The third edition of the Book of Common Prayer appeared in 1559 following the death of Mary and the beginning of the reign of her half-sister Eliza- beth I. This 1559 Book (revised slightly in 1604, the year after James I came to the throne) was used in the English-speaking colonies now part of the United States until after 1662 wherever a congre- gation was loyal to the Church then established in England, Wales and Ireland (even Scotland for much of that period).

After the Restoration in 1660, a new edition of the Book of Common Prayer appeared in 1662, still the official Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England (however little used).John Booty's sum- mary clarifies the connections between the early revisions: "The first two Prayer Books lasted but a short while and were not generally accepted. The 1559 Book, a revision of the 1552 Book, was in constant use until 1604, when minor changes were made, none of which affected the general tone of the contents." [John E. Booty, ed., The Elizabethan Prayer Book (Washington: Folger Shakespeare Library; London & Toronto: Associated University Presses, 1976; 4th Printing, 1982), 329].

Without mentioning the period of the Inter- regnum (approximately 1645-1660) when Parlia- ment substituted an alternative Directory of Public Worship and imposed penalties for using the Book of Common Prayer (still used, where possible, by those loyal to the King and bishops), Booty continues, saying:

Indeed, it was not until 1661/62 that further changes occurred, some of which did in fact alter the tone of the Book, few of which were of very great importance. The Restoration Book maintained the tradition established in the sixteenth century (that is, by the 1552 and 1559 Books) and represented a defeat for High Churchmen, such as Johyn Cosin, and for the Puritans, such as the conciliatory Richard Baxter. (Ibid)

This fourth Prayer Book of 1662 was in use in the territories that became the United States for 127 years, until 1789. Thus the 1662 revision still holds the record for the number of years it was the official Book, since the 1789 Book adopted by the newly organized Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America was superseded in 1892, by a revised Book that was then superseded by the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, that ceased to have canonical authority in 1979.

There were significant differences between the Order for Holy Communion prescribed by these three later American Books and the 1552, 1559 and 1662 Books, namely in the portion of the Ordinary between the Sanctus and the Prayer of Thanksgiv- ing. Beginning in 1789, there were other changes so that by 1928 PECUSA had a Book whose kin- ship with the 1662 B. C. P. was clearly recognizable, but whose several differences did give it a different "tone," if one may borrow Booty's vocabulary here.

These other differences did not result from the influence of earlier editions of the Book of Common Prayer, but from changing positions on doctrine and discipline. However, the changes in the portion of the Order for Holy Communion referred to above did come from sources not yet mentioned. Those sources are the 1637 Order for Holy Communion prepared for Scotland by Arch- bishop William Laud, and the 1764 Book prepared by the Episcopal Church in Scotland, the legally oppressed independent Church influenced by the liturgical views of the Nonjurors (High Church- men who remained loyal to the Stuart monarchs deposed by the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and who admired Eastern Orthodox liturgy).

Of particular note here are the prayers referred to as the "Oblation" and "Invocation" that follow the Words of Institution in the 1928 B. C. P. There is no Oblation in the 1552, 1559, and 1662 English Books, and the position of the Invocation (differ- ing also in form) precedes the Words of Institution in those Books. The influence of the 1637 Order and 1764 Book on these portions of the American Books is evident (although the 1637 Order pre- serves the position but not the form of the Invoca- tion in the Books after 1552 and closely resembles both the position and the form of the 1549 Book). The 1789 and 1892 American Books preserve the position of the Prayer of Humble Access in the English Books from 1552 where it follows the Sanc- tus. The 1928 Book transfers that prayer to the position following the Lord's Prayer where it is placed in the 1637 Order.

A comparison of the variations among these nine Books would fill many pages. Nevertheless, fifty years ago Stephen Neill could say:

The fundamental unity of the Anglican Communion is doctrinal....Secondly, the unity of the Anglican Communion is liturgi- cal. Many Provinces... have now their own Prayer Books. But they have been careful to maintain the main lines of the Anglican tra- dition of worship - sober, biblical, ethical. In any part of the world the traveling Angli- can will find services that are familiar to him, though he may in places be bewildered by diversities of local usage [as opposed to diversities in the words on the pages of the Book]. As the number of Provinces... increases..., there is a danger that the devel- opment of local traditions of worship may be carried to the point at which the unity of the Anglican tradition is threatened. It was for this reason that... Lambeth... 1948... passed resolution 78; [holding that the B.C.P. had been so strong a bond of unity that revisions must be in accordance with the doctrine and accepted worship of the Communion]. Tendencies in one or two areas have already shown that this warning is not superfluous. [Anglicanism (Penguin Books, 1958) 429-30.]

This writer can vouch for the sense of familiarity to be found by the Anglican traveler almost fifty years ago, and to the disarray now encountered. Essentially there was the dominant liturgy to be found almost everywhere in the Communion and dependent on the 1662 B. C. P. on the one hand and the variation to be found in Scotland, and the U. S., and PECUSA installations elsewhere abroad on the other. The most obvious exception to this uni- formity was found where some congregations used a Missal drawn from Roman Catholic sources (and no Missal had canonical authority) or in places where items found in these Missals were added on an ad hoc basis by the more timid. In England the so-called Interim Rite proposed in 1931 might also be counted as a less obvious exception, but its main difference made it familiar to an American.

Those of us who recognize that the historic Book of Common Prayer duly used according to its teaching is an excellent guide to a devout and obedient Christian Life have a duty to know its past. That duty is increased by the present urgency of the need to make sure that the Book so used has a present healthy life and a secure future carried out by legitimate heirs.

(A very good source for most of the texts of historic editions of the Book of Common Prayer is found at justus.anglican.org.)