Rubrics also denote the rules and directions given at the beginning and in the course of the liturgy, for the order and manner in which the several parts of the office are to be performed.
Statutes of the English Parliament have confirmed the use of the rubric inserted in the part of the Common Prayer Book relating to the marriage ceremony. But prior to the British marriage acts, a case arose where no ring was used according to the Common Prayer Book. A then Chief Justice (C. J. Pemberton) was inclined to think it a good contract, there being words of a present contract repeated after a person in orders.[338]
The rubric directs that the man shall give unto the woman a ring, laying the same upon the book; and the priest, taking the ring, shall deliver it unto the man to put it on the fourth finger of the woman’s left hand. And he says, “With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship and with all my worldly gifts I thee endow.” These words are best explained by the rubric of the 2d of Edward VI., which ran thus:[339] “The man shall give unto the woman a ring and other tokens of spousage, as gold or silver, laying the same upon the book; and the man, taught by the priest, shall say, ‘With this ring I thee wed, this gold and silver I thee give;’” and then these words, “With all my worldly goods I thee endow,” were delivered with a more peculiar significancy. Here the proper distinction is made, the endowment of all his goods means granting the custody or key and care of them. It will be seen that the word “endow” is kept apart from the positive gift of pieces of gold and silver. It has been said that the ancient pledge was a piece of silver worn in the pocket; but marriage being held sacred, it was thought more prudent to have the pledge exposed to view by making it into a ring worn upon the hand.[340]
The Christian marriage-ring appears, in its substance, to have been copied from the Roman nuptial ring. It was, according to Swinburn, of iron, adorned with an adamant; the metal hard and durable, signifying the durance and perpetuity of the contract. Howbeit, he says, it skilleth not at this day what metal the ring be of, the form of it being round and without end doth import that their love should circulate and flow continually.
In the Roman ritual there is a benediction of the ring and a prayer that she who wears it may continue in perfect love and fidelity to her husband and in fear of God all her days.[341]
§ 8. We have remarked on the vulgar error of a vein going from the fourth finger of the left hand to the heart. It is said by Swinburn and others that therefore it became the wedding finger. The priesthood kept up this idea by still keeping it as the wedding finger; but it was got at through the use of the Trinity: for, in the ancient ritual of English marriages, the ring was placed by the husband on the top of the thumb of the left hand, with the words, “In the name of the Father;” he then removed it to the forefinger, saying: “In the name of the Son;” then to the middle finger, adding: “And of the Holy Ghost;” finally, he left it, as now, on the fourth finger, with the closing word “Amen.”[342]
As to the supposed artery to the heart. Levinus Lemnius quaintly says:—“A small branch of the artery and not of the nerves, as Gellius thought, is stretched forth from the heart unto this finger, the motion whereof you may perceive evidently in all that affects the heart of woman, by the touch of your forefinger. I used to raise such as are fallen in a swoon by pinching this joint and by rubbing the ring of gold with a little saffron: for, by this, a restoring force that is in it passeth to the heart and refresheth the fountain of life unto which this finger is joined. Wherefore antiquity thought fit to encompass it about with gold.”[343]
By the way, a correspondent, in a British periodical, suggests: that a lady of his acquaintance has had the misfortune to lose the ring finger, and the question is raised whether she can be married in the Church of England!?[344]
In the “British Apollo” it is said that, during the time of George the First, the wedding-ring, though placed in the ceremony of the marriage upon the fourth finger, was worn upon the thumb.[345]
The use of the ring has become so common in England that poor people will not believe the marriage to be good without one; and the notion also is that it must be of gold. At Worcester (England) on one occasion, the parties were so poor that they used a brass ring. The bride’s friends indignantly protested that the ring ought to have been of gold; and the acting officer was threatened with indictment for permitting the use of such base metal.