The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1902-08-15
KISSING TIE COOK.
a Relic 81 she Time when kissing Was
General IN merry Euntand.

Relic 81 tha Time when kissing WISE
General IN merry KnEiand.
slf Francis Jeune and Mr.. Justice
Goreil Barnes have had posted out-
side the two courts Of the probate. dl-
yorce and admiralty division notices
TO witnesses calling their attention %
the fact that they may be sworn in
the Scotch manner before giving EVIL
dence That is to say, they may be
sworn with upliited hand repeating
solemn invocation to the Deity. instead
OF taking a book and kissing 1t after
listening to q form repeated by a mi-
nor official Of the court The notice
to which we refer is repeated outside
one of the courts of the chancery di-
vision and we have every hope that 1t
may become universal.
We have for many years contended
that the oath by kissing a book has
nothing to commend it, while 1t is
nasty and may become a means of
propagation OF disease; and we have
seen with regret that the statutory
permission TO swear In the Scotch fash
ion was, as a rule, not known by
witnesses and frequently. also, that
judges, coroners and magistrates were
ignorant of it.
The form of swearing by kissing a
book is purely one of custom. There
is no direct authority for it in any act
OF parliament, or rule, or book of
practice The date also Of its intro
duction is unknown, but this is not
because it has been lost in the mists
of antiquity for 1t is fairly certain
that, so recently as at the end of the
18th century, if the form existed it
was not in any general use It has
been pointed out that Coke In his in
stitutes makes no mention of kissing
the book but writes of the corporal
oath as thus named because the wit
ness touched with his hand a portion
of the Scriptures, and this aspect of
the oath no doubt survives in the
familiar warning of the usher to the
witness to remove the glove before
taking the Testament for the purpose
Of kissing it. 1t is also observed that
in the Book of Oaths," of which an
edition was published in 1889, there
is no mention of kissing a book How
the kissing originated is, we believe,
almost as much a matter OF specula-
ton as is the date at which it became
frequent or universal.
The laying of the hand on the Cos
pels in swearing is, no doubt, of great
antiquity, while the laying of the
hand on the altar of a deity in inyok-
ing the deity to witness a statement
/ or promise is older than the Gospels.
The laying of the hand on the Cos
pels has its parallel in other countries
besides England The kissing of the
book is, however, we believe, pecu-
liar to England, or to England and
Ireland, and it is not quite easy to
assign its origin to the kissing of rel
les when we apparently find it intro
duced in England after all veneration
for relics had been swept away and
made illegal.
/ 1t IS worth noting that Engllsh peo-
pie were more addicted to kissing once
than they are now kissing as a form
of salutation was so common among
them that it excited the interest and
amusement of foreigners. Erasmus
refers to it and a Hungarian gentle
man who visited London and moved
in good society in 1868 was much
| struck with the way in which men
kissed ladies when they greeted them
where Hungarians would have shaken
hands. Even Frenchmen in the mid
die ages held kissing as a popularity
! of the English nation, much as we re-
mark upon it now among the French.
1t is, therefore at least possible that
the kiss bestowed upon the book in
taking an oath may have been not so
much a kiss Of veneration as form
of salutation or acknowledgment by
bodily contact somewhat more cere-
monious than manual contact, but
still not associated with any great
feeling of solemnity Lancet.