This page has been validated.
68
COMPROMISES

all "antiphones, myssales, scrayles, processionales, manuelles, legendes, pyes, prymars in Lattyn or Inglishe, cowchers, journales, ordinales, or other books or writings whatsoever, heretofore used for the service of the churche, written or prynted in the Inglishe or Lattyn tongue." Owners of these precious volumes were commanded to give them up (heavy fines being exacted for disobedience), that they might be "openlye brent, or otherways defaced and destroied." None were spared, save the "Prymars in the Inglishe or Lattyn tongue set forthe by the late Kinge of famous memorie, Kinge Henrie the eight;" and even from such hallowed pages all "invocations or prayers to saintes" were to be "blotted or clerelye put out." Orthodoxy is a costly indulgence. What treasures were lost to the world, what—

Small rare volumes, dark with tarnished gold,

shrivelled into ashes, that the Book of Common Prayer might rule in undisputed authority and right!

Queen Elizabeth was strenuously opposed to "schismatical" works, as well as to those