The Lord bless us, &c.

Printed by Parker and Co., Crown Yard, Oxford.

Notes:

[a] "The Act of Uniformity is to be construed by the same rules
exactly as any act passed in the last session of Parliament. The
clause in question, by which I mean the rubric in question (the
Ornaments Rubric), is perfectly unambiguous in language, free from
all difficulty as to construction. It therefore lets in no argument
as to intention other than that which the words themselves import.
There might be a seeming difficulty in fact, because it might not
be known what vestments were in use by authority of Parliament in
the second year of the reign of King Edward the Sixth; but this
difficulty has been removed. It is conceded in the report that the
vestments, the use of which is now condemned, were in use by
authority of Parliament in that year. Having that fact, you are
bound to construe the rubric as if those vestments were specifically
named in it, instead of being only referred to. If an act should be
passed to-morrow that the uniform of the Guards should henceforth
be such as was ordered for them by authority, and used by them in
the 1st George I., you would first ascertain what that uniform was,
and having ascertained it, you would not enquire into the changes
which may have been made, many or few, with or without lawful
authority, between the 1st George I. and the passing of the new
act. All these, from that act specifying the earlier date, would
have been made wholly immaterial. It would have seemed strange, I
suppose, if a commanding officer, disobeying the statute, had said
in his defence, 'There have been many changes since the reign of
George I., and as to "retaining," we put a gloss on that, and
thought it might mean only retaining to the Queen's use; so we have
put the uniforms safely in store.' But I think it would have seemed
more strange to punish and mulct him severely, if he had obeyed the
law and put no gloss on plain words.

"This case stands on the same principle. The rubric, indeed, seems
to me to imply with some clearness that, in the long interval
between Edw. VI. and the 14th Car. II., there had been many changes;
but it does not stay to specify them, or distinguish between what
was mere evasion, and what was lawful. It quietly passes them all
by, and goes back to _the legalized usage of the second year of
Edward VI_. What had prevailed since, whether by an archbishop's
gloss, by commissioners, or eve