enotes all the ceremonies in general belonging to divine service. The word comes from the Greek, λειτουργία, service, public ministry, formed from λειτος, public, and εργον, work. In a more restricted signification, liturgy is used amongst the Roman Catholics to signify the mass, and amongst the Episcopalians it is used to signify the common prayer.

In the primitive days divine service was exceedingly simple, being clogged with but few ceremonies, and consisting of only a small number of prayers; but by degrees the number of external ceremonies was increased, and new prayers were added, to make the office look more venerable to the people. At length things were carried to such a pitch, that regulation became necessary; it was found proper to put the service, and the manner of performing it, into writing; and this was what was called a liturgy.

In the early ages of the church every bishop had the power to form a liturgy for his own diocese; and if he kept to the analogy of faith and doctrine, all circumstances were left to his own discretion. Afterwards the practice was for the whole province to follow the metropolitan church, which also became the general rule of the church; and this Lindwood acknowledges to be the common law of the church, intimating, that the use of several services in the same province, which was the case in England, had no warrant except by long custom.

The liturgy of the church of England was composed in the year 1547, and established in the second year of Edward VI. (2 and 3 Edw. VI. cap. 1.) In the fifth year of this king it was reviewed, because some things were contained in that liturgy which showed a compliance with the superstition of the time, and various exceptions were taken against it by some learned men at home, and by Calvin abroad. Certain alterations were made in it, which consisted in adding the general confession and absolution, and the communion to begin with the ten commandments. The use of oil in confirmation and extreme unction was left out; prayers for souls departed, and what tended to a belief of Christ's real presence in the eucharist, were also omitted. This liturgy, so reformed, was established by the act 5 and 6 Edward VI. cap. 1. But it was abolished by Queen Mary, who enacted that the service should stand as it was most commonly used in the last year of the reign of Henry VIII. The liturgy of 5 and 6 Edward VI., however, was re-established with some few alterations and additions by 1 Elizabeth, cap. 2. Some further alterations were introduced, in consequence of the review of the common-prayer book, by order of James I. in the first year of his reign, particularly in the office of private baptism, in several rubrics, and other passages, with the addition of five or six new prayers and thanksgivings, and all that part of the catechism which contains the doctrine of the sacraments. The book of common prayer, so altered, remained in force from the first year of James I. till the fourteenth of Charles II. The last review of the liturgy was made in the year 1661, and the last act of uniformity enjoining the observance of it is 13 and 14 Car. II. cap. 4.