PRAYER BOOK 



minosae, native of India. The 

 leaf is divided into two rows of 

 narrow oblong leaflets, and the 

 pea-like, pale purple flowers are in 

 clusters. The oblong pods contain 

 from four to six bright scarlet 

 polished seeds, with a black patch 

 around the scar marking their 

 attachment to the pod. Buddhists 

 thread them to make rosaries, and 

 they are also made into necklaces. 

 They are employed in India as a 

 standard of weight. 



Prayer Book. Authorised ser- 

 vice book of the Church of England. 

 Otherchurches in communion with 

 it, such as the Church of Ireland, 

 the Episcopal Church of Scotland, 

 and the American Church, have 

 service books which differ" from the 

 Anglican Prayer Book in some 

 important details. 



The Book of Common Prayer is 

 in one sense a product of the Re- 

 formation, since it originated from 

 the demand that the public worship 

 of the Church should be in the 

 vernacular 1 ; but in another sense 

 it is a product of earlier times, 

 since the materials from which it 

 is compiled are the services of the 

 medieval Church, which them- 

 selves developed from the rites of 

 the early Christian centuries. Be- 

 sides the medieval service books 

 some influence must be attributed 

 to Reformation orders of public 

 worship, in particular to the so- 

 called Consultation of Archbishop 

 Herrmann (1543). 



The first authorised service in 

 English was the Litany, trans- 

 lated and adopted by Archbishop 

 Cranmer. During the same reign 

 portions of the Mass were also read 

 in English. In the reign of Edward 

 VI the Prayer Book first appears 

 as a complete order of public 

 worship in the English language. 

 The chief author of it was Cranmer, 

 though he had the assistance of 

 several other bishops. It was, 

 almost certainly, approved by 

 Convocation, and was enforced by 

 Parliament in the first Act of Uni- 

 formity, 1549. The first Prayer 

 Book did not go far enough in the 

 direction of innovation to satisfy 

 the more extreme reformers, such 

 as Ridley and Hooper, and in 1552 

 the second Prayer Book was 

 authorised, which went a long way 

 to meet their demands, and repre- 

 sents the nearest approach made 

 by the Church of England to as- 

 similation with the services of the 

 reformed churchesof the Continent. 



The accession of Elizabeth saw 

 another revision of the Prayer 

 Book, 1559, which was on the 

 whole a return towards the position 

 of the first Prayer Book. Under 

 Elizabeth the Prayer Book as- 

 sumed substantially the form 



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which it still retains, and subse- 

 quent alterations have been of 

 minor importance. During the 

 Commonwealth the use of the 

 Prayer Book, whether in public or 

 private, was prohibited, but at the 

 Restoration it became once more 

 the service book of the nation, 

 and in 1661 underwent its last re- 

 vision. Since that date no changes 

 have been made, except that in 

 1871 a new list of lessons was 

 adopted. In 1907 royal letters 

 were addressed to the Convoca- 

 tions of Canterbury and York, in- 

 structing them to inquire into the 

 advisability of another revision. 

 In 1923 certain minor changes 

 were adopted. See Church of 

 England ; consult also Anno- 

 tated Book of Common Prayer, 

 J. H. Blunt, 1892; The Workman- 

 ship of the Prayer Book, J. Dowden, 

 1899 ; A New History of the Book 

 of Common Prayer, F. Proctor and 

 W. H. Frere, 3rd ed. 1905 ; The 

 Prayer Book: What it is, 1907, 

 3rd ed. 1911. and The Art of Public 

 Worship, 1919, P. Dearmer; The 

 Prayer Book Dictionary, ed. George 

 Harford, Morley Stevenson, and 

 J. W. Tyrer, 19i3. 



Praying Mat OR CARPET. Article 

 used by Mahomedans for kneeling 

 upon when at prayer. About the 

 size of a wide hearthrug, and 

 known as a seggidch, it is marked 

 with a nick, the point of which 

 is turned towards Mecca. See 

 Liberia. 



Praying -Wheel. Symbolical 

 instrument used by Buddhists of 

 Tibet in religious exercises. It 

 consists of a 

 cylinder, 

 around which 

 are wound 

 paper bands 

 inscribed with 

 repetitions 'of 

 the s a c r e d 



m a n t r a, om 

 man i padme 

 hum Oh, the 

 Jewel in_ the 

 L o t u s a 

 form of ador- 

 ation of the 

 B u d d h a. 

 The cylinders 

 are made in 

 various sizes, 

 and are 

 turned by 

 hand, or by 

 the agency of 

 wind, water, 

 or fire. The 

 paper used 



Praying-Wheel of 



Hindu silver ware, 



Tibetan type 



PREACHING 



is so thin, and so closely printed 

 are the symbols, that a praying- 

 wheel 8 ft. in height may contain 

 many more than a million re- 

 petitions of the mantra. Prayer 

 flags, printed strips of butter- 

 muslin fastened to poles from 20 

 to 30 ft. in height, are also used. 

 See Lamaism , consult also The 

 Buddhist Praying-Wheel, W. Simp- 

 son, 1896 ; Lhasa, P. Landon, 1906. 



Preaching (Lat. praedicare, to 

 proclaim). Public oral appeal on 

 behalf of a religious belief, i.e. the 

 delivery of a sermon. It is intended 

 to convert, or at least exhort, oc- 

 cupies an important place in the 

 history of Christianity, and is 

 practised in other religions. A ser- 

 mon was formerly called a homily, 

 hence the term homiletics (q.v.). 



The disciples of Jesus Christ, 

 notably S. Paul, preached a great 

 deal, as did some of the fathers of 

 the Church. Chrysostom was a 

 great preacher, and in the early 

 centuries of the Christian era 

 there were a number of men who 

 combined religious fervour with in- 

 tellectual distinction and oratorical 

 power. The next group of great 

 preachers were the missionaries 

 who, from the monasteries of Ire- 

 land and Scotland, carried the 

 Christian faith over Europe. The 

 Reformation gave an added im- 

 portance to preaching, and Luther, 

 Knox, Latimer, and their contem- 

 poraries realized the value of an im- 

 passioned personal appeal. Hither- 

 to, preaching had not been a regu- 

 lar part of the services of the 

 Church, but Protestants, espe- 

 cially Nonconformists, soon made 

 the sermon an integral part of 

 divine worship. They, too, stereo- 

 typed the plan of basing it on a 

 text taken from the Bible. After 

 the excitement of the Reformation, 

 preaching took a more intellectual 

 tone, marked by the names of 

 Bossuet, Massillon, Jeremy Tay- 

 lor, South, and others. 



Preaching was a feature of the 

 religious revival of the 18th cen- 

 tury, as of all religious revivals, 

 Wesley and Whitefield being 

 among the best known of many 

 popular preachers. In the 19th 

 century Spurgeon exercised a 

 remarkable sway by his preaching, 

 while Robertson and Liddon, with 

 their more intellectual appeal, 

 were equally though less appar- 

 ently successful. Of many other 

 great 19th century preachers may 

 be mentioned Newman, Phillips 

 Brooks, and Lacordaire. Preach- 

 ing has been most obviously effec- 

 tive when addressed to an un- 

 lettered audience at a time of re- 

 ligious unrest. 



The first requisite of the preacher 

 is an intense belief in the truth of 



