A.D. 1801.
[1. The Latin text of the Elizabethan Articles, adopted in 1562, is a reprint of the editio princeps of Reginald Wolfe, royal printer, London, 1563, issued by express authority of the Queen, and reproduced by Charles Hardwick, in his History of the Articles of Religion, new edition, Cambridge, 1859, pp. 277 sqq. (Hardwick gives also, in four parallel columns, the English edition of 1571, and the Forty-two Articles of 1553, Latin and English, with the textual variations of the Parker MS. of 1571, and other printed editions.)
2. The English text is reprinted, with the old spelling, from the authorized London edition of John Cawood, 1571, as found in Hardwick, l. c.
The question of the comparative authority of the Latin and English texts is answered by Burnet, Waterland, and Hardwick, to the effect that both are equally authentic, but that in doubtful cases the Latin must determine the sense. The Articles were passed, recorded, and ratified to the year 1562 (1563), in Latin only; but these Latin Articles were revised and translated by the Convocation of 1571, and both the Latin and English texts, adjusted as nearly as possible, were published in the same year by the royal authority. Subscription was hereafter required to the English Articles, called the Articles of 1562, by the famous Act of the XIII. of Elizabeth. See Hardwick, l. c. p. 159.
3. The American Revision of the Articles, as adopted by the General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, held in Trenton, New Jersey, Sept. 12, 1801, is taken from the standard American edition of The Book of Common Prayer (published by the Harpers, New York, 1844, and by the New York Bible and Common Prayer-Book Society, 1873, pp. 512 sqq.). It has been compared with the Journal of the Convention, edited by Dr. W. Stevens Perry, in Journals of the General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, 1785–1835 (Claremont, N. H., 1874), Vol. I. pp.279 sqq.
4. To facilitate the comparison, the words in which the English and American editions differ are printed in italics. The chief differences are the omission of the Athanasian Creed, in Art. VIII.; the omission of Art. XXI., on the Authority of General Councils; and the entire reconstruction of Art. XXXVII., on the Power of the Civil Magistrate.]
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The English editions of the Articles are usually preceded by the following Royal Declaration, which is the work of Archbishop Laud (1628):
'Being by God's Ordinance, according to Our just Title, Defender of the Faith, and Supreme Governour of the Church, within these Our Dominions, We hold it most agreeable to this Our Kingly Office, and Our own religious Zeal, to conserve and maintain the Church committed to Our Charge, in the Unity of true Religion, and in the Bond of Peace; and not to suffer unnecessary Disputations, Altercations, or Questions to be raised, which may nourish Faction both in the Church and Commonwealth. We have therefore, upon mature Deliberation, and with the Advice of so many of Our Bishops as might conveniently be called together, thought fit to make this Declaration following:
'That the Articles of the Church of England (which have been allowed and authorized heretofore, and which Our Clergy generally have subscribed unto) do contain the true Doctrine of the Church of England agreeable to God's Word, which We do therefore ratify and confirm, requiring all Our loving Subjects to continue in the uniform Proffession thereof, and prohibiting the least difference from the said Articles; which to that End We command to be new printed, and this Our Declaration to be published therewith.
'That We are Supreme Governour of the Church of England: And that if any Difference arise about the external Policy, concerning the Injunctions, Canons, and other Constitutions whatsoever thereto belonging, the Clergy in their Convocation is to order and settle them, having first obtained leave under Our Broad Seal so to do: and We approving their said Ordinances and Constitutions, providing that none be made contrary to the Laws and Customs of the Land.
'That out of Our Princely Care that the Churchmen may do the Work which is proper unto them, the Bishops and Clergy, from time to time in Convocation, upon their humble Desire, shall have Licence under Our Broad Seal to deliberate of, and to do all such Things, as, being made plain by 487them, and assented unto by iis, shall concern the settled Continuance of the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church of England now established; from which We will not endure any varying or departing in the least Degree.
'That for the present, though some differences have been ill raised, yet We take comfort in this, that all Clergymen within Our Realm have always most willingly subscribed to the Articles established; which is an argument to Us, that they all agree in the true, usual, literal meaning of the said Articles; and that even in those curious points, in which the present differences lie, men of all sorts take the Articles of the Church of England to be for them; which is an argument again, that none of them intend any desertion of the Articles established.
'That, therefore, in these both curious and unhappy differences, which have for so many hundred years, in different times and places, exercised the Church of Christ, We will, that all further curious search be laid aside, and these disputes shut up in God's promises, as they be generally set forth to us in the holy Scriptures, and the general meaning of the Articles of the Church of England according to them. And that no man hereafter shall either print or preach to draw the Article aside any way, but shall submit to it in the plain and full meaning thereof: and shall not put his own sense or comment to be the meaning of the Article, but shall take it in the literal and grammatical sense.
'That if any publick Reader in either of Our Universities, or any Head or Master of a College, or any other person respectively in either of them, shall affix any new sense to any Article, or shall publickly read, determine, or hold any publick Disputation, or suffer any such to be held either way, in either the Universities or Colleges respectively; or if any Divine in the Universities shall preach or print any thing either way, other than is already established in Convocation with our Royal Assent, he, or they the Offenders, shall be liable to our displeasure, and the Church's censure in Our Commission Ecclesiastical, as well as any other: And we will see there shall be due Execution upon them.'
801The omission of 'all' dates from the year 1630, and the revised text of the Westminster Assembly of Divines, 1647. It appears in the edition of 1628, and is restored in modern English editions. See Hardwick, p. 279.
802In the Forty-two Articles of 1553 there is the addition: 'Although the decrees of predestination are unknown unto us.'
803The Twenty-first of the English Articles is omitted in the Amer. ed., because it is partly of a local and civil nature, and is provided for, as to the remaining parts of it, in other Articles.
804The following clause against the real presence and ubiquity of Christ's body was here added in the Parker Latin MS., but struck out in the Synod: 'Christus in cœlum ascendens, corpori suo Immortalitatem dedit, Naturam non abstulit humane enim nature veritatem (iuxta Scripturas), perpetuo retinet, quam uno et definito Loco esse, et non in multa, vel omnia simul loca diffundi oportet. Quum igitur Christus in celum sublatus, ibi usque ad finem seculi permansurus, atque inde, non aliunde (ut loquitur Augustinus) venturus sit, ad iudicandum viuos et mortuos, non debet quisquam fidelium, et carnis eius, et sanguinis, realem, et corporalem (ut loquuntur) presentiam in Eucharistia vel credere, vel profiteri. Corpus tamen Christi datur,' etc.
805This Article, which agrees with the Zwinglian and Calvinistic theory against the Lutheran, is wanting in all the printed copies until 1571, and has here been supplied from the Parker MS. See Hardwick, p. 315, note 3, and p. 143.
806In the Forty-two Articles of Edward VI. there are four additional Articles—on the Resurrection of the Dead, the State of the Souls of the Departed, Millenarians, and the Eternal Damnation of the Wicked.
807In the Forty-two Articles of Edward VI. there are four additional Articles—on the Resurrection of the Dead, the State of the Souls of the Departed, Millenarians, and the Eternal Damnation of the Wicked.
808This heading is inserted in the later English editions after the Ratification.
