people of this Realm: for the great men by these excesses have been sore grieved, and the lesser people who only endeavor to imitate the great ones in such sorts of meats are much impoverished, whereby they are not able to aid themselves nor their liege lord in time of need as they ought, and many other evils have happened as well to their souls as to their bodies, our Lord the King, desiring the common profit as well of the great men as of the common people of his Realm, and considering the evils, grievances, and mischiefs aforesaid, by the common assent of the prelates, earls, barons, and other nobles of his said Realm and of the commons of the said Realm, hath ordained and established that no man, of what state or condition soever he be, shall cause himself to be served in his house or elsewhere, at dinner-meal or supper, or at any other time, with more than two courses and each mess of two sorts of victuals at the utmost, be it of flesh or fish, with the common sort of pottages without sauce or any other sort of victuals. And if any man choose to have sauce for his mess he may, provided it be not made at great cost; and if flesh or fish be to be mixed therein it shall be of two sorts only at the utmost, either flesh or fish, and shall stand instead of a mess except only on the principal feasts of the year, on which days every man may be served with three courses at the utmost, after the manner aforesaid."
But laws and proclamations were of no avail, though they continued to be issued and passed down to the reign of Queen Elizabeth; and in the reign of James I all sumptuary laws were repealed. Since then the people of England have been allowed to wear, to eat, and to drink what they pleased.
In our own country the experiment has been tried with as much thoroughness and with practically as little result as has attended the attempt by other nations. As early as the year 1639 we have the prototype of that curious law enacted a few years ago in the State of Iowa, which prohibits one person from inviting another to take a drink, or treating, as it is called.
In the records of the colony of Massachusetts for the year mentioned we find as follows:
"Forasmuch as it is evident unto this Court that the common custom of drinking one to another is a mere useless ceremony, and draweth on that abominable practice of drinking healths, and is also an occasion of much waste to the good creatures and of many other sins," such things are declared to be a reproach to a Christian commonwealth and are not to be tolerated. However, invectives of the council appear to have been of little effect, notwithstanding the severity of the punishments which were meted out to those who infringed the laws. Drunkenness, which is at most only a vice, was made a crime; and in 1636 one Peter
