invested with parliamentary privileges. This is an extraordinary example of the small foresight of ambitious politicians, who, neglecting all fixed principles of government, enact laws to suit their own personal advantage, or to meet the pressure of immediate exigencies. Edward, and his barons, by this device, monopolized, it is true, all the feudal sovereignties, and prevented their vassals from becoming lords like themselves; but though they preserved the profits of escheats, forfeitures, wardships, and of the other feudal incidents, they purchased them at a dear rate, for, by extending legislative power, they laid the axe to the root of their own authority, or at least to that of their descendants. The tenants in capite, who had a right to be summoned to parliament, now became so numerous, in consequence of the frequent alienation of the king's vassals, whose immense territories were divisible into many less baronies, that it became utterly impossible for them all to transact business in one assembly, even had it been held in the open air. The feudal peers had, in fact, become the people, by repeated and minute subinfeudations. The idea of representation thus necessarily arose; and the feudal and personal privileges now were changed into natural and corporate privileges.-This period of our annals is one of the most important epochs in the history of constitutional freedom. It is very probable, that burgage tenure first gave the idea of a representation of the smaller barons; for when the king enfranchised a town, and gave it lands out of the royal demesne, this instantly made the corporation a tenant in capite; but, as the corporation could not sit in parliament, it elected a burgess. It was in consequence of this burgage tenure, or tenancy in capite of a corporation, that the rotten boroughs, such as Gatton and old Sarum, formerly sent two members to parliament, while the opulent and populous towns of Manchester and Birmingham were unrepresented.

Thus then it appears that the house of commons, and the lords spiritual, who still sit in parliament as tenants in capite, are the only remains of the genuine feudal territorial peerage; for, when the tenants in capite became numerous and poor, such an alloy was mixed with the ancient original nobility, that it would have been absurd to have allowed tenure in chief to convey any longer a personal honour and privilege; the peerage, therefore, no longer passed with the fief, but, from being territorial and official, became personal and honorary; yet, as tenure in chief was still, from the very nature of the feudal system, a legislative title, although its exercise was no longer personally practicable, in consequence of the multiplication of royal holdings, a representative system was naturally adopted.

The feudal aristocracy, thus expanded, changed by degrees into a democracy, and the aristocratical part of the government would have

been utterly extinguished, (on failure of the peers by prescription,) if the crown had not preserved it, by conferring on a few, by personal investiture, an hereditary right of legislation in the room of that territorial peerage that had branched out and become a popular right. This produced a great change in the orders of the state, for the feudal baronage, after having produced the house of commons, continued to balance, and struggle with, the prerogative, as a democracy, in the same manner that it had resisted it before as an aristocratical body; whereas, the monarchical peerage, which sprung up on the decay of the feudal, is merely an emanation of the royal prerogative, interested in the support of the crown, from which it derives its lustre and its power, and has no connection with the feudal system which conferred no legislative rights but by tenure in capite, which tenure, diffused among the multitude, constituted the house of commons.

And here two considerations present themselves. It is clear, in the first place, that the constitution of Britain, such as it is, is not the creature of wisdom, but of accident; and that our ancestors are in no respect entitled to those panegyrics on their sagacity which unlearned statesmen are so fond of heaping on their memory. In the next place, it is plain that things have been brought into their present form, by constant revolutions working silently, but surely. Hence, we conclude that the vital principle of the constitution is change: if it became stationary, it would languish, and soon retrograde; it possesses within itself an elasticity, which, if not rudely repressed, can adapt itself to all the numerous alterations which time and circumstances are incessantly producing among the tastes, and habits, and wants, and opinions of the people. We apprehend that we are now treading on the threshold of one of those periodical epochs of our constitutional history which have been of so frequent recurrence in former ages, and on the probable results we shall offer a few reflections.

It is a debateable question, whether the office of king should be hereditary or elective. As a general rule, it is quite clear that no responsible trust should descend from father to son, because talents and virtues are not, in their nature, transmissible. But the office of king, especially under the peculiar constitution of Britain, appears to be an exception to the rule, for the following, among other, reasons.

First. Because the worst evil that can befall a state is a disputed succession. The civil wars in England between the houses of York and Lancaster; those of the League in France against Henry the Fourth; and the partition and ultimate extinction of the kingdom of Poland, are awful warnings against the system of elective monarchy. But when the line of succession is distinctly marked, ambition is deprived of hope, and faction loses courage, for the most daring will fear to disturb the

settlement at the certain risk of anarchy, and with a doubtful chance of success. The grand argument, therefore, in favour of the hereditary character of the kingly office is the security it affords against intestine commotion, an advantage paramount to all other considerations.

Secondly. Very little danger is to be apprehended from the undue exercise of the royal prerogative in the present state of public opinion. In those rude times when the king enforced his pleasure by the sword, the title of hereditary descent was a crying evil; but those days are passed, and the more education spreads itself among the masses, the more improbable is their recurrence. It is only by the diffusion of sound knowledge that men can be made acquainted with their duties and their rights, and when that knowledge is possessed by the great majority of a nation, the quiet expression of it soon puts to flight both regiments of infantry and squadrons of cavalry. Great Britain is rapidly approaching to that state of moral and intellectual virtue, when the smile of a peer, or the craft of a demagogue, will be equally valueless and inoperative. Now, it is ridiculous to suppose that the royal family alone would linger behind the rest of the world in the march of mental improvement; for, though it has hitherto been the misfortune of princes to be surrounded by knaves and sycophants, yet their reign must terminate when the spirit of the age becomes decidedly intellectual. Kings once thought that they ruled by divine right; that they personally constituted the state; that their caprice was equivalent to law; and that the masses were simply born to be the slaves of their pleasures. These dreams are now dissipated, because public opinion has seized hold on the immutable truth of all power being delegated, and therefore of all power being a trust. If we consider the notions entertained of the royal prerogative in the time of the Stuarts, and contrast them with the ideas now held on the same subject, we may conclude that our kings will still farther relax their pretensions in obedience to the spirit of the age. Since, then, hereditary succession in the office of the chief magistrate secures a country against the chances of civil war, and since there is no danger to be apprehended from the undue exercise of the royal prerogative in the present state of Britain, utility recommends in the strongest terms the preference of hereditary over elective monarchy. But though we would preserve intact the present rights of the crown, we would earnestly recommend many alterations in the construction of both houses of parliament; and, first, let us notice the peerage. We have already explained the ancient qualification of a legislator, to which we now add a short remark from the learned Selden. He says, "that not long after the great charter of king John, or probably in his life time, some law was made that induced the utter exclusion of all tenants in capite from parliament, except the ancient and greater barons, and such

others as the king thought proper to summon. During the period from the reign of king John to the eleventh of Richard the Second, tenure began to be disregarded, and persons were summoned to parliament by writ, who held no lands of the king. This continued to be the case till the eleventh of Richard the Second, when the practice of creating peers by letters patent first commenced, and since that time peerages have been created both by writ and patent, without any regard to tenure or estate."* And we learn from Lord Coke that "king Richard the Second created John Beauchampe de Holte, baron of Kidderminster, by his letters patent, bearing date the tenth of October, in the eleventh year of his reign, before whom there was never any baron created by letters patent, but by writ."+

So far, then, as the question of law is concerned, it is evident that the modern peerage possess the privileges of hereditary legislation on very different grounds than those of their remote predecessors. It is also clear that the creation of nobility by patent was a direct violation of the old constitution, and an arbitrary stretch of the royal prerogative; and the consequence fairly deducible from these facts is this: that William the Fourth has as much right to cancel all these patents as Richard the Second had to originate them. We might push this legal point much further, but as we have already, in our March number, devoted an entire article to the "Reform of the House of Lords," we should only be repeating the facts and arguments there adduced.

The questions of utility and justice still remain. The peerage, as now constructed, are not trustees for the nation. They are only responsible to themselves. The power they exercise is assumed, not delegated; absolute, not conditional. They are independent both of the crown and the democracy. Formerly, as we have shown in our March number, the peerage was forfeited by absenteeism. But the proxy of the

He is not only not re

modern peer is now equivalent to his presence. quired to understand the subject propounded, but he is relieved even from the necessity of hearing a single argument on either side of the question, or listening to the contents of a single petition. His person may be at Naples, but his legislative vote remains at Westminster. Such an institution is surely neither just nor useful. It subverts all the principles of delegated power, of trust, of responsibility, and accountability. It opposes the right of equality, as sanctioned by natural law, and violates the rule that all power ought to be derived from the will of the people. In short, the house of lords, as now constructed, is an imperium in imperio,-a government within a government,—an usurpation co-existent with delegation,-an incubus on intelligence,—a clog on industry, and a satire on jurisprudence.

Titles of honour, p. 2., c. 5., s. 17. + First institute, c. ix., p. 2.

Independently of the legal and political questions, we are, moreover, of opinion that a distinct body of men, possessing the power of hereditary legislation, is an institution fatal to the progress of religion and morals. A peer without enormous wealth is no better than a ship without a rudder and rigging. To perpetuate this wealth, primogeniture must be maintained, and thus religion is violated in its holiest commandment, and morality outraged in its most sacred obligations. A love of titular distinctions, such as a garter, a star, a bit of blue ribband, degrades manhood to childhood, and must necessarily deaden the expansion of those intellectual faculties which are required to be fully developed in a legislator. A peerage creates invidious distinctions in society, generating pride among the few, and hatred among the many. As the representatives of the people must be limited in number, the nation is deprived of the services of many of its most intelligent members, by having the ground constantly preoccupied by persons, whose sole pretensions to govern consist in the fortuitous accident of birth, and this being known, many neglect to cultivate their minds, knowing that an impassable barrier is raised against them; and thus the cause of truth loses many an able advocate. If we could discover a single argument in favour of hereditary legislation adapted to the present state of the country, we would frankly state it, and give it its just value, but, in our heart and conscience, we can find none.

The essential particular in which the house of commons differs from the house of lords is, in its being based on the principle of delegated power as distinguished from assumed power. But though this principle be recognized in its construction, it has been hitherto carried to a very limited extent in practice. It is true that the recent reform bill has cured many defects; that it has consecrated the doctrine of all legislative power being a trust, and put an end to the silly sophism of virtual representation. But much more still remains to be done before the house of commons becomes a true and perfect expression of the will of the people.

Our first objection applies to the present restricted character of the elective franchise. Hitherto, realized property has been considered as the sole qualification of an elector, upon which two difficulties have presented themselves. First, to determine in what realized property consists; secondly, to fix the amount which shall entitle the elector to a vote. Thus, at the very outset, that which ought to be a matter of intelligence, is reduced into a question of arithmetic. It appears to us both absurd and unjust to limit the elective franchise to realized property, be it land, houses, shipping, or funds. We are bound to consider the cause as well as the effect, and therefore do we maintain that those who create capital are as much entitled to the privilege as the property itself,