THE CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND, FROM EDWARD I. TO HENRY VII. BY HENRY HALLAM. TEXT ENTIRE FROM THE FOURTH EDITION. LONDON: ALEX. MURRAY AND SON, 30, QUEEN SQUARE, W.C. 1869. 226. K. 110 MURRAY'S REPRINTS. THE CONSTITUTION OF ENGLAND formed Chap. VIII. of the great work of Henry Hallam, on the STATE OF EUROPE DURING THE MIDDLE AGES; and the text is given complete in this issue, by A. MURRAY. HENRY HALLAM ON THE ENGLISH CONSTITUTION. THOUGH the undisputed accession of a prince, like Edward I., to the throne of his father, does not seem so convenient a resting-place in history, as one of those revolutions which interrupt the natural chain of events, yet the changes wrought during his reign make it an epoch in the progress of these inquiries. And, indeed, as ours is emphatically styled a government by king, lords, and commons, we cannot, perhaps, in strictness carry it farther back than the admission of the latter into parliament; so that, if the constant representation of the commons is to be referred to the age of Edward I., it will be nearer the truth to date the English constitution from that than from any earlier era. The various statutes affecting the law of property and administration of justice, which have caused Edward I. to be named, rather hyperbolically, the English Justinian, bear no immediate relation to our present inquiries. In a constitutional point of view, the principal object is that statute, entitled the Confirmation of the Charters, which was very reluctantly conceded by the king in the twenty-fifth year of his reign. I do not know that England has ever produced any patriots to whose memory she owes more gratitude than Humphrey Bohun, earl of Hereford and Essex, and Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk. In the Great Charter, the base spirit and deserted condition of John take off something from the glory of the triumph, though they enhance the moderation of those who pressed no farther upon an abject tyrant. But to withstand the measures of Edward, a prince unequalled by any who had reigned in England since the Conqueror for prudence, valour, and success, required a far more intrepid patriotism. Their provocations, if less outrageous than those received from John, were such as evidently manifested a disposition in Edward to reign without any control; a |