GEORGE FOX AND RITUAL [To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
SIR,--YOU admire George Fox for banishing ritual and imply that this banishment has been maintained by his followers. What of the following statement written by that most excellent man .Joseph John Gurney :-
" I was engaged long beforehand to a dinner-party. For three weeks beforehand I was in agitstion from the knowledge that I must enter the drawing-room with my hat on. From this sacrifice,. strange and unaccountable as it may appear, I could not escape. In a Friend's attire, and with my hat on, I entered the drawing- room at the dreaded moment, shook hands with the mistress of the house, wont back into the hall, deposited my hat, and returned home in some degree of peace."
What is that but an act of ritual ? What is the " Friend's attire," and the use of " thou " and " thee," and the special way of naming the months and days of the week, but " ritual- istic " ? Is not the lesson this, that you cannot banish ritual, and if you abolish the ritual of priest and public worship you establish a ritual for all the faithful in every action of their life ?—I am, Sir, &e.,
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