Untitled - 24grammata.com

OF POLITICAL THEORIES. > 319country, and to understand these we must give a cursoryglance at the history of its constitution. This was at first abranch of the great feudal system, which was the origin ofmost of the European governments, and which had been introduced in its full rigour by William the Conqueror in1066, when he took possession of England. The feudalcustoms fell into disuse here, as elsewhere, for the vassalswere not slow in taking advantage of the circumstances ofthe times, and even under the immediate successors of theConqueror obtained considerable privileges, which, by degrees, ripened into a formal warrant of their liberties, andwere embodied inMagna Charta (1215).It was not, however, the armed opposition which the nobles offered tofrequent occurrence in other countries : nor was it thegrowth of a middle order nor :yet the representation of thisorder in parliament, which gave to the British constitutionits peculiar character for all these ; phenomena are to befound alike in the French and Spanish histories. The causesof ittheir sovereign,for this was of much morelay in the different shape which rank assumed in Englanhcompared with other countries, in the variety of relations which existed between the nobles and commons, andby means of which it became possible to constitute the LowerHome in such a form as it aftem*ards assumed."We might expect that a subject, which has received somuch attention from the best writers, should be clearlyunderstood, but it neither is, nor indeed ever will be.The early history of the British parliament, especiallyduring the thirteenth century, when its limits were first defined, is more scantily supplied from original documentsthan can well be believed. And yet this ought not to astonish us if we remember that in England, as in other countries of Europe, during the middle ages, no institution of anynote arose at once and from a preconcerted scheme, butthat they were all of gradual formation, and dependent onthe changes of men's wants and circumstances. Thus manythings which afterwards became of the highest importancefrom appearing so, atwere very far from being, or, at least,first : and it was consequently impossiblefor the chroniclersof the day to perceive the advantage of recordingWe them.must be content, therefore, to receive such accounts of