Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 404, June, 1849

BULLER

And is it so?

NORTH

The Fact answers to the Theory more or less. The original Thought – simplicity of worship – is to the utmost expressed, when the chased Covenanters are met on the greensward, between the hillside and the brawling brook, under the coloured or uncoloured sky. Understand that, when their descendants meet within walls and beneath roofs, they would worship after the manner of their hunted ancestors.

BULLER

I wish I were better read than I am, in the history of Scotland, civil and ecclesiastical.

NORTH

I wish you were. I say, then, my excellent friend, that the Ritual and whole Ordering of the Scottish Church is moulded upon, or issues out of, the human spirit kindling in conscious communication of the Divine Spirit. The power of the Infinite – that is, the Sense of Infinitude, of Eternity – reigns there; and the Sense in the inmost soul of the sustaining contact with Omnipotence, and self-consciousness intense, and elation of Divine favour personally vouchsafed, and joy of anticipated everlasting bliss, and triumph over Satan, death, and hell, and immeasurable desire to win souls to the King of the Worlds.

BULLER

In England we are, I am ashamed to say it, ill informed on —

NORTH

In Scotland we are, I am ashamed to say it, ill informed on —

BULLER

But go on, sir.

NORTH

What place is there for Forms of any kind in the presence of these immense overpowering Realities? For Forms, Buller, are of the Imagination; the Faculty that inhales and lives by the Unreal. But some concession to the humanity of our nature intrudes. Imagination may be subordinated, subjugated, but will not, may not, forego all its rights. Therefore, Forms and hallowing associations enter.

BULLER

Into all Worship.

NORTH

Form, too, is, in part, Necessary Order.

BULLER

Perhaps, sir, you may be not unwilling to say a few words of our Ritual.

NORTH

I tremble to speak of your Ritual; for it appears to me as bearing on its front an excellence which might be found incompatible with religious truth and sincerity.

BULLER

I confess that I hardly understand you, sir.

NORTH

The Liturgy looks to be that which the old Churches are, the Work of a Fine Art.

BULLER

You do not urge that as an objection to it, I trust, sir?

NORTH

A Poetical sensibility, a wakeful, just, delicate, simple Taste, seems to have ruled over the composition of each Prayer, and the ordering of the whole Service.

BULLER

You do not urge that as an objection to it, I trust, sir?

NORTH

I am not urging objections, sir. I seldom – never, indeed – urge objections to anything. I desire only to place all things in their true light.

BULLER

Don't frown, sir – smile. Enough.

NORTH

The whole composition of the Service is copious and various. Human Supplication, the lifting up of the hands of the creature knowing his own weakness, dependence, lapses, and liability to slip – man's own part, dictated by his own experience of himself, is the basis. Readings from the Old and New Volume of the Written Word are ingrafted, as if God audibly spoke in his own House; the Authoritative added to the Supplicatory.

BULLER

Finely true. We Church of England men love you, Mr North – we do indeed.

NORTH

The hymns of the sweet Singer of Israel, in literal translation, adopted as a holier inspired language of the heart.

BULLER

These, sir, are surely three powerful elements of a Ritual Service.

NORTH

Throughout, the People divide, the service with the Minister. They have in it their own personal function.

BULLER

Then the Homily, sir.