The amendments consisted of certain additions to the preamble--of the connection with the Prayer Book of the Psalms of David, as they were to be said or sung in churches; of the form of ordaining and consecrating Bishops, Priests, and Deacons;--of the substitution of the feast of St. Bartholomew for Michaelmas, as the time when the Act should come in force;--of the insertion of a new form, according to that adopted by Convocation, declaring "unfeigned assent and consent" not only as originally prepared to the use of the Book, but to all and everything it contained and prescribed; and of an additional form, repudiating the Solemn League and Covenant. Both these forms required subscription. A further amendment rendered it necessary, that every minister of the Church of England should be episcopally ordained, and that licenses from Bishops should be secured by all who undertook the office of Lecturers.[317] [Sidenote: UNIFORMITY BILL.] Some of the amendments occasioned little or no debate, a circumstance which surprises us when we consider the Puritan tendencies of certain Lords. The points which chiefly occupied attention were--first, the requirement of Episcopal ordination as a _sine quâ non_; and, secondly, the imposition of the form which repudiated the Covenant. The debates on these questions, so far as they can be recovered, will now be given. I. It was argued by some who retained Puritan sympathies, that the first of these requirements was not in accordance with what had "been the opinion of the Church of England,--and that it would lay a great reproach upon all other Protestant Churches, who had no Bishops; as if they had no ministers, and, consequently, were no Churches:--for, that it was well known, the Church of England did not allow reordination, as the ancient Church never admitted it; insomuch, as if any priest of the Church of Rome renounces the communion thereof, his ordination is not questioned, but he is as capable of any preferment in this Church, as if he had been ordained in it. And, therefore, the not admitting the ministers of other Protestant Churches, to have the same privilege, can proceed from no other ground than that they looked not upon them as ministers, having no ordination; which is a judgment the Church of England had not ever owned, and that it would be very imprudent to do it now." [Sidenote: 1662.]