Preface 

It is a most invaluable part of that blessed "liberty wherewith Christ 
hath made us free," that in his worship different forms and usages may 
without offense be allowed, provided the substance of the Faith be kept 
entire; and that, in every Church, what cannot be clearly determined to 
belong to Doctrine must be referred to Discipline; and therefore, by 
common consent and authority, may be altered, abridged, enlarged, 
amended, or otherwise disposed of, as may seem most convenient for the 
edification of the people, "according to the various exigency of times 
and occasions." 

The Church of England, to which the Protestant Episcopal Church in
these States is indebted, under God, for her first foundation and a long
continuance of nursing care and protection, hath, in the Preface of her 
Book of Common Prayer, laid it down as a rule, that "The particular 
Forms of Divine Worship, and the Rites and Ceremonies appointed to be 
used therein, being things in their own nature indifferent, and 
alterable, and so acknowledged; it is but reasonable that upon weighty 
and important considerations, according to the various exigency of times 
and occasions, such changes and alterations should be made therein, as 
to those that are in place of Authority should, from time to time, seem 
either necessary or expedient." 

The same Church hath not only in her Preface, but likewise in her 
Articles and Homilies, declared tho necessity and expediency of 
occasional alterations and amendments in her Forms of Public Worship; 
and we find accordingly, that, seeking to keep the happy mean between 
too much stiffness in refusing, and too much easiness in admitting 
variations in