The History of England, from the Accession of James the Second - Volume 1, Thomas Babington Macaulay [ebook pc reader txt] 📗

and of the Saxon

yeomanry. How great a part the Roman Catholic ecclesiastics

subsequently had in the abolition of villenage we learn from the

unexceptionable testimony of Sir Thomas Smith, one of the ablest

Protestant counsellors of Elizabeth. When the dying slaveholder

asked for the last sacraments, his spiritual attendants regularly

adjured him, as he loved his soul, to emancipate his brethren for

whom Christ had died. So successfully had the Church used her

formidable machinery that, before the Reformation came, she had

enfranchised almost all the bondmen in the kingdom except her

own, who, to do her justice, seem to have been very tenderly

treated.


There can be no doubt that, when these two great revolutions had

been effected, our forefathers were by far the best governed

people in Europe. During three hundred years the social system

had been in a constant course of improvement. Under the first

Plantagenets there had been barons able to bid defiance to the

sovereign, and peasants degraded to the level of the swine and

oxen which they tended. The exorbitant power of the baron had

been gradually reduced. The condition of the peasant had been

gradually elevated. Between the aristocracy and the working

people had sprung up a middle class, agricultural and commercial.

There was still, it may be, more inequality than is favourable to

the happiness and virtue of our species: but no man was

altogether above the restraints of law; and no man was altogether

below its protection.


That the political institutions of England were, at this early

period, regarded by the English with pride and affection, and by

the most enlightened men of neighbouring nations with admiration

and envy, is proved by the clearest evidence. But touching the

nature of these institutions there has been much dishonest and

acrimonious controversy.


The historical literature of England has indeed suffered

grievously from a circumstance which has not a little contributed

to her prosperity. The change, great as it is, which her polity

has undergone during the last six centuries, has been the effect

of gradual development, not of demolition and reconstruction. The

present constitution of our country is, to the constitution under

which she flourished five hundred years ago, what the tree is to

the sapling, what the man is to the boy. The alteration has been

great. Yet there never was a moment at which the chief part of

what existed was not old. A polity thus formed must abound in

anomalies. But for the evils arising from mere anomalies we have

ample compensation. Other societies possess written constitutions

more symmetrical. But no other society has yet succeeded in

uniting revolution with prescription, progress with stability,

the energy of youth with the majesty of immemorial antiquity.


This great blessing, however, has its drawbacks: and one of those

drawbacks is that every source of information as to our early

history has been poisoned by party spirit. As there is no country

where statesmen have been so much under the influence of the

past, so there is no country where historians have been so much

under the influence of the present. Between these two things,

indeed, there is a natural connection. Where history is regarded

merely as a picture of life and manners, or as a collection of

experiments from which general maxims of civil wisdom may be

drawn, a writer lies under no very pressing temptation to

misrepresent transactions of ancient date. But where history is

regarded as a repository of titledeeds, on which the rights of

governments and nations depend, the motive to falsification

becomes almost irresistible. A Frenchman is not now impelled by

any strong interest either to exaggerate or to underrate the

power of the Kings of the house of Valois. The privileges of the

States General, of the States of Britanny, of the States of

Burgundy, are to him matters of as little practical importance as

the constitution of the Jewish Sanhedrim or of the Amphictyonic

Council. The gulph of a great revolution completely separates the

new from the old system. No such chasm divides the existence of

the English nation into two distinct parts. Our laws and customs

have never been lost in general and irreparable ruin. With us the

precedents of the middle ages are still valid precedents, and are

still cited, on the gravest occasions, by the most eminent

Statesmen. For example, when King George the Third was attacked

by the malady which made him incapable of performing his regal

functions, and when the most distinguished lawyers and

politicians differed widely as to the course which ought, in such

circumstances, to be pursued, the Houses of Parliament would not

proceed to discuss any plan of regency till all the precedents

which were to be found in our annals, from the earliest times,

had been collected and arranged. Committees were appointed to

examine the ancient records of the realm. The first case reported

was that of the year 1217: much importance was attached to the

cases of 1326, of 1377, and of 1422: but the case which was

justly considered as most in point was that of 1455. Thus in our

country the dearest interests of parties have frequently been on

the results of the researches of antiquaries. The inevitable

consequence was that our antiquaries conducted their researches

in the spirit of partisans.


It is therefore not surprising that those who have written,

concerning the limits of prerogative and liberty in the old

polity of England should generally have shown the temper, not of

judges, but of angry and uncandid advocates. For they were

discussing, not a speculative matter, but a matter which had a

direct and practical connection with the most momentous and

exciting disputes of their own day. From the commencement of the

long contest between the Parliament and the Stuarts down to the

time when the pretensions of the Stuarts ceased to be

formidable, few questions were practically more important than

the question whether the administration of that family had or had

not been in accordance with the ancient constitution of the

kingdom. This question could be decided only by reference to the

records of preceding reigns. Bracton and Fleta, the Mirror of

Justice and the Rolls of Parliament, were ransacked to find

pretexts for the excesses of the Star Chamber on one side, and of

the High Court of Justice on the other. During a long course of

years every Whig historian was anxious to prove that the old

English government was all but republican, every Tory historian

to prove that it was all but despotic.


With such feelings, both parties looked into the chronicles of

the middle ages. Both readily found what they sought; and both

obstinately refused to see anything but what they sought. The

champions of the Stuarts could easily point out instances of

oppression exercised on the subject. The defenders of the

Roundheads could as easily produce instances of determined and

successful resistance offered to the Crown. The Tories quoted,

from ancient writings, expressions almost as servile as were

heard from the pulpit of Mainwaring. The Whigs discovered

expressions as bold and severe as any that resounded from the

judgment seat of Bradshaw. One set of writers adduced numerous

instances in which Kings had extorted money without the authority

of Parliament. Another set cited cases in which the Parliament

had assumed to itself the power of inflicting punishment on

Kings. Those who saw only one half of the evidence would have

concluded that the Plantagenets were as absolute as the Sultans

of Turkey: those who saw only the other half would have concluded

that the Plantagenets had as little real power as the Doges of

Venice; and both conclusions would have been equally remote from

the truth.


The old English government was one of a class of limited

monarchies which sprang up in Western Europe during the middle

ages, and which, notwithstanding many diversities, bore to one

another a strong family likeness. That there should have been

such a likeness is not strange The countries in which those

monarchies arose had been provinces of the same great civilised

empire, and had been overrun and conquered, about the same time,

by tribes of the same rude and warlike nation. They were members

of the same great coalition against Islam. They were in communion

with the same superb and ambitious Church. Their polity naturally

took the same form. They had institutions derived partly from

imperial Rome, partly from papal Rome, partly from the old

Germany. All had Kings; and in all the kingly office became by

degrees strictly hereditary. All had nobles bearing titles which

had originally indicated military rank. The dignity of

knighthood, the rules of heraldry, were common to all. All had

richly endowed ecclesiastical establishments, municipal

corporations enjoying large franchises, and senates whose consent

was necessary to the validity of some public acts.


Of these kindred constitutions the English was, from an early

period, justly reputed the best. The prerogatives of the

sovereign were undoubtedly extensive. The spirit of religion and

the spirit of chivalry concurred to exalt his dignity. The sacred

oil had been poured on his head. It was no disparagement to the

bravest and noblest knights to kneel at his feet. His person was

inviolable. He alone was entitled to convoke the Estates of the

realm: he could at his pleasure dismiss them; and his assent was

necessary to all their legislative acts. He was the chief of the

executive administration, the sole organ of communication with

foreign powers, the captain of the military and naval forces of

the state, the fountain of justice, of mercy, and of honour. He

had large powers for the regulation of trade. It was by him that

money was coined, that weights and measures were fixed, that

marts and havens were appointed. His ecclesiastical patronage was

immense. His hereditary revenues, economically administered,

sufficed to meet the ordinary charges of government. His own

domains were of vast extent. He was also feudal lord paramount of

the whole soil of his kingdom, and, in that capacity, possessed

many lucrative and many formidable rights, which enabled him to

annoy and depress those who thwarted him, and to enrich and

aggrandise, without any cost to himself, those who enjoyed his

favour.


But his power, though ample, was limited by three great

constitutional principles, so ancient that none can say when they

began to exist, so potent that their natural development,

continued through many generations, has produced the order of

things under which we now live.


First, the King could not legislate without the consent of his

Parliament. Secondly, he could impose no tax without the consent

of his Parliament. Thirdly, he was bound to conduct the executive

administration according to the laws of the land, and, if he

broke those laws, his advisers and his agents were responsible.


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