The ornaments in use in the second year of Edward VI. are stated in the rubrics of the first Prayer-Book of King Edward (1549):
“Upon the day, and at the time appointed for the ministration of the Holy Communion, the Priest that shall execute the holy ministry shall put upon him the vesture appointed for that ministration, that is to say: a white Albe plain, with a vestment or Cope. And where there be many Priests or Deacons, there so many shall be ready to help the Priest in the ministration as shall be requisite: and shall have upon them likewise the vestures appointed for their ministry, that is to say, Albes with tunicles.” At the end there is another rubric: “Upon Wednesdays and Fridays, the English Litany shall be said or sung in all places after such form as is appointed by the King’s Majesty’s Injunctions; or as is or shall be otherwise appointed by His Highness. And though there be none to communicate with the Priest, yet these days (after the Litany ended) the Priest shall put upon him a plain Albe or surplice, with a cope, and say all things at the Altar appointed to be said at the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, until after the offertory.”
[567] Parker’s Correspondence, p. 65.
[568] The rubric is: “And here it is to be noted that the minister at the time of communion and at all other times in his ministrations, shall use such ornaments in the church as were in use by authority of Parliament in the second year of the reign of King Edward VI., according to the Act of Parliament set in the beginning of this Book.”
[569] Dr. Gee (Elizabethan Ornaments, etc. p. 131) thinks that there can be no reasonable doubt that the rubric was recorded on the authority of the Privy Council. “The Privy Council had certainly inserted the Black Rubric in 1552, as their published Acts attest, but all the records of the Privy Council from 13th May 1559 until 28th May 1562 have disappeared.” The precedent cited is scarcely a parallel case. The Black Rubric was an explanation; the Rubric of 1559 is almost a contradiction in terms of the Act which restores the Prayer-Book of 1552. If I may venture to express an opinion, it seems to me most likely that the rubric was added by the Queen herself, and that she inserted it in order to be able to “hedge.” It is too often forgotten that the danger which overshadowed the earlier years of Elizabeth was the issue of a papal Bull proclaiming her a heretic and a bastard, and inviting Henry II. of France to undertake its execution. The Emperor would never permit such a Bull if Elizabeth could show reasonable pretext that she and her kingdom held by the Lutheran type of Protestantism. An excommunication pronounced in such a case would have invalidated his own position, which he owed to the votes of Lutheran Electors. In the middle of the sixteenth century the difference between the different sections of Christianity was always estimated in the popular mind by differences in public worship, and especially in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. All over Germany the Protestant was distinguished from the Romanist by the fact that he partook of the communion in both “kinds.” Elizabeth had definitely ranged herself on the Protestant side from Easter Day 1559; and a more or less ornate ritual could never explain away the significance of this fact. The great difference between the Lutherans and the Calvinists to the popular mind was that the former retained and the latter discarded most of the old ceremonial. Luther says expressly: “Da lassen wyr die Messgewand, altar, liechter noch bleyben” (Daniel, Codex Liturgicus Ecclesiæ, Lutheranæ, p. 105); and crosses, vestments, lights, and an altar appear in regular Lutheran fashion whenever the Queen wished to place herself and her land under the shield of the Augsburg Peace. This rubric was a remarkably good card to play in the diplomatic game.
[570] XXXth Injunction of 1559: “Item, Her Majesty being desirous to have the prelacy and clergy of this realm to be had as well in outward reverence, as otherwise regarded for the worthiness of their ministries, and thinking it necessary to have them known to the people in all places and assemblies, both in the church and without, and thereby to receive the honour and estimation due to the special messengers and ministers of Almighty God, wills and commands that all archbishops and bishops, and all other that be called or admitted to preaching or ministry of the sacraments, or that be admitted into any vocation ecclesiastical, or into any society of learning in either of the Universities or elsewhere, shall use and wear such seemly habits, garments, and such square caps as were most commonly and orderly received in the latter year of the reign of King Edward VI.; not meaning thereby to attribute any holiness or special worthiness to the said garments, but as St. Paul writeth: ‘Omnia decenter et secundum ordinem fiant’ (1 Cor. xiv. cap.).” Cf. Gee’s Elizabethan Prayer Booke and Ornaments (London, 1902); Tomlinson, The Prayer Book, Articles and Homilies (London, 1897); Parker, The Ornaments Rubric (Oxford, 1881).
[571] The Advertisements are printed in Gee and Hardy; Documents, etc. p. 467; the Injunctions, at p. 417.
[572] Copes were used in the cathedrals and sometimes in collegiate churches in the years between 1559 and 1566, when it was desired to add some magnificence to the service; but it ought to be remembered that the cope was never a sacrificial vestment. It was originally the cappa of the earlier Middle Ages—the mediæval greatcoat. Large churches were cold places, the clergy naturally wore their greatcoats when officiating, and the homely garment grew in magnificence. It never had a doctrinal significance like the chasuble or casula.
[573] Calendar of State Papers, Spanish, 1558-67, p. 89.
[574] Machyn’s Diary (Camden Society, London, 1844), p. 108.