Burial to

take place accordingly.

Regulations and fees.

Burial may

be with or without religious service.

in such churchyard or graveyard, or the church or chapel ecnnected there with, or on account of any byelaws or regulations lawinlly in force in any graveyard limiting the times at which burials may take place in such graveyard, the person receiving the notice shall, unless some other day or time shall be mutually arranged within twenty-four hours from the time of giving or leaving such notice, signify in writing, to be delivered to or left at the address or usual place of abode of the person from whom such notice has been received or at the house where the deceased person is lying, at which hour of the day named in the notice, or in case of burial in a churchyard, if such day shall be a Sunday, Good Friday, or Christmas Day) of the day next following, such burial shall take place; and it shall be lawful for the burial to take place, and it shall take place, at the hour so appointed or mutually arranged, and in other respects in accordance with the notice: Provided that, unless it shall be otherwise mutually arranged, the time of such burial shall be between the hours of ten o'clock in the forenoon and six o'clock in the afternoon if the burial be between the first day of April and the first day of October, and between the hours of ten o'clock in the forenoon and three o'clock in the afternoon if the burial be between the first day of October and the first day of April: Provided also, that no such burial shall take place in any churchyard on Sunday, or on Good Friday or Christmas Day, if any such day being proposed by the notice shall be objected to in writing for a reason assigned by the person receiving such notice."

Sect. 4. "When no such intimation of change of hour is sent to the person from whom the notice has been received, or left at the house where the deceased person is lying, the burial shall take place in accordance with and at the time specified in such notice."

Sect. 5. "All regulations as to the position and making of the grave which would be in force in such churchyard or graveyard in the case of persons interred therein with the service of the Church of England shall be in force as to burials under this Act; and any person who, if the burial had taken place with the service of the Church of England, would have been entitled by law to receive any fee, shall be entitled, in case of a burial under this Act, to receive the like fee in respect thereof."

Sect. 6. "At any burial under this act all persons shall have free access to the churchyard or graveyard in which the same shall take place. The burial may take place, at the option of the person so having the charge of or being responsible for the same as aforesaid, either without any religious service, or with such Christian and orderly religious service at the grave, as such person shall think fit; and any person or persons who shall be thereunto invited, or be authorized by the person having the charge of or being responsible for such burial, may conduct such service or take part in any religious act thereat. The words

'Christian service' in this section shall include every religious service used by any church, denomination, or person professing to be Christian."

conducted in

obstruction.

Sect. 7. "All burials under this act, whether with or without Burials to be a religious service, shall be conducted in a decent and orderly a decent and manner; and every person guilty of any riotous, violent, or orderly indecent behaviour at any burial under this act, or wilfully manner, and obstructing such burial or any such service as aforesaid thereat, without or who shall, in any such churchyard or graveyard as aforesaid, deliver any address, not being part of or incidental to a religious service permitted by this act, and not otherwise permitted by any lawful authority, or who shall, under colour of any religious service or otherwise, in any such churchyard or graveyard, wilfully endeavour to bring into contempt or obloquy the Christian religion, or the belief or worship of any church or denomination of Christians, or the members or any minister of any such church or denomination, or any other person, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor."

disorder.

Sect. 8. "All powers and authorities now existing by law for Powers for the preservation of order, and for the prevention and punish- prevention of ment of disorderly behaviour in any churchyard or graveyard, may be exercised in any case of burial under this act in the same manner and by the same persons as if the same had been a burial according to the rites of the Church of England."

burial where

Sect. 9. "Nothing in this act shall authorise the burial of Act not to any person in any place where such person would have had no give right of right of interment if this act had not passed, or without per- no previous formance of any express condition on which, by the terms of right existed. any trust deed, any right of interment in any burial ground vested in trustees under such trust deed, not being the churchyard or graveyard, or part of the churchyard or graveyard, of the parish or ecclesiastical district in which the same is situate, may have been granted."

Sect. 10. "When any burial has taken place under this act Burials under the person so having the charge of or being responsible for such act to be registered. burial as aforesaid shall, on the day thereof, or the next day thereafter, transmit a certificate of such burial, in the form or to the effect of Schedule (B.) annexed to this act, to the rector, vicar, incumbent, or other officiating minister in charge of the parish or district in which the churchyard or graveyard is situate or to which it belongs, or in the case of any burial ground or cemetery vested in any burial board to the person required by law to keep the register of burials in such burial ground or cemetery, who shall thereupon enter such burial in the register of burials of such parish or district, or of such burial ground or cemetery, and such entry shall form part thereof. Such entry, instead of stating by whom the ceremony of burial was performed, shall state by whom the same has been certified under this act. Any person who shall wilfully make any false statement in such certificate, and any rector,

Order of

coroner or

certificate of

delivered to

relative, &c.,

instead of to person who buries.

vicar, or minister, or other such person as aforesaid, receiving such certificate, who shall refuse or neglect duly to enter such burial in such register as aforesaid, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor."

Sect. 11. "Every order of a coroner or certificate of a registrar given under the provisions of section seventeen of the registrar to be Births and Deaths Registration Act, 1874, shall, in the case of a burial under that act, be delivered to the relative, friend, or legal representative of the deceased, having the charge of or being responsible for the burial, instead of being delivered to the person who buries or performs any funeral or religious service for the burial of the body of the deceased; and any person to whom such order or certificate shall have been given by the coroner or registrar who fails so to deliver or cause to be delivered the same shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding forty shillings, and any such relative, friend, or legal representative so having charge of or being responsible for the burial of the body of any person buried under this act as aforesaid, as to which no order or certificate under the same section of the said act shall have been delivered to him, shall, within seven days after the burial, give notice thereof in writing to the registrar, and if he fail so to do shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding ten pounds."

Liberty to use burial service

of Church of England in

Sect. 12. "No minister in holy orders of the Church of England shall be subject to any censure or penalty for officiating with the service prescribed by law for the burial of the dead unconsecrated according to the rites of the said church in any unconsecrated ground. burial ground or cemetery or part of a burial ground or cemetery, or in any building thereon, in any case in which he might have lawfully used the same service, if such burial ground or cemetery or part of a burial ground or cemetery had been consecrated. The relative, friend, or legal representative having charge of or being responsible for the burial of any deceased person who had a right of interment in any such unconsecrated ground vested in any burial board, or provided under any act relating to the burial of the dead, shall be entitled, if he think fit, to have such burial performed therein according to the rites of the Church of England by any minister of the said church who may be willing to perform the same."

Relief of clergy of Church of

England from penalties in certain cases.

Sect. 13. "It shall be lawful for any minister in holy orders of the Church of England authorized to perform the burial service, in any case where the office for the burial of the dead according to the rites of the Church of England may not be used, and in any other case at the request of the relative, friend, or legal representative having the charge of or being responsible for the burial of the deceased, to use at the burial such service, consisting of prayers taken from the Book of Common Prayer and portions of Holy Scripture, as may be prescribed or approved of by the Ordinary, without being subject to any ecclesiastical or other censure or penalty."

Church of

Sect. 14. "Save as in this act expressly provided as to Saving as to ministers of the Church of England, nothing herein contained ministers of shall authorize or enable any such minister who shall not have England. become a declared member of any other church or denomination, or have executed a deed or relinquishment under the Clerical Disabilities Act, 1870, to do any act which he would not by law have been authorized or enabled to do if this act had not passed, or to exempt him from any censure or penalty in respect thereof."

I

of

SCHEDULE (A).

Notice of Burial.

being the relative [or friend, or legal representative, as the case may be, describing the relation if a relative], having the charge of or being responsible for the burial of A.B.,

of

who died at

day of

in the parish of

day of

on the

do hereby give you notice that it is intended by me that the body of the said A.B. shall be buried within the [here describe the churchyard or graveyard in which the body is to be buried], on the at the hour of without the performance in the manner prescribed by law of the service for the burial of the dead according to the rites of the Church of England, and I give this notice pursuant to the Burial Laws Amendment Act, 1880.

To the Rector [or, as the case may be], of

"I

of

, the person having the charge of (or being responsible for) the burial of the deceased, do hereby certify that on

in the churchyard [or graveyard] of the parish [or district] of To the Rector [or, as the case may be,] of

CHAPTER XI.

LITURGY AND RITUAL.

SECT. 1.-General Law of the Church as to Ritual.

2.-Sources of the Law of the English Church as to Ritual. 3.-Ornaments and Vestments of Bishops and Ministers.

4.-Ornaments and Decorations of the Church.

5.-Attendance on and Behaviour at Public Worship.
6.-Acts of Uniformity.

7.-Performance of Divine Service.

8.-Kalendar and Tables of Lessons.
9.-Public Preaching.

10.-Publication of Notices in Church.

Necessity of ritual.

Distinction between

mutable and immutable ceremonies.

St. Paul.

St. Augustine.

SECT. 1.-General Law of the Church as to Ritual.

EVERY church must have some ritual, that is, some recognized order established by competent authority, in accordance with which its rites and ceremonies are conducted.

Before we consider the question, what ceremonies are enjoined or allowed or forbidden by the ecclesiastical law of England, and more especially by that part of it which consists of the provisions of the Prayer Book and the Statutes of Uniformity, it is right to draw attention to the judgment of the church universal, and especially of "that pure and apostolical branch of it esta"blished in this realm," upon the general subject of ceremonies.

And from that judgment it will appear that an essential distinction is drawn between those ceremonies which are from their origin immutable, and those which it is competent to the proper authorities to mould according to the varying necessities and exigencies of each particular church.

The only orders given in the new Testament with respect to the ritual of the church are of the most general kind, and are to be found in the following passages: Saint Paul in his first epistle to the Corinthians directs,

and

"Let all things be done unto edifying,"

"Let all things be done decently and in order."

Saint Augustine, whose authority our church so highly regards, observes (a), "In his enim rebus de quibus nihil certi statuit

(a) Augustini, Opera, Epist. 36, vol. ii. p. 101.