statute law Burn includes the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion, agreed upon in Convocation in the year 1562 ; and in like manner the Rubric of the Book of Common Prayer, which, being both of them established by Acts of
Parliament, are to be esteemed as part of the statute law. "The first principle of the ecclesiastical law is the assertion of the supremacy of the crown, which in the present state of the constitution means the same thing as the supremacy of Parliament. This principle has been maintained ever since the Reformation. Before the Reformation the ecclesiastical supremacy of the Pope was recognized, with certain limitations, in England, and the church itself had some pretensions to ecclesiastical freedom. The freedom of the church is, in fact, one of the standing provisions of those charters on which the English constitution was based. The first provision of Magna Charta is quod ecdesia Angli- cana libera sit. By the various enactments of the period of the Reformation the whole constitutional position of the church, not merely with reference to the Pope but with reference to the state, was definitely fixed. The legislative power of Convocation was held to extend to the clergy only, and even to that extent required the sanction and assent of the Crown. The common law courts controlled the jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts, claiming to have " the exposition of such statutes or Acts of Parliament as concern either the extent of the jurisdiction of these courts or the matters depending before them. And there fore if these courts either refuse to allow these Acts of Parliament, or expound them in any other sense than is truly and properly the exposition of them, the king s great courts of common law may prohibit and control them."
The design of constructing a code of ecclesiastical laws was entertained during the period of the Reformation, but never carried into effect. It is alluded to in various sta tutes of the reign of Henry VIII., who obtained power to appoint a commission to examine the old ecclesiastical laws, with a view of deciding which ought to be kept and which ought to be abolished; and in the meantime it was enacted that " such canons, institutions, ordinances, synodal or provincial or other ecclesiastical laws or juris dictions spiritual as be yet accustomed and used here in the Church of England, which necessarily and con veniently are requisite to be put in ure and execution for the time, not being repugnant, contrarient, or derogatory to the laws or statutes of the realm, nor to the prerogatives of the royal crown of the same, or any of them, shall be occupied, exercised, and put in ure for the time within this realm" (35 Henry VIII. c. 16, 25 c. 19, 27 c. 8).
The work was actually undertaken and finished in the reign of Edward VI. by a sub-committee of eight persons, under the name of the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum, which, however, never obtained the royal assent. Although the powers of the 25 Henry VIII. c. 1, were revived by the 1 Elizabeth c. 1, the scheme was never executed, and the ecclesiastical laws remained on the footing assigned to them in that statute, so much of the old ecclesiastical laws might be used as had been actually in use and was not repugnant to the laws of the realm.
The statement is, indeed, made by Sir R. Phillimore that the "Church of England has at all times, before and since the Reformation, claimed the right of an independent church in an independent kingdom, to be governed by the laws which she has deemed it expedient to adopt." This position can only be accepted if it is confined, as the authorities cited for it are confined, to the resistance of interference from abroad. If it mean that the church, as distinguished from the kingdom, has claimed to be governed by laws of her own making, all that can be said is that the claim has been singularly unsuccessful. From the time of the Reformation no change has been made in the law of the church which has not been made by the king and par liament, sometimes indirectly, as by confirming the resolu tions of Convocation, but for the most part by statute. The list of statutes cited in Sir R. Phillirnore s Ecclesiastical Law fills eleven pages. It is only by a kind of legal fiction that the church can be said to have deemed it expedient to adopt these laws.
The terms on which the Church Establishment of Ireland was abolished by 32 and 33 Viet. c. 42 may be mentioned. By sect. 20 the present ecclesiastical law is made binding on the members for the time being of the church, as if they had mutually contracted and agreed to abide by and observe the same;" and by section 21 it is enacted that the ecclesiastical courts shall cease after 1st January 1871, and that the ecclesiastical laws of Ireland, except so far as relates to matrimonial causes and matters, shall cease to exist as law.
ECCLESIASTICUS. See Apocrypha.
ECHIDNA, or Porcupine Ant-eater (Echidna hystrix), one of the four known species of Monotremata, the lowest order of Mammalia. It is a native of Australia, where it chiefly abounds in New South Wales, inhabiting rocky and mountainous districts, where it burrows among the loose sand, or hides itself in crevices of rocks. In size and appearance it bears a considerable resemblance to the hedgehog, its upper surface being covered over with strong spines directed backwards, and on the back inwards so aa to cross each other on the middle line. The spines in the neighbourhood of the tail form a tuft sufficient to hide that almost rudimentary organ. The head is produced into a long tubular snout, covered with skin for the greater part of its length. The opening of the mouth is small, and from it the echidna puts forth its long slender tongue, lubricated with a viscous secretion, by means of which it seizes the ants and other insects on which it feeds. It is entirely destitute of teeth. Its legs are short and strong, and form, with its broad feet and large solid nails, power ful burrowing organs : In common with the other mono- tremes, the male echidna has its heel provided with a sharp hollow spur, connected with a secreting gland, and with muscles capable of pressing the secretion from the gland into the spur ; but as the animal has never been observed to use this in defending itself, the spur probably serves some other purpose than that of offence or defence. It is a nocturnal or crepuscular animal, generally sleeping during the day, but showing considerable activity by night. When attacked it seeks to escape either by rolling itself into a ball, its erect spines proving a formidable barrier to its capture, or by burrowing into the sand, which its power ful limbs enable it to do with great celerity. " The only mode of carrying the creature," says Bennet {Gatherings of a Naturalist in Australasia] " is by one of the hind legs, when it may be removed to any place with great facility, for an attempt to seize it by any other part of the body, from its powerful resistance and the sharpness of the spines, will soon oblige the captor to relinquish his hold." They are exceedingly restless in confinement, and constantly endeavour by burrowing to effect their escape. From the quantity of sand and mud always found in the alimentary canal of the echidna, it is supposed that these ingredients must be necessary to the proper digestion of its insect food. The only other members of this family are the Short-spined Echidna (Echidna setosa), confined to Tasmania, and differ ing from the former species chiefly in the shortness of its spines, which are nearly hidden by the long harsh fur, and the Echidna Bruijnii a new species discovered in 1877 in the mountains on the north-east coast of New Guinea, at an elevation of 3500 feet. By many naturalists the generic term Echidna has lately been abandoned in favour of Tachyglossus of Illiger.
