Ib. p. 273.

We are sure that kneeling in any adoration at all, in any worship, on any Lord’s Day in the year, or any week day between Easter and Pentecost, was not only disused, but forbidden by General Councils, &c.—­and therefore that kneeling in the act of receiving is a novelty contrary to the decrees and practice of the Church for many hundred years after the Apostles.

Was not this because kneeling was the agreed sign of sorrow and personal contrition, which was not to be introduced into the public worship on the great day and the solemn seasons of the Church’s joy and thanksgiving?  If so, Baxter’s appeal to this usage is a gross sophism, a mere pun.

Ib. p. 308.

  Baxter’s Exceptions to the Common Prayer Book.

  1.  Order requireth that we begin with reverent prayer to God for his
     acceptance and assistance, which is not done.

Enunciation of God’s invitations, and promises in God’s own words, as in the Common Prayer Book, much better.

  2.  That the Creed and Decalogue containing the faith, in which we
     profess to assemble for God’s worship, and the law which we have
     broken by our sins, should go before the confession and Absolution;
     or at least before the praises of the Church; which they do not.

Might have deserved consideration, if the people or the larger number consisted of uninstructed ‘catechumeni’, or mere candidates for Church-membership.  But the object being, not the first teaching of the Creed and Decalogue, but the lively reimpressing of the same, it is much better as it is.

  3.  The Confession omitteth not only original sin, but all actual sin
     as specified by the particular commandments violated, and almost
     all the aggravations of those sins....  Whereas confession, being
     the expression of repentance, should be more particular, as
     repentance itself should be.

Grounded, on one of the grand errors of the whole Dissenting party, namely, the confusion of public common prayer, praise, and instruction, with domestic and even with private devotion.  Our Confession is a perfect model for Christian communities.

  4.  When we have craved help for God’s prayers, before we come to them,
     we abruptly put in the petition for speedy deliverance—­(’O God,
     make speed to save us:  O Lord make haste to help us’,) without any
     intimation of the danger that we desire deliverance from, and
     without any other petition conjoined.

  5.  It is disorderly in the manner, to sing the Scripture in a plain
     tune after the manner of reading.

  6. (’The Lord be with you.  And with thy spirit’,) being petitions
     for divine assistance, come in abruptly in the midst or near the
     end of morning prayer:  And (’Let us pray’.) is adjoined when we
     were before in prayer.