A discourse concerning liturgies, and their imposition

I know no ground of expectation of the performance of that, which as yet men have come short in, namely, in producing Testimonies for the use of such Liturgies as we are enquiring after, considering the diligence, ability, and interest of those have been already engaged in that enquiry. Now the silence of those, who in all probability would have given an account of them, had any such been in use in their days, with the description they gave us of such a performance of the Worship of God in the Assemblies of Christians, as is inconsistent with, and exclusive of such prescribed Forms as we treat of, is as full an evidence in this kind as our negative is capable of. In those golden Fragments of Antiquity which we have preserved by Eusebius, I mean the Epistles of the Church of Smyrna, about the Martyrdom of Polycarpus, and of the Churches of Vienna and Lyons, concerning their Persecution, we have not the least intimation of any such Forms of Service. In the Epistle of Clemens, or the Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth, in those of Ignatius, in the Writings of Justin Martyr, Clemens, Tertullian, Origen, Cyprian, and their Contemporaries, there is the same silence concerning them. The Pseudepigraphical Writings that bear the Names of the men of those days, with any pretence of considerable Antiquity, as the Canons of the Apostles, Quaestiones ad Orthodoxos, Dionysius Hierarch. Divin. Nom. will not help in the cause. For though in some of them there are Prayers mentioned, and that for and about such things as were not in Rerum Natura, in the days wherein those persons lived, unto whose Names they are falsely ascribed; yet they speak nothing to the point of Liturgies as stated in our enquiry. Something I confess may be found in some of the Writings, of some one or two of those of the third Century, intimating the use of some particular Prayers in some Churches; ⟨p. 27⟩So Origen. Homil. 11. in Hierimea. Ubi frequenter in or at jone dicimus, da omnipotens, da nobis partem cum Prophetis, da cum Apostolis Christi tui, tribue ut inveniamur ad vestigia unigeniti tui. But whether he speaks of a Form, or of the matter only of Prayer, I know not. But such Passages belong not unto our purpose. Those who deal expressly about the Order, State, and Condition of the Churches, and the Worship of God in them, their Prayers and Supplications knew nothing of prescribed Liturgies;

I know no ground of expectation of the performance of that, which as yet men have come short in, namely, in producing Testimonies for the use of such Liturgies as we are enquiring after, considering the diligence, ability, and interest of those have been already engaged in that enquiry. Now the silence of those, who in all probability would have given an account of them, had any such been in use in their dayes, with the description they gave us of such a performance of the Worship of God in the Assemblies of Christians, as is inconsistent with, and exclusive of such prescribed Forms as we treat of, is as full an evidence in this kind as our negative is capable of. In those golden Fragments of Antiquity which we have preserved by Eusebius, I mean the Epistles of the Church of Smyrna, about the Martyrdome of Polycarpus, and of the Churches of Vienna and Lyons, concerning their Persecution, we have not the least intimation of any such Forms of Service. In the Epistle of Clemens, or the Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth, in those of Ignatius, in the Writings of Justin Martyr, Clemens, Tertullian, Origen, Cyprian, and their Contemporaries, there is the same silence concerning them. The Pseudopegraphical Writings that bear the Names of the men of those dayes, with any pretence of considerable Antiquity, as the Canons of the Apostles, Quaestiones ad Orthodoxos, Dionysius Hierarch. Divin. Nom. will not help in the cause. For though in some of them there are Prayers mentioned, and that for and about such things as were not in Rerum Natura, in the dayes wherein those persons lived, unto whose Names they are falsly ascribed; yet they speak nothing to the point of Liturgies as stated in our enquiry. Something I confess may be found in some of the Writings, of some one or two of those of the third Century, intimating the use of some particular Prayers in some Churches;