policy during the transitional era of English history, when that system was maturing upon which our present Constitution is founded. 1189. Rolls of the gis, com upon the accession of Richard I. With the accession of Richard Coeur-de-Lion appear the Rolls of the Curia Regis, the pro- Curia Receedings before the Justiciars representing the mencing person of the King. Modern legal enrolments are strictly formal, lifeless, and arid: not so the ancient records, formal, but not arid, strict, but not stereotyped narratives, exhibiting plaintiff and defendant, prosecutor and criminal, judges and suitors, in a lively and living form. Let me here remark that the interest of our judicial Records is not local, or confined to this our Country: they appertain not merely unto England but to the English people, now so commonly denominated the Anglo-Saxon race, wheresoever dispersed, for here we have, above all, the germs and elements of the Laws obtaining in the Imperial and triumphant Republic of America, expanding from the Atlantic to the Pacific; and whose States, together with our vast Colonies, seem appointed to cherish the institutions of England beneath other skies, when, yielding to the inevitable destiny of all human dominations, power and splendour of the British Commonwealth shall have departed. the 1199. 27th May. Chancery On the Feast-day of the Ascension, the twenty- enrolments beginning day of King seventh day of May, one thousand one hundred upon the and ninety-nine, the day when John Duke of Nor- John's co ronation. mandy was crowned King of England, begin the Rolls of the Chancery, the great Secretariat of the realm, the Chancellor being Secretary of State for all departments. Every instrument authenticated by the Great Seal, whereby the King declared his mind and will, was to be entered or enrolled upon these records. And here again we read a deeper doctrine than is expressed by the written words of the record. It is very certain that no such enrolments were made during the preceding reigns in England, nor do we find the like in any coeval European State. Now Hubert Archbishop of Canterbury, who was appointed Chancellor on the day of King John's Coronation, had been very active during the interregnum which ensued between the death of Coeur-de-Lion and the confirmation of John's inchoate title. He was one of the Commissioners or Justiciars deputed to England as soon as Richard died; and the Archbishop, by causing the English to become the men of John Duke of Normandy, had secured the accession of the new Sovereign. We therefore believe (as we have stated elsewhere in this Work) that this registration of State documents was connected with the views entertained by the Prelate, who declared how he anticipated that John would bring Crown and Kingdom into the greatest confusion. Henceforward, all constitutional transactions between Crown and Subject are both essentially and formally legal covenants, King and people alike obeying the supremacy of the law. The Coronation Oath is deposited in the Chancery, to be produced against the Sovereign, should the compact be infringed. The Chancery-Rolls furnish us with the writs and other documents, demonstrating, not collaterally or inferentially, but directly and positively, the composition of the Great Council of the realm. In subsequent reigns, the records of the Legislature enlarge into the regular series of Parliament-Rolls, Statute-Rolls, and Bills or Petitions, still continued, and made up, so far as the Statute-Rolls are concerned, in the old form and fashion. And thus do we possess the muniments elucidating the whole course of our Constitution as it arose. The instruments exist, coeval and sincere, giving the required testimony, equally with respect to the acting parties and the transactions in which they were engaged, and exhibiting at the same time the whole process of formation, not effected by forethought or design, but by constant exertions, struggles, labour, fortuitous events, contending parties, contending passions: granted, persisted in, diverted, frustrated, or overruled, affording lessons, which, the evidence being lacking, cannot be taught by the history of any other country in the world. stances § 2. The unsupported industry of Prynne Circumand Selden, and the other great constitutional which the under work en Progress monwealth was com posed. titled The lawyers of the preceding age, had been unable Rise and to advance beyond the preliminary examinations glish Com- of the masses of documents absolutely needful for the accurate and systematic investigation of our constitutional history. Acting under public authority, I was entrusted with the formation of collections intended to comprize all the extant materials, elucidating the development and authority of the Legislature from the Conquest to the accession of Henry the Eighth, when the organization of the High Court of Parliament was settled upon the scheme which still obtains. Upon the details of these works and collections, this is not the occasion to speak. It is sufficient to observe that the volumes I was enabled to publish under the sanction of the House of Commons, will, for the period which they include, afford an indispensable authority for the solution of various important constitutional questions, as well as incontrovertible testimonies of historical events, so that the general outline of the constitutional periods therein comprized may be traced in an authentic form. Engaged upon these public works, it appeared to me that my official tasks would be insufficiently executed, unless, acting in my private and individual capacity, I accompanied the collections undertaken at the national expense, by what I may term a preface and a perpetual commentary. Ascending, therefore, to the earliest stages of Z our history, I have, in the series of essays devoted to that object, endeavoured to elucidate the rise and progress of the English Commonwealth during the Anglo-Saxon period, proceeding by synthesis; examining in the first place, the duties, rights, and privileges appertaining to the various ranks and orders of society, the territorial organization which the country assumed in relation to the people, and the attributes of the authorities and tribunals federatively combined in our political Constitution. In the Work comprehending these enquiries, I have, therefore, attempted to demonstrate, so to speak, the political anatomy of the nation, and to connect that anatomy with the national physiology, describing the organs of national vitality, and elucidating the laws of that vitality. Hence the disquisitions upon the legal and social institutions of the Anglo-Saxons constitute the main portion of the Work, illustrated by comparison with those of other nations. 10, 11, 17, Rise and to be read ion with the Work. Many important questions, which in this pre- Chapters sent composition are noticed briefly, and presented 18,19, of the rather as suggestions than as lessons, are in the Progress, first-mentioned Work discussed minutely and in connexanxiously, supported by reference to the several present authorities upon which my opinions have been formed. Here I may be permitted to crave the attention of the reader, in particular, to the five chapters in which I explained the origin of feudality, the Carlovingian Institutions, and above |