conflicting character; for in them we can trace
constantly the influence of two opposing spirits:
one fighting for freedom from the authority of
Rome: the other battling as fiercely to maintain
the Catholic faith. The thirty-fifth year of
Edward the First presents us with the first cuff
that our statutes dealt in hostility to Rome;
and in the twenty-fifth year of Edward the
Third a more vehement blow was delivered in
the passing of the celebrated Statute of
Provisors. This was followed, two years later, by
another; again by a fourth, at the beginning
of Richard the Second's reign. The object of
all these statutes was, to restrain the influence
and authority of foreign ecclesiastics and courts,
in England. So far, so good; but acts of a
different character soon appear. About the year
1390, Wickliffe and his followers, sensible of the
radical defects in the existing system, were
preaching about the country for a complete
reform in the Church; the nation not being
yet ripe for reformation, the legislature took up
the matter, ordering the preachers of the new
doctrines to be arrested and thrown into prison
"until they were willing to justify themselves
according to reason and the law of Holy Church."
It is noticeable that in this statute the Pope is
called " our holy father the Pope," while in the
Statute of Provisors he is simply " the Bishop of
Rome." On the settlement of the crown under
Henry the Fourth, we come again upon provisions
similar to those of the Statutes of Provisors;
but by their side stands another act, the
Statute de haeretico comburendo, which loudly
asserted the orthodoxy of the Church of England.

After the subsidence of the Lollard movement,
things went on pretty calmly in the matter of
religious statutes for a hundred years, when the
conflict with Rome was revived with tenfold
fury. We may naturally expect much cuffing
and contention among the statutes of Henry
the Eighth's reign. The various acts relating
to the succession, and to Henry's conjugal relations,
present us with one important series, but
those affecting the religious question are perhaps
of more general interest. In these latter we
still observe the oscillation already remarked
upon, between hostility to Rome as a temporal
power, and submission to her rule of faith. The
ebb and flow of national feeling on the subject
of the Reformation may afterwards be traced in
the sweeping anti-Romish statutes of Edward
the Sixth, and the equally sweeping pro-Romish
statutes of Mary, with finally the counter-cuffs
of Elizabeth, settling things somewhat in their
modern form, and relieving the Statute-book of
this fruitful element of discord.

The language of all these partisan acts is
uniformly violent and exaggerated, and
intended to deal decisive blows at the unfortunate
"opposition." Long strings of
denunciatory epithets follow each other, and the
resources of the vocabularies of the respective
periods are sorely tasked to supply the necessary
strength of condemnation. There was a good
reason for this, no doubt, in old times, when
the statutes were promulgated by proclamation,
and not by print and paper as at the present
day. When the herald appeared in his coat of
many colours, at the market cross, and flourished
his trumpet, it would have produced a strange
anti-climax if his words had been confined to a
mere recital of the dry law. He was therefore
armed with a long rhetorical preamble to
represent the excellence of the new measure,
or its makers, and to hold up to execration the
individual or object against which it was aimed.

Jack Cade, in an act touching his attainder,
is denounced as "the most cruel, abominable
tyrant, horrible, odious and arrant false traitor,
John Cade . . . whose name, fame, acts
and deeds ought to be removed out of the
language and memory of every faithful Christian
man perpetually." The instigators of the
Gunpowder Plot are "malignant and devilish
papists." The execution of Charles the First is
spoken of in the act attainting Cromwell, as
"the horrid and execrable murther of our late
most glorious sovereign, Charles the First, of
ever blessed and glorious memory, hath been
committed by a party of wretched men,
desperately wicked and hardened in impiety," &c.

Sometimes our statutes could rush to the
other extreme, and exhaust the power of
language in servile adulation of the reigning powers.
If we would see how far base inordinate
flattery can go, we should read from beginning
to end the act (the very first in the reign) of
James the First, for declaring and recognising
his right to the throne. The following abridgment
but faintly shadows forth the spirit of the
original; but it may give some idea of its
ludicrous effect.

It states that the acknowledgment of the
king's title and the love of his subjects had been
shown by several means, " yet, as we cannot do
it too often or enough, so can there be no means
or way so fit, both to sacrifice our unfeigned and
hearty thanks to Almighty God, for blessing us
with a sovereign adorned with the rarest gifts
of mind and body in such admirable peace and
quietness, and upon the knees of our hearts to
agnise our most constant faith, obedience, and
loyalty to your majesty and your royal progeny,
as in this high court of parliament," &c., it is
therefore declared by the authority of parliament
that " they do recognise and acknowledge,
and thereby express their unspeakable joys"
that the crown descended by right of birth to
his majesty, to whom " they most humbly and
faithfully do submit and oblige themselves, their
heirs, and posterities, for ever, until the last
drop of their bloods be spent. Which, if your
majesty shall be pleased (as an argument of
your gracious acceptation) to adorn with your
majesty's royal assent .... according to our
most humble desire (as a memorial of your
princely and tender affection towards us), we
shall add this also to the rest of your majesty's
unspeakable and inestimable benefits."

What mental agonies must this composition
have cost its framers! With what shamelessness
have they sacrificed sense, grammar, and decorum
at the feet of their ungainly idol; with