding many rich vestments which
surrounded the altars of the ancient faith, she yet retained, to
the horror of weak minds, a robe of white linen, typical of the
purity which belonged to her as the mystical spouse of Christ.
Discarding a crowd of pantomimic gestures which, in the Roman
Catholic worship, are substituted for intelligible words, she yet
shocked many rigid Protestants by marking the infant just
sprinkled from the font with the sign of the cross. The Roman
Catholic addressed his prayers to a multitude of Saints, among
whom were numbered many men of doubtful, and some of hateful,
character. The Puritan refused the addition of Saint even to the
apostle of the Gentiles, and to the disciple whom Jesus loved.
The Church of England, though she asked for the intercession of
no created being, still set apart days for the commemoration of
some who had done and suffered great things for the faith. She
retained confirmation and ordination as edifying rites; but she
degraded them from the rank of sacraments. Shrift was no part of
her system. Yet she gently invited the dying penitent to confess
his sins to a divine, and empowered her ministers to soothe the