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1573.] "The second reason [for wearing the vestments] is, that they that wear this apparel, have edified and do edify: which is as if a man would say, The midwives which lied unto Pharaoh did much good among the Israelites, ergo, their lying did much good. If he will say, the comparison is not like, because the one is not sin in his [its] own nature, whereas the other is sin, then take this one that stammereth and stuttereth in his tongue, edifieth the people, therefore stammering and stuttering is good to edify. For what if the LORD give His blessing unto His word, and to other good gifts that he hath that preacheth and weareth a surplice, &c.: is it to be thought therefore that He liketh well of the wearing of that apparel? This is to assign the cause of a thing to that which is not only not the cause thereof, but some hindrance also......of that whereof it is supposed to be a cause. For a man may rather reason that, forasmuch as they which preach with surplice, &c. edify, (notwithstanding that they thereby drive away some, and to other some give suspicion of evil, &c.), if they preached without wearing any such thing, they should edify much more. And yet if a man were assured to gain a thousand by doing of which may offend one or cause to fall one brother, he ought not to do it."-A Reply to an Answer made of M. Doctor Whitgift against the Admonition of the Parliament, &c., pp. 78, 79.

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"The laws of the Church have prescribed this apparel to the ministers of the Word as decent, orderly, and comely; the same laws have inhibited those to preach that refuse to submit themselves unto such orders wherefore, seeing they be appointed as fit garments for preachers, and none may preach except he receive them, they do edify, &c."-The Defence of the Answer to the Admonition, &c., by Dr. Whitgift, p. 288.

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1574.] "And whereas they allege also order and decency for their surplice, I would know why it should seem more comely and decent for a minister that he should preach or pray in a surplice than in a gown; in white raiment, than black apparel? For as for the colour, methinketh black to be more comely for him; and for the fashion, methinketh a long garment reaching down to the foot should be more honest and seemly."—A Full and Plain Declaration, &c., by Thomas Cartwright, pp. 130, 131.

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Ibid.] "How should it possibly help or further them [the puritans] in their course......in a pensive manner to tell their audience,......Our pastoral charge is GOD's positive commandment. Rather than that shall be taken from us, we are resolved to take this filth [the surplice] and to put it on, although we judge it to be so unfit and inconvenient, that as oft as ever we pray or preach so arrayed before you, we do as much as in us lieth to cast away your souls that are weak-minded, and to bring you unto endless perdition.'”—Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, v. 29. 7, Keble's Edit.

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1603.] "In the time of divine service and Prayers, in all cathedral and collegiate churches, when there is no Communion, it shall be sufficient to wear surplices: saving that all deans, masters, and heads of collegiate churches, canons and prebendaries, being graduates, shall daily, at the times both of prayer and preaching, wear with their surplices such hoods as are agreeable to their degrees."-Canon xxv.

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Temp. Charles I.] "He [Archbishop Ussher] came constantly into the church in his episcopal habit, and preached in it; and for myself, by his approbation, when I officiated I wore my surplice and hood, administered the Communion, at such occasions preached in them also."-Dr. Bernard's Clavi Trabales, p. 58, quoted in the Irish Ecclesiastical Journal, No. xxxvш. p. 216.

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1636.] "At S. Edmund's Bury, there were three [lectures]: two single lectures on Wednesday and Friday (in either of their churches one), and one by combination of neighbouring divines, on Monday the market-day. The combination ending at Christmas last, of themselves they forbear to begin it again till they sought to me for leave and order therein. I gave my consent, and allowed fifty choice divines inhabiting within that archdeaconry, upon these two conditions: First, that the divine service being began duly by the curate of the church at nine of the clock, the preacher for that day should be ready in his surplice and hood to begin the second service at the Communion-table, and so should ascend the pulpit after the Nicene Creed; and there using no other prayer than is prescribed in the 55th canon, nor preaching above one hour, should

not give the blessing from the pulpit, but should descend again to the Table and read the prayer for the Universal Church, and so dismiss the congregation with the Peace of GOD, &c.' Secondly, that the people of the town should duly resort to the church to the beginning of divine service, and there deport themselves with all humility, reverence, and devotion, in kneeling, standing, bowing, being uncovered, and answering audibly. Both which conditions were joyfully and duly performed, as well by the preachers for their part, as the people for theirs respectively."-An Account, by Matthew Wren, Bishop of Norwich, touching the Royal Instructions concerning certain Orders to be observed by all the Bishops of the Province of Canterbury. Canterbury's Doom, pp. 374, 375.

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1641.] "To the twelfth article, this defendant answereth and saith, that he did inquire whether the minister did preach standing, and in his gown with his surplice and hood (if he were a graduate), and his head uncovered......but he denieth that this was done to alienate the people's hearts from hearing sermons; or that it could alienate their hearts at all, or could be offensive to them as a scandalous innovation, as being a thing not used before in the diocese... What was herein directed by him, was done upon these grounds.

"First, for decency and convenience; otherwise, the minister being in his surplice unto the end of the Nicene Creed, after which the sermon is to follow; and after the sermon, being again to finish the Morning service in his surplice: and such putting of the surplice off to go to the pulpit, and putting of it on again when he comes from the pulpit, would not only create loss of time and too great a pause in the divine Administration, but would also beget vain surmises in the people's minds, neither of which could be if he kept it still on.

"Secondly, for an uniformity of all other persons, places, and times, the reverend bishops, as well in preaching as in all other divine offices, ever have worn, and still do wear, their rochets. In colleges also, and in the cathedral and collegiate churches, the fellows, canons, and prebends do ordinarily preach in their surplices: and that in parish churches also they did preach in them in Queen Elizabeth's time, appears by that complaint thereof cited by Mr. Hooker, ('we judge it unfit and inconvenient, as oft as we pray or preach so arrayed,' p. 247,) viz. with a surplice on.

"Thirdly, for conformity to the law itself. For the rubrick before the Morning prayer saith, and emphatically setteth it on, which here is to be noted, That the minister at the time of the Communion, and at all other times in his ministration, shall use such ornaments in the church as were in use in the second year of King Edward VI. But that the priest was in those times to wear a surplice appears by the Liturgy of that year. Will they then say, that they which be permitted to administer either the Word or the Sacraments, (as they are styled in Queen Elizabeth's Injunctions, 29,) in the ministry of the Word, that is, in preaching, are not in execution of part of their ministration? For if they be, then are they to wear the surplice by the rule above alleged. But if they say they be not, in so saying they contradict not only those which make preaching the chiefest part of their ministry, but also the whole opinion of the first Reformers. For so Bishop Cox ranks the offices of the minister, (at the time of Common-prayer, preaching, and other service of GOD, Injunct. 2, 8), which words are taken out of the Act of Parliament for Uniformity, of 1 Eliz. And by our rubrick, before the offertory the sermon is brought in as a part of the divine service, no less than the Epistle or the Gospel or the Lessons were: at all which the surplice might as reasonably be put off as at the sermon; not to say, if the sermon be no part of the divine service, what does it then in the church? especially within the time of divine service."-Bishop Wren's Answer to the Articles of Impeachment exhibited against him by the Commons' House of Parliament. Parentalia, pp. 91, 92, fol. 1750.

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1639.] "The preacher, as soon as he hath repeated the Nicene Creed, shall go up into the pulpit in his surplice and hood.”*—Orders given by the Right Reverend Father in GOD, John [Towers], Lord Bishop of Peterborough, for and concerning the Sermon weekly on Wednesday in S. James's Chapel, in Brackley, September the 14th, 1639. Canterbury's Doom, p. 379.

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1661.]"If the last text [Rev. xix. 14.] be truly enforced, it will thence most properly be inferred, that bishops, priests, and

*The above extract negatives the assertion of Mr. Robertson, that "Bishop Wren appears to have been the only prelate of Charles the First's time, who prescribed this preaching dress." (How shall we Conform to the Liturgy of the Church of England,' p. 75.)-EDD.

clergymen should always ride and march about upon white horses, clothed in clean and fine white linen, not on black or bay horses, nor in black canonical coats, cassocks, cloaks, as now they usually do. 2. That they must march many together in troops and armies thus arrayed. 3. That all other Christians following JESUS CHRIST (the Word of GOD) should do the like, rather than that they should only read Common Prayers, preach, administer the Sacraments in fine white linen garments, rochets, surplices, in their cathedral and parish churches, wherein they never use to ride on horses, but only out of them."-A Short, sober, pacific Examination of some Exuberances in, and Ceremonial Appurtenances to, the Common Prayer, &c., by William Prynne, Esq., pp. 102, 103, 4to. 1661.

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1669.] "I do promise, in the presence of ALMIGHTY GOD, on the faith of a Christian, and the word of a priest, that so long as I shall be Rector of Markfield, in the county of Leicester, I will at all times, when the Communion-service is read by me in this church, perform it at the Communion-table, placed altar-wise, as well when there is no Sacrament as when there is; and that when and as often as I preach and read prayers at the same time in the said church, I will preach in my surplice, and read the prayers at the Communion. table after service on those days the Church directs, and I will cause the like to be done by those who shall officiate for me. In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand this 6th day of December, anno Dom. 1669. JOSEPH CRADOCK.' Promise of Joseph Cradock, Rector of Markfield, Leicestershire, to Theophilus, Earl of Huntingdon, to preach in his surplice, &c. A similar undertaking was entered into in 1690, by Theophilus Brookes, Rector of Markfield."—Nicholls' History of Leicestershire, vol. iv. p. 800. Book of Fragments, p. 81.

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1722, May 17.] "Die Dom. Read; walked with my dear to Batley church, where Mr. Rhodes preached well, (though in his surplice,) but used more ceremony than at Leeds.”—Thoresby's Diary, vol. ii. p. 341, 8vo. 1830.

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1746.] "I cannot dismiss this article without giving you another remarkable instance of the prevalence of custom in these sort of usages, under the approbation of the ordinary: and the rather,