Knox's Berwick Communion Service, 1549-1551
Knox's Berwick Communion Service 15 Knox's Berwick Communion Service, 1549-1551. ONE of the most interesting relics of the association of our Scottish Reformer, John Knox, with the " neighbour kirk " of England, is the fragment of the Communion Service which he used when Minister at Berwick-on-Tweed, 1549- 1551. This was found by the late Professor Lorimer,' among the Morrice Manuscripts, preserved in Dr Williams' Library, Grafton Street, London, and published by him in " John Knox and the Church of England " in 1875 ;2 the copy3 there preserved is not the original, but is believed to be a contemporary transcript, and cannot be dated later than about the beginning of the reign of Queen Elizabeth.4 Along with the Communion Service which is given here, there was discovered the letter of " John Knokk's to the Congregation of Bervik," written towards the end of the year 1552 ; as well as the " Declaration on Kneeling " which was submitted to the Privy Council of England about the same time, and of which Knox is believed to have been the " chief author."5 We are apt to think that Knox's work as a Reformer lay almost entirely within the Northern Kingdom, whereas it is the case that he was almost as many years a Minister of the Church of England, as he was of the Church of Scotland.6 The most vigorous years of his life were spent ministering to Englishmen, either in their own country or on the Continent ; though it is a somewhat remarkable fact that in his own " History of the Reformation," which is largely an auto- biography, he devotes only a few lines to his work in England.' " The said John was first appointed preacher 1 Professor of Theology, English Presbyterian College.
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