The survey of corrigenda is now complete. The list looks like a
long one, but really the points noted are few compared with those
which have passed unchallenged. Here and there in the Resolutions
that have not been considered are words or phrases that admit of
improvement, and which in an actual and authorized re-review by
a Committee of Conference would undoubtedly be improved.
The bulk of the work has, for a period of three years, stood the
incessant fire of a not always friendly criticism far better than
could have been anticipated by those who in the first instance
gave it shape. The difficulties of the task have been immense. That
they have not all of them been successfully overcome is clear
enough, but that they were faced with an honest purpose to be
just and fair, and that this purpose was clung to persistently
throughout, is a credit which Churchmen of the next generation
will not withhold from those who sought to be of service to them.
It remains to be seen whether the representatives of the Church
will take up this work and perfect it; or _per contra_ in response
to the demand for a "Commission of Experts," or the specious but
utterly impracticable[89] proposal of concerted action with the
Church of England, will decide to postpone the whole affair to the
Greek Kalends. One thing is certain, to wit, that the death of this
movement will mean inaction for at least a quarter of a century.
The men do not live who will have the courage to embark on a fresh
enterprise of the like purport while the shipwreck of this one is
before their eyes. There are many who, out of a conscientious fear
of disturbing what they like to think of as permanently settled,
would view such a conclusion of the whole matter with profound
gratitude to God. But there are many more to whom such a confession
of the Church's inability to appreciate and unwillingness to meet
the spiritual needs of a civilization wonderfully unlike anything
that has preceded it would be most disheartening. Least of all is
there valid ground for hope in the case of those who fancy that if
they can only annihilate this project, the day will speedily
come when they can revise the Prayer Book in a manner perfectly
conformable to their own conception of the "Ideal Liturgy," and
after a fashion which the most ardent Anglo-Catholic must fain
approve.
The American Book of Common Prayer bears the impress to-day of
two controlling minds, the mind of Seabury and the mind of White.
Doubtless it stood written in the councils of the Divine Providence
that so it should be. The two men represented respectively the two
modes of apprehending spiritual truth which have always been allowed
counterplay and interaction in the history of English religion, and
which always will be allowed such counterplay and interaction while
English religion remains the comprehensive thing it is. No scheme
of liturgical revision, no matter how scientifically constructed,
will ever find acceptance with the people of this Church which does
not do even-handed justice to both of the great historic growths
which find their common root in Anglican soil.
When the spirit of Seabury shall have completely exorcised the
spirit of White, or the spirit of White shall have completely
exorcised the spirit of Seabury from the Church and from the Prayer
Book, logic will have triumphed, as sixteen years ago it triumphed
under the dome of St. Peter's--logical consistency will have
triumphed, but catholicity will have fled.