The first of them shut out wholly the consideration of such questions as the reinstatement of the Athanasian Creed or the proposal to make optional the use of the word "regenerate" in the Baptismal Offices; while the other forbade the introduction of such sentimental and grotesque conceits as "An Office for the Blessing of Candles," "An Office for the Benediction of a Lifeboat," and "An Office for the Reconciliation of a Lapsed Cleric."[38] Still another very serious limitation, and one especially unfriendly to that perfectness of contour which we naturally look to see in a liturgical formulary, grew out of the tender solicitude of the Committee for what may be called the vested rights of congregations. There was a strong reluctance to the cutting away even of what might seem to be dead wood, lest there should ensue, or be thought to ensue, the loss of something really valuable. It was only as the result of much painstaking effort, and only at some sacrifice of literary fastidiousness, that the Committee was enabled to report a book of which it could be said that, while it added much of possible enrichment, it took away almost nothing that had been in actual possession.[39] There could be no better illustration of this point than is afforded by certain of the alterations proposed to be made in the Order for Evening Prayer. The Committee felt assured that upon no point was the judgment of the Church likely to be more unanimous than in approving the restoration to their time-honored home in the Evening Office of _Magnificat_ and _Nunc dimittis_, and yet so unwilling were they to displace _Bonum est confiteri_ and _Benedic anima mea_ from positions they have only occupied since 1789 that they authorized the unquestionably clumsy expedient of printing three responds to each Lesson. Probably a large majority of the Committee would have preferred to drop _Bonum est confiteri_ and _Benedic anima mea_ altogether, retaining _Cantate Domino_ and _Deus miser eatur_ as the sole alternates to the two Gospel canticles, as in the English Book, but rather than have a thousand voices cry out, as it was believed they would cry out, "You have robbed us," the device of a second alternate was adopted, to the sad defacement of the printed page. In may be charged that, in thus choosing, the Committee betrayed timidity, and that a wise boldness would have been the better course; but if account be taken of the attitude consistently maintained by General Convention towards any proposition for the change of so much as a comma in the Prayer Book, during a period of fifty years prior to the introduction of _The Book Annexed_, it will perhaps be concluded that for the characterization of the Committee's policy timidity is scarcely so proper a word as caution. SPECIAL CRITICISMS. (_a_) _Foreign_.