ished; and it is not too much to assert
that just in proportion to the growth of the liturgical service in any
Church, in that proportion the power of its ministry has declined.
Indeed the whole history of liturgies in their origin, development, and
effects, should make the Church that rejoices in freedom from their
binding forms most careful ere submitting in any degree to their
paralyzing influence.

It is argued in favor of the introduction of forms of prayer that their
use would tend to the more orderly and dignified conducting of public
worship by the minister. It is not a difficult matter to take
exception to methods to which we have long been accustomed, and to
compare these, sometimes to their disadvantage, with ideal conditions.
As a matter of fact, however, it may in all fairness be asked, does
disorder or irreverence characterize Presbyterian worship in general,
or indeed to any noticeable extent? Whatever lovers of another system,
within our own Church, may say, it cannot be denied that the impression
in the minds of men of all denominations (an impression that has not
gained strength without cause) is that, compared with the worship of
any other denomination, that of the Presbyterian Church is
characterized by reverence, dignity and order. The conduct of any
average congregation in the Presbyterian Church, and the heartiness
with which its members join in every part of public worship will appear
at no disadvantage when compared with that of a congregation
worshipping with a ritual. Whatever other blessings a liturgy may
secure for those devoted to its use, it has never been able to develop
in the Churches where it is employed a spirit and conduct in public
worship as reverent and devotional, and at the same time so marked by
understanding, as that which has uniformly characterized the
Presbyterian Church, and that Church would have to gain very much in
other directions to compensate for the opening of the door to the
formal and careless repetition of holy words so often associated with
the use of a liturgy.

It is further argued that congregations would, with the aid of a
liturgy, be enabled to take both a more lively and a more intelligent
part in public prayer than they can possibly do when endeavoring to
follow a minister who uses extempore prayer only. This argument must
appear to be of considerable weight to those only who forget how
lifeless and unmeaning a mere form of words, with which the li