Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n
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A53943
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Easter not mis-timed a letter written out of the countrey to a friend in London concerning Easter-Day.
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Pell, John, 1611-1685.
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1664
(1664)
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Wing P1070; ESTC R19186
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5,171
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14
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Grandfathers Libraries till they have found the Mass-book which was printed by Kingston and Sutton in Quarto at London in 1555 which was the second year of Queen Mary The Title of the Book is Missale ad usum Ecclesiae Sarisburiensis The Title of the second page is Extracta ex compoto computo they would have said It contains no such Table of moveable Feasts readily calculated as our Liturgies are wont to have but in stead of it there are Rules for finding the Dominical Letters the Leap-years the Moveable-Feasts the New Moons and Easter Easter-day is there found by New or Full Moons with these directions Carmina docentia per novilunia invenire Pascha Post regum festa quaere novilunia trina Post dominica tertia Pascha sacrum celebra Aliud Post veris Aequinoctium Quaere plenilunium Et Dominica proxima sacrum celebra Pascha Non verius invenies Si mille legas codices The New Moon meant in those verses is not such as our Almanacks now profess to give us namely the hour and minute of the true Conjunction of the Sun and Moon But it is onely the day of the Moons mean Conjunction as it was above 1300 years ago and is there found meerly by taking the day against which the proposed years Golden Number stands in the margin of each month For that Computist knew well enough that that day would be four days after the New Moon of his own time and therefore bids us begin at the day so found and tell up wards a syllable to each day saying In Coelis est hic The syllable hic will fall four days above your Golden Number and there shew you the day of New Moon for your time The full Moons meant in the same Verses are not so much as precise days of mean opposition of Sun and Moon but are to be found in this plain manner To the day of that ancient New Moon found by the Golden Number add 13 So have you the 14th day of that Ecclesiastical Cyclic month Which day Victorius who flourished 1200 years ago did call the Full Moon and a great many others after him called it so If you have not that Missale you may try its rules in any other Book that hath the golden numbers set in the margin of each month like that Missal as if 3 stand against the first of March and 13 against the last of December Such were Henry the Eight's Bible printed 1540 Edward the Sixth's Common-prayer-Book printed 1552 for that of 1549 had no manner of direction to finde moveable Feasts Orarium seu libellus precationum published by Queen Elizabeth 1560. I cannot tell you when the Golden numbers were first put up 4 days higher to save men the labour of using In coelis est hic I finde them so high in the Common prayer Book printed at Edinburg 1637 as also in the great Church-Bible printed at London 1640. But in the Common prayer Book printed in follo 1662 those Golden numbers are restored to the places which they had in King Henry's Bible King Edward's Liturgy Queen Mary's Missal and Queen Elizabeth's Orarium except some few faults But you will finde no Rubrick to tell you to what end they were set there I will therefore here tell you some use of them The Golden Number of any year set to some day between March 7 and Aprill 6 shews that day to be the Ecclesiastical beginning of that year For when the Emperour Constantine had set an end to the cruel persecutions of the Christians and had called that great Council of Bishops to Nicaea in Bithynia They abhorring those outrageous quarrels and shameful disagreements which had been among Christians concerning the time of keeping Easter did decree that thenceforth All Christians should in remembrance of our Saviours Resurrection celebrate Easter upon the first Sunday after the fourteenth day of the first month because the holy Scriptures bear witness that our Lord did arise upon the first Sunday after the Jews Pass-over And that their Pass-over Lamb was to be killed and eaten on the fourteenth day of the first month which months were Lunar and always began with the New Moons The Astronomical spring that is the Vernal Aequinoctial fell always before the middle of their first month Nisan For the month whose middle fell before the Vernal Equinox they accounted the last month of the preceding year But because this Decree would be ill observed if all men were left to their little skill in the courses of the Sun and Moon the Fathers of that Council referred the whole business to the Church of Alexandria wherein at that time were more and better Astronomers than in any other part of the world Yet the rest of Christendom grew weary of depending upon Alexandria and yearly expecting Letters from thence to tell them when they were to begin their Lent and to celebrate Easter Which Letters often mis-carrying men grew impatient and offered at several rules to enable men to find Easter day according to the Nicene Decree without the help of Alexandria But none had the hap to be generally liked till one Dionysius Exiguus in the time of the Emperor Justinian fitted them with a Cycle of 532. years which received universal approbation and in short time was every where received and is in use in England at this day The grounds of this Cycle are these March 21. was then accounted the day of the Vernal Equinox If this be the earliest fourteenth day of the month then March 8. must be the earliest New Moon that can be admitted for a First month or a beginner of the Ecclesiastical year The next years First month will begin March 27. and so forth in this order March Ap. March March March Ap. March Ap. March March 8. 27. 16. 4. 23. 12. 31. 20. 9. 28. 17. 5. 25. 14. 2. 22. 11. 30. 19. and then March 8. again as at the first The Moons returning after 19. years as the Greeks had been taught long before they were Christians I have not now time to tell you why these 19. several beginnings of the First month were not reckoned in this Order for they accounted that year the first of the Cycle whose New Moon fell upon March 23. so that March the 8. begins the 16. year and accordingly in March and April the New Edition of the Liturgy in Folio hath a Red 16. standing against March 8. and 17. against March 27. c. Whence it is easie to draw such a Table as this Golden Number 16. 5. 13. 2. 10. 18. 7. 16. 4. 12. 1. 9. 17. 6. 14. 3. 11. 19. 8 First day Mar. 8. 9. 11. 12. 14. 16. 17. 19. 20. 22. 23. 25. 27. 28. 30. 31 Ap. 2. 4. 5 14. day Mar. 21. 22. 24. 25. 27. 29. 30. Ap. 1. 2. 4. 5. 7. 9. 10. 12. 13 15. 17. 18 And thus we have found the 19. Easter limits Terminus Paschalis saith Scaliger est quarta decima Luna mensis Paschalis Christiani seculo Constantini Magni It is so called because as November 26. is always the limit for Advent upon which day Advent Sunday never falls but as soon after as may be so every year hath a different limit for Easter upon which limit Easter must not be kept though it be Sunday but on the first Sunday after the limit As this year 1664. the Golden Number is 12. and therefore by the foregoing Table this years Easter limit is April 4. which being Munday the next Sunday after must needs be April 10. And that must be Easter day this year 1664. If you would seek it by the Table which teacheth to find Easter for ever you must enter it with the Golden number 12. and the Sunday letter B for the other letter C shews not Sunday after Matthias day you will find April 10. as before So that the Easter day of 1664. is found to be the tenth of April by all the four ways of finding taught in the Common-Prayer-Book namely The Red numbers in the Kalendar The Rule next after the end of the Kalendar The Table for forty years And the Table to find Easter for ever If you doubt of the sense or truth of what I have here hastily written let your next Letter tell me what it is you stick at I shall endeavour to remove it as being Sir Your c.
Imprimatur Atque imprimi forte necesse est ut qui occasionem Schismatis hinc illinc quaerunt se sciant nec hinc habere nisi de ignorantiâ suâ aut malitiâ quod querantur Ex Aedib Lambethan April 4. 1664. M. Frank S. T. P. R. in Christ Pat. ac Dom. Archiepisc Cantuar. à Sacris Dom. EASTER not Mis-timed A LETTER Written Out of the Countrey to a Friend IN LONDON Concerning EASTER-DAY CR LONDON Printed for Timothy Garthwait at the Kings-head in St. Pauls Church-yard 1664. SIR YOur Letter tells me that you have met with very many men that say We ought to keep Easter this year upon APRIL 3. though all our English Almanack-makers have placed it upon APRIL 10. Yet you cannot be of that opinion because it seems unlikely that All our makers of Almanacks could be deceived in a thing of that nature or that they would conspire to miss-lead the whole Nation without any advantage to themselves You therefore desire to know my minde concerning this Controversie and that so fully and cleerly expressed as that it may enable you to escape undeceived by their seeming Reasons To satisfie your desire In the first place I answer that In England for this year 1664 Easter ought to be kept upon the tenth of April And that because no other day is designed by those old Rules which hitherto England hath alwayes followed and our Superiours have not yet substituted New Rules commanding us to use them in the place of the Old ones Witness the Book of Common-Prayer printed in Folio at London 1662 Wherein the second Page before the beginning of Morning-Prayer hath A Table to finde Easter for ever Which Table had been often printed in the former Common-Prayer-Books and by being re-printed in the Edition of 1662 did sufficiently shew that the Church of England had made no alteration for the time of celebrating Easter That Tables title promiseth to shew Easter for ever onely in opposition to the Table of Moveable Feasts in the fore-going Page which teacheth to finde Easter for forty years onely so that after the year 1700 it will be almost useless Yet that Table of forty years will alwayes afford forty examples of Easter found by the following Table and by the Precept under it If for exercise you seek all those forty Easters by the lesser Table you shall finde no other dayes then those that are set down in the greater Table in the column whose title is Easter-day The aforesaid Book of Common-Prayer hath two other old Touch-stones by which the forty years Table may be tried and whatsoever others tell you the forty Easters of that Table will endure all those three trials and no difference will be found in them if the Examiner have as much skill or sagacity as that Book requireth in those that look after higher rules and will not be content with the lowest and easiest sort of Precepts The forty years Table is fitted for mean understandings But if men will question the truth of that Table or the firmness of the grounds of its calculation let them not blame that Book because for the satisfaction of their curiosity it hath not other rules delivered in words sollicitously weighed and considered lest ought should be superfluous deficient or ambiguous If the High way be open straight plain firm and safe they that will run out of it should not blame the Surveyors if all the declivities and brinks of Rivers be not fenced with Guardefous To come nearer to your Controversie All the English Almanacks place Easter upon April the tenth this year The Book of Common-Prayer in its forty years Table tells you that in 1664. Easter-day is April the tenth yet some of your acquaintance say We ought to keep it sooner How much sooner Ten dayes say some who know no difference between fixed and moveable Feasts France keeps Christmass ten dayes before us in England therefore it keeps Easter so too But if you meet with any such tell them That if the French keep Easter ten days before us they must keep it on a Thursday The difference of Old and New Stile was introduced by skipping over ten dayes of the Moneth of October 1582 but keeping the names of the Week-dayes unchanged And therefore both Stiles calling the same day Sunday and keeping Easter upon Sunday must needs differ a just number of weeks or not at all Of the fourscore Easters kept since 1583 Weeks Easters 0 36 1 26 4 5 5 13 Summe 80 36 differed not at all 26 Roman Easters were a week before Ours 5 were 4 weeks before ours and 13 were 5 weeks before those that were observed in England as shall be particularly shewn hereafter if need be In all Roman-Catholick Countreys except Valesia Easter-day will be kept upon their April 13. which we call Apr. 3 and so a week before us this year 1664. But in the rest of Christendome Holland and Zealand excepted this year the tenth of April will be observed for an easter-Easter-day even in the remotest parts of Asia and Africa Because they as well as we finde easter-Easter-day by the Rules which were generally received by all Christians Eleven hundred and thirty two years ago and were observed by all Christians ever since till the year of our Lord 1583 when in obedience to a Bull of Pope Gregory the Thirteenth many Countries celebrated Easter a fortnight sooner then the rest of Christendome And ever since that year they have followed new Rules for the finding of Easter-day Which Rules 773 years hence will give them an Easter-day six weeks before Ours but till then none more then five weeks before us as it was in 1663. But I need not speak any more of that Kalendar and its new Rules at this time although you tell me that divers Roman Catholicks and Priests are eager pleaders for the third of April I perceive that they pretend not to prove their Assertion by saying It is so in the Roman Kalendar For they know that Kalendar is not yet publickly received in England But they say It must be so because in the Common-Prayer-Book printed 1662 there is this Rule Easter-day is alwayes the first Sunday after the first full Moon which happens next after the one and twentieth day of March. But say they this year that full Moon is on the one and thirtieth of March a Thursday after which the first Sunday is the third of April the second Sunday is the tenth of April Therefore according to this Rule not April the tenth but April the third must be Easter-day This were a sufficient demonstration if the words full Moon had the same meaning in both places But the FULL MOON meant in the Rule this year is no other then the fourth of April Which being Munday the first Sunday after it must needs be April 10 which therefore by this Rule shall be Easter If the Priests you write of make difficulty to admit such full Moons pray them to search their