Octagonian - The Liverpool Liturgy

The Liverpool Liturgy

The liturgy of the Octagon Chapel became known as the Liverpool Liturgy. It was written by Philip Holland and Richard Godwin, and was published in 1763, as edited by John Seddon. Among the hymns chosen was one by Elizabeth Scott, later arranged by John Broderip. The Octagonian psalms, at least, became known to Thomas Jefferson.

Although it was in fact adapted by a prominent minister, David Williams, for his congregation at Exeter, the liturgy proved controversial and even divisive. Seddon and Holland were founders of the nearby Warrington Academy: John Taylor, who was a tutor there, opposed the liturgy from before the time of its publication. Seddon and Taylor had in fact a profound disagreement on the suitability of the philosophy of Francis Hutcheson for the teaching at the academy; while the liturgy was Hutchesonian in intent.

While Bentley in 1762 had found the proposed liturgy "very chaste and yet animated", the basic idea, as well as that of the chapel, was contentious. Seddon himself backed away from becoming the chapel's minister, preferring extemporary prayer to a formal service. The arguments that Anglicans of broad views would prefer a liturgy, and that it would curb the tendency to free-thinking in nonconformists, remained on a theoretical level, and were apparently contradicted by Methodist success at the time. Job Orton, who supported Taylor's position, went as far as to say that the liturgy had damaged the reputation of Warrington Academy.

In the longer term, the creedless and liberal liturgy of the Octagon Chapel formed a starting point for the beliefs and writings of Anna Aikin (later Anna Barbauld) who was brought up at Warrington Academy, her father John Aikin being a tutor there and on Seddon's side of the debate. The liturgy was however condemned by others, following Orton's verdict: "It is scarcely a Christian Liturgy; in the Collects the name of Christ is hardly mentioned, and the Spirit is quite banished from it"; and elsewhere "Grieved I am, and very much so, to see such an almost deistical composition", an opinion followed in Buck's Theological Dictionary (c.1820).