"Licensed pursuant to Act of Parliament of the Twenty fifth of King George the Second."
This is a form of words that we have found at three 19th century places of entertainment, two physically and one (at the 1816 English Opera House). We've made some assumptions: that the Act permits licensed premises to sell liquor and/or provide entertainment to the public; that the Act stipulated that this form of wording had to be displayed at the premises so licensed; that "Twenty fifth of King George" means "Twenty fifth year of King George" which would mean 1752-3.
Both of the inscriptions that we have seen ourselves show a ghost inscription below that looks like it had (almost) the same wording. Perhaps the law changed and the mandatory inscription was changed slightly so they all had to get the sign-writers back up their ladders.
lists Acts of the Parliament of Great Britain, 1750–1759 and has over 60 classified as "25 Geo. 2". There it's explained that the "25" refers to the year of the reign during which the relevant parliamentary session was held. We have not searched the 60 trying to identify the particular Act but if you'd like to do that and send us your findings....
This image shows the paperwork for an Act from approximately the same period.
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