A similar poesy is said to have been used at a later date by John Thomas, Bishop of London, on the ring which he used at his fourth marriage:
If I survive
I’ll make them five.[385]
The Puritan reaction in England during the Commonwealth, against the customs of the English Church, extended to the use of the wedding-ring, and Samuel Butler in his Hudibras alludes to this tendency in the following lines:
Others were for abolishing
That tool of matrimony, a ring
With which the unsanctify’ed bridegroom
Is marry’d only to a thumb.
There is a possibility that this curious custom of wearing a wedding ring on the thumb may have had some connection with the old fancy that the second joint of the thumb was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, whose supposed espousal ring is preserved in the Cathedral of Perugia. It is true that this ought rather to apply to a betrothal ring than a wedding ring. The following list gives the religious dedication of the various finger-joints: In the right hand the upper joint of the thumb was dedicated to God, the lower joint to the Virgin; the first joint of the index to St. Barnabas, the second to St. John, the third to St. Paul; the first joint of the middle finger to St. Simon Cleophas, the second to St. Thaddæus, the third to St. Joseph; the first joint of the annular to St. Zacchæus, the second to St. Stephen, the third to St. Luke; the first joint of the little finger to St. Leatus, the second to St. Mark, the third to St. Nicodemus. The dedication of the left hand fingers was: First joint of thumb, to Christ, second joint to the Virgin; first joint of the index to St. James, the second to St. John the Evangelist, the third to St. Peter; first joint of the middle finger to St. Simon, the second to St. Matthew, the third to St. James the Greater; first joint of the annular to St. Jude, the second to St. Bartholomew, the third to St. Andrew; first joint of the little finger to St. Matthaias, the second to St. Thomas, the third to St. Philip.[386]
