Chapter 7

(24)This is by the Acts 7 and 8 Will. III. c. 15; 6 Anne, c. 7; and 39 Geo. III. c. 127. See Stephen’s Commentaries, ii. 380. Blackstone’s reasoning runs thus: “This dissolution formerly happened immediately upon the death of the reigning sovereign; for he being considered in law as the head of the parliament (caput principium, et finis), that failing, the whole body was held to be extinct. But the calling a new parliament immediately on the inauguration of the successor being found inconvenient, and dangers being apprehended from having no parliament in being, in case of a disputed succession, it was enacted,” etc. By the Reform Act of 1867 the whole tradition of the lawyers was swept away.

(25)I have said something on this head in Norman Conquest, i. 94, but the whole thing should be studied in Allen’s great section on the Tenure of Landed Property; Royal Prerogative, 125-155. It is to Allen that the honour belongs of showing whatbooklandandfolklandreally were.

(26)I have given a few examples in Norman Conquest, i. 589. Endless examples will be found in Kemble’s Codex Diplomaticus.

(27)See the complaints on this head as late as the time of William the Third, in Macaulay, iv. 646. On the Acts by which the power of the Crown in this matter is restrained, see Stephen’s Commentaries, ii. 520. See also May’s Constitutional History, i. 229.

(28)See May, i. 234—248.

(29)This is discussed in full by Allen, Royal Prerogative, 143-145. The great example is the will of King Ælfred. See Codex Diplomaticus, ii. 112, v. 127.

(30)See May, i. 249; Allen, 154-155, who remarks: “By a singular revolution of policy there was a recurrence in the late reign to the ancient policy of the Anglo-Saxons. The crown lands were virtually restored to the public, while the King obtained the right of acquiring landed property by purchase, and of bequeathing it by will like a private person.”

(31)Edward the First was the earliest King whose reign is dated from a time earlier than his coronation. He was out of the kingdom at his father’s death, and his right was acknowledged without opposition. But even in this case there was an interregnum. The regnal years of Edward the First are not reckoned from the day of his father’s death, but from the day of his funeral, when Edward was acknowledged King, and when the prelates and nobles swore allegiance to him. See the account in the Worcester Annals, Annales Monastici, iv. 462, and the documents in Rymer, i. part ii. 497. See also the remarks of Allen, 46, 47. The doctrine that there can be no interregnum seems to have been put into shape to please James the First, and it was of course altogether upset by the great vote of 1688. Now of course there is no interregnum; not indeed from any mysterious prerogative of the Crown, but simply because the Act of Settlement has entailed the Crown in a particular way.

(32)On this see Norman Conquest, i. 107, 263, 625. See the same question discussed in quite another part of the world in Herodotus, vii. 3.

(33)The helpless way in which Blackstone himself wrote was perhaps pardonable in the dark times in which he lived. But it is really too bad when lawyer after lawyer, in successive editions, gives again to the world the astounding rubbish which in Blackstone’s day passed for early constitutionalhistory. In Kerr’s edition of Blackstone, published in 1857, vol. i. p. 180, I find repeated, without alteration or comment, the monstrous assertion of Blackstone: “I believe there is no instance wherein the Crown of England has ever been asserted to be elective, except by the regicides at the infamous and unparalleled trial of King Charles I.” And in Serjeant Stephen’s Commentaries [1853], which are not a mere edition of Blackstone, but “New Commentaries partly founded on Blackstone,” the same words are found in vol. ii. p. 403, only leaving out the epithet “unparalleled,” which might with truth have been allowed to stay. In another place (iv. 481-2) we read how “after the Saxon government was firmly established in this island” came “the subdivision of the kingdom into a heptarchy, consisting of seven independent kingdoms, peopled and governed by different clans and colonies.” It seems then that in 1857 there were learned gentlemen who believed in a kingdom subdivided into a heptarchy. But when, in the next page, Blackstone tells us how Ælfred set about “to new-model the constitution, to rebuild it on a plan that should endure for ages,” and goes on in the usual style to attribute everything whatever to Ælfred personally, this seems to have been too much, and the editor gives an extract from Kemble by way of correction. One wonders that, if he had read Kemble at all, he had not learned a little more from him. It is amusing again when Blackstone tells us (i. 186, Kerr), “From Egbert to the death of Edmund Ironside, a period of above two hundred years, the Crown descended regularly through a succession of fifteen princes, without any deviation or interruption: save only”—all the cases where it did not descend regularly, according to Blackstone’s notions of regularity: But it is almost more amusing when Serjeant Stephen (ii. 410) throws Blackstone’s exceptions, which are at least historical facts, into a note, and gives us instead ashis own exceptions, the statement, very doubtful and, if true, utterly irrelevant, that Æthelstan and Eadmund Ironside were illegitimate (see Norman Conquest, i. 669-673). We of course get the usual talk about the usurpations of Harold, Stephen, John, and Henry the Fourth, and about the rights of Eadgar and Arthur of Britanny. For the former we get a quotation from Matthew Paris, to whom it would have been more to the purpose to go for the great speech of Archbishop Hubert. The comments on the succession of John (i. 189, Kerr) are singularly amusing, but too long to quote.One point however must be mentioned. To prove the strictly hereditary nature of the succession, Blackstone (i. 189, Kerr) quotes the Statute of 25 Edward III. “that the law of the Crown of England is, and always hath been, that the children of the King of England, whether born in England or elsewhere, ought to bear the inheritance after the death of their ancestors.” We are bound to suppose that these learned lawyers had read through the statute which they quoted; but it is wonderful that they did not see that it had nothing whatever to do with fixing the hereditary succession of the Crown. The original text (Revised Statutes, i. 176) runs thus:—“La lei de la Corone Dengleterre est, et ad este touz jours tiele, que les enfantz des Rois Dengleterre,queu part qils soient neez en Engleterre ou aillors, sont ables et deivent porter heritage, apres la mort lour auncestors.”The object of the statute is something quite different from what any one would think from Blackstone’s way of quoting it. The emphatic words are those which are put in italics. The object of the statute is to make the King’s children and others born of English parents beyond sea capable of inheriting in England. As far as the succession to the Crown is concerned, its effect is simply to put a child of the King born out of the realm on a level with his brother born in therealm; that is, in the view of our older Law, to give both alike the preference due to an Ætheling.

One point however must be mentioned. To prove the strictly hereditary nature of the succession, Blackstone (i. 189, Kerr) quotes the Statute of 25 Edward III. “that the law of the Crown of England is, and always hath been, that the children of the King of England, whether born in England or elsewhere, ought to bear the inheritance after the death of their ancestors.” We are bound to suppose that these learned lawyers had read through the statute which they quoted; but it is wonderful that they did not see that it had nothing whatever to do with fixing the hereditary succession of the Crown. The original text (Revised Statutes, i. 176) runs thus:—

“La lei de la Corone Dengleterre est, et ad este touz jours tiele, que les enfantz des Rois Dengleterre,queu part qils soient neez en Engleterre ou aillors, sont ables et deivent porter heritage, apres la mort lour auncestors.”

The object of the statute is something quite different from what any one would think from Blackstone’s way of quoting it. The emphatic words are those which are put in italics. The object of the statute is to make the King’s children and others born of English parents beyond sea capable of inheriting in England. As far as the succession to the Crown is concerned, its effect is simply to put a child of the King born out of the realm on a level with his brother born in therealm; that is, in the view of our older Law, to give both alike the preference due to an Ætheling.

(34)It is as well to explain this, because most people seem to think that a man becomes a Bishop by virtue of receiving a private letter from the First Lord of the Treasury. We constantly see a man spoken of as Bishop of such a see, and his works advertised as such, before a single ecclesiastical or legal step has been taken to make him so.

(35)See Norman Conquest, iii. 44, 623.

(36)The succession of a grandson, which first took place in England in the case of Richard the Second, marks a distinct stage in the growth of the doctrine of hereditary right. It involves the doctrine of representation, which is a very subtle and technical one, and is not nearly so obvious or so likely to occur in an early state of society as the doctrine of nearness of kin. No opposition was made to the accession of Richard the Second, but there seems to have been a strong notion in men’s minds that John of Gaunt sought to displace his nephew. In earlier times, as the eldest and most eminent of the surviving sons of Edward the Third, John would probably have been elected without any thought of the claims of young Richard.

(37)In Yorkist official language the three Lancastrian Kings were usurpers, and Duke Richard wasde jure, though notde facto, King. Henry the Sixth is, in the Act of 1461, “Henry Usurpour, late called Kyng Henry the sixt.” The claim of the House of York was through an intricate female descent from Lionel Duke of Clarence, a son of Edward the Third older than John of Gaunt. A claim so purely technical had never been set forth before; but we may be quite sure that it would not have been thought to have much weight, if Duke Richard had not been, by another branch,descended from Edward the Third in the male line, and if he had not moreover been the ablest and most popular nobleman in the country.

(38)A prospective election before the vacancy of course hindered any interregnum. In this case the formula “Le Roi est mort; vive le Roi,” was perfectly true. The new King was already chosen and crowned, and he had nothing to do but to go on reigning singly instead of in partnership with his father, just as William went on reigning alone after the death of Mary. In Germany this took place whenever a King of the Romans was chosen in the lifetime of the reigning Emperor. In France, under the early Kings of the Parisian dynasty, the practice was specially common, and the fact that there seldom or never was an interregnum doubtless helped much to make the French Crown become, as it did, the most strictly hereditary crown in Christendom. In England, the only distinct case of a coronation of a son during the lifetime of his father was that of Henry, the son of Henry the Second, known as the younger King, and sometimes as Henry the Third. In earlier times we get something like it in the settlement of the Crown by Æthelwulf, with the consent of his Witan (see Old-English History, 105, 106), but it does not seem clear whether there was in this case any actual coronation during the father’s lifetime. If there was not, this would be the case most like that of Duke Richard. The compromise placed the Duke in the same position as if he had been Prince of Wales, or rather in a better position, for it might be held to shut out the need of even a formal election on the King’s death.

(39)See note 59 on Chapter II.

(40)See Norman Conquest, iii. 623.

(41)See Hallam’s Constitutional History, i. 8. It is to be noticed that the settlement enacts that “the inheritance ofthe Crown, &c., should remain in Henry the Seventh and the heirs of his body for ever, and in none other.” This would seem to bar a great number of contingent claims in various descendants of earlier Kings. As it happens, this Act has been literally carried out, for every later Sovereign of England has been a descendant of the body of Henry the Seventh.

(42)The will of Henry the Eighth is fully discussed by Hallam, i. 34, 288, 294; Lingard, vi. 213. There are two Acts of Henry’s reign bearing on the matter. In the earlier one, 28 Henry VIII. c. 7, the Crown is entailed on the King’s sons by Jane Seymour or any other wife; then on the King’s legitimate daughters, no names being mentioned; the Act then goes on to say, “your Highnes shall have full and plenar power and auctorite to geve despose appoynte assigne declare and lymytt by your letters patentes under your great seale or ells by your laste Will made in wrytynge and signed with your moste gracious hande, at your onely pleasure from tyme to tyme herafter, the imperiall Crowne of this Realme and all other the premisses thereunto belongyng, to be remayne succede and come after your decease and for lack of lawfull heires of your body to be procreated and begoten as is afore lymytted by this Acte, to such person or persones in possession and remaynder as shall please your Highnes and according to such estate and after such maner forme facion ordre and condicion as shalbe expressed declared named and lymytted in your said letters patentes or by your said laste will.” The later Act, 35 Henry VIII. c. 1, puts Henry’s two daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, into the entail, but in a very remarkable way. The Acts declaring their illegitimacy are not repealed, nor is the legitimacy of either of them in any way asserted; in fact it is rather denied when the preamble rehearses that “The king’s Majesty hath only issue of his body lawfully begotten betwixt his Highness and his said latewife Queen Jane the noble and excellent Prince Edward.” The Act then goes on to enact that, although the King had been enabled to “dispose” the Crown “to any person or persons of such estate therein as should please his Highness to limit and appoint,” yet that, in failure of heirs of the body of either the King or his son, “the said imperial Crown and all other the premises shall be to the Lady Mary the King’s Highness daughter, and to the heirs of the body of the same Lady Mary lawfully begotten, with such conditions as by his Highness shall be limited by his letters patents under his great seal, or by his Majesty’s last will in writing signed with his gracious hand.” Failing Mary and her issue, the same conditional entail is extended to Elizabeth and her issue. The power of creating a remainder after the issue of Elizabeth of course remained with Henry, and he exercised it in favour of the issue of his younger sister Mary. Mary and Elizabeth therefore really reigned, not by virtue of any royal descent, but by virtue of a particular entail by which the Crown was settled on the King’s illegitimate daughters, as it might have been settled on a perfect stranger. It was an attempt on the part of Edward the Sixth to do without parliamentary authority what his father had done by parliamentary authority which led to the momentary occupation of the throne by Lady Jane Grey. Mary, on her accession, raked up the whole story of her mother’s marriage and divorce, and the Act of the first year of her reign recognized her as inheriting by legitimate succession. The Act passed on the accession of Elizabeth, 1 Eliz. c. 3, is much vaguer. It enacts “that your majestie our sayd Sovereigne Ladye ys and in verye dede and of most meere right ought to bee by the Lawes of God and the Lawes and Statutes of this Realme our most rightfull and lawfull Sovereigne liege Ladie and Quene; and that your Highness ys rightlye lynyallye and lawfully discended and come of the bloodd royall of thisRealme of Englande in and to whose princely person and theires of your bodye lawfully to bee begotten after youe without all doubte ambiguitee scruple or question the imperiall and Royall estate place crowne and dignitie of this Reallme withe all honnours stiles titles dignities Regalities Jurisdiccons and preheminences to the same nowe belonging & apperteyning arre & shalbee most fully rightfully really & entierly invested & incorporated united & annexed as rightfully & lawfully to all intentes construccons & purposes as the same were in the said late Henrye theight or in the late King Edwarde the Syxte your Highnes Brother, or in the late Quen Marye your Highnes syster at anye tyme since thacte of parliament made in the xxxvth yere of the reigne of your said most noble father king Henrye theight.”It should be remembered that Sir Thomas More, though he refused to swear to the preamble of the oath prescribed by the Act of Supremacy, was ready to swear to the order of succession which entailed the Crown on the issue of Anne Boleyn. On his principles the issue of Anne Boleyn would be illegitimate; but he also held that Parliament could settle the Crown upon anybody, on an illegitimate child of the King or on an utter stranger; to the succession therefore he had no objection to swear.For a parallel to the extraordinary power thus granted to Henry we have to go back to the days of Æthelwulf.

It should be remembered that Sir Thomas More, though he refused to swear to the preamble of the oath prescribed by the Act of Supremacy, was ready to swear to the order of succession which entailed the Crown on the issue of Anne Boleyn. On his principles the issue of Anne Boleyn would be illegitimate; but he also held that Parliament could settle the Crown upon anybody, on an illegitimate child of the King or on an utter stranger; to the succession therefore he had no objection to swear.

For a parallel to the extraordinary power thus granted to Henry we have to go back to the days of Æthelwulf.

(43)The position of the daughters of Henry the Eighth was of course practically affected by the fact that each was the child of a mother who was acknowledged as a lawful wife at the time of her daughter’s birth. There was manifest harshness in ranking children so born with ordinary illegitimate children; but, in strictness of Law, as Henry married Anne Boleyn while Katharine of Aragon was alive, the daughter of Katharine and the daughter of Anne could notboth be legitimate. The question was, which marriage was lawful. It should also be remembered that the marriage of Anne Boleyn was declared void, and her daughter declared illegitimate, on grounds—whatever they were—which had nothing to do with the earlier question of the marriage and divorce of Katharine.

(44)See Hallam, i. 129; Lingard, vi. 239, 243. The Act 13 Elizabeth, c. 1, declares it to be treason “yf any person shall in any wyse holde and affyrme or mayntayne that the Common Lawes of this Realme not altred by Parlyament, ought not to dyrecte the Ryght of the crowne of England, or that our said sovrayne Ladye Elizabeth the Quenes Majestie that nowe is, with and by the aucthoritye of the Parlyament of Englande is not able to make Lawes and Statutes of suffycyent force and valyditie to lymit and bynd the Crowne of this Realme, and the Descent Lymitacion Inheritaunce and Government thereof.” The like is the crime of “whosoever shall hereafter duryng the Lyef of our said Soveraigne Ladye, by any Booke or Worke prynted or written, dyrectly and expresly declare and affyrme at any tyme before the same be by Acte of Parlyament of this Realme established and affyrmed, that any one particular person whosover it be, is or ought to be the ryght Heire and Successor to the Queenes Majestie that nowe is (whome God longe preserve) except the same be the naturall yssue of her Majesties bodye.”This statute may possibly be taken as setting aside the claims of the House of Suffolk; but, if so, it sets aside the claims of the House of Stewart along with them.

This statute may possibly be taken as setting aside the claims of the House of Suffolk; but, if so, it sets aside the claims of the House of Stewart along with them.

(45)James’s right was acknowledged by his own first Parliament, just as the claims of other Kings who entered in an irregular way had been. It should be marked however that he was crowned before he was acknowledged. The Act 1 Jac. I. c. 1, declares that “immediatelie upon the Dissolutionand Decease of Elizabeth late Queene of England, the Imperiall Crowne of the Realme of England, and of all the Kingdomes Dominions and Rights belonging to the same, did by inherent Birthright and lawfull undoubted Succession, descend and come to your moste excellent Majestie, as beinge lineallie justly and lawfullie next and sole Heire of the Blood Royall of this Realme as is aforesaid.” It is worth noticing that in this Act we get the following definition of Parliament; “this high Court of Parliament, where all the whole Body of the Realm and every particular member thereof, either in Person or by Representation (upon their own free elections), are by the Laws of this Realm deemed to be personally present.”

(46)The fact that James the First, a King who came in with no title whatever but what was given him by an Act of Parliament passed after his coronation, was acknowledged without the faintest opposition is one of the most remarkable things in our history. Hallam (i. 294) remarks that “there is much reason to believe that the consciousness of this defect in his parliamentary title put James on magnifying, still more than from his natural temper he was prone to do, the inherent rights of primogenitory succession, as something indefeasible by the legislature; a doctrine which, however it might suit the schools of divinity, was in diametrical opposition to our statutes.” Certainly no opposition can be more strongly marked than that between the language of James’s own Parliament and the words quoted above from 13 Eliz. c. 1. But see the remarks of Hallam a few pages before (i. 288) on the kind of tacit election by which it might be said that James reigned. “What renders it absurd to call him and his children usurpers? He had that which the flatterers of his family most affected to disdain—the will of the people; not certainly expressed in regular suffrage ordeclared election, but unanimously and voluntarily ratifying that which in itself could surely give no right, the determination of the late Queen’s Council to proclaim his accession to the throne.”

(47)Whitelocke’s Memorials, 367. “The heads of the charge against the King were published by leave, in this form: That Charles Stuart, being admitted King of England, & therein trusted with a limited power, to govern by, & according to the Laws of the Land, & not otherwise, & by his trust being obliged, as also by his Oath, & office to use the power committed to him, for the good & benefit of the people, & for the preservation of their Rights and Privileges,” etc.

At an earlier stage [365] the President had told the King that the Court “sat here by the Authority of the Commons of England: & all your predecessours, & you are responsible to them.” The King answered “I deny that, shew me one Precedent.” The President, instead of quoting the precedents which were at least plausible, told the prisoner that he was not to interrupt the Court. Earlier still the King had objected to the authority of the Court that “he saw no Lords there which should make a Parliament, including the King, & urged that the Kingdom of England was hereditary, & not successive.” The strong point of Charles’s argument undoubtedly was the want of concurrence on the part of the Lords. Both Houses of Parliament had agreed in the proceedings against Edward the Second and Richard the Second.

It is a small point, but it is well to notice that the description of the King as Charles Stewart was perfectly accurate. Charles, the son of James, the son of Henry Stewart Lord Darnley, really had a surname, though it might not be according to Court etiquette to call him by it. The helplessFrench imitators in 1793 summoned their King by the name of “Louis Capet,” as if Charles had been summoned by the name of “Unready,” “Bastard,” “Lackland,” “Longshanks,” or any other nickname of an earlier King and forefather.

I believe that many people fancy that Guelph or Welf is a surname of the present, or rather late, royal family.

(48)The Act 1 William and Mary (Revised Statutes, ii. 11) entailed the Crown “after their deceases,” “to the heires of the body of the said princesse & for default of such issue to the Princesse Anne of Denmarke & the heires of her body & for default of such issue to the heires of the body of the said Prince of Orange.” It was only after the death of “the most hopeful Prince William Duke of Gloucester” that the Crown was settled (12 and 13 Will. III. c. 2; Revised Statutes, ii. 94) on “the most excellent Princess Sophia Electress and Dutchess Dowager of Hannover, daughter of the most excellent Princess Elizabeth, late Queen of Bohemia, daughter of our late sovereign lord King James the First of happy memory,” “and the heirs of her body being protestants.”

(49)We hardly need assurance of the fact, but if it were needed, something like an assurance to that effect was given by an official member of the House during the session of 1872. At all events we read in Sir T. E. May (ii. 83); “The increased power of the House of Commons, under an improved representation, has been patent and indisputable. Responsible to the people, it has, at the same time, wielded the people’s strength. No longer subservient to the crown, the ministers, and the peerage, it has become the predominant authority in the state.” But the following strange remark follows: “But it is characteristic of the British constitution,anda proof of its freedom from the spirit of democracy, that the more dominant the power of the House of Commons,—the greater has been its respect for the law, and the more carefully have its acts been restrained within the proper limits of its own jurisdiction.”ὦ δημοκρατία, ταῦτα δῆτ' ἀνασχετά;Has Mr. Grote lived and written so utterly in vain that a writer widely indeed removed from the vulgar herd of oligarchic babblers looks on “the spirit of democracy” as something inconsistent with “respect for the law”?

ὦ δημοκρατία, ταῦτα δῆτ' ἀνασχετά;

Has Mr. Grote lived and written so utterly in vain that a writer widely indeed removed from the vulgar herd of oligarchic babblers looks on “the spirit of democracy” as something inconsistent with “respect for the law”?

(50)The story is told (Plutarch, Lycurgus, 7), that King Theopompos, having submitted to the lessening of the kingly power by that of the Ephors, was rebuked by his wife, because the power which he handed on to those who came after him would be less than what he had received from those who went before him. ὃν καί φασιν ὑπὸ τῆς ἑαυτοῦ γυναικὸς ὀνειδιζόμενον ὡς ἐλάττω παραδώσοντα τοῖς παισὶ τὴν βασιλείαν, ἢ παρέλαβε, μείζω μὲν οὖν, εἰπεῖν, ὅσῳ χρονιωτέραν· τῷ γὰρ ὄντι τὸ ἄγαν ἀποβαλοῦσα μετὰ τοῦ φθόνου διέφυγε τὸν κίνδυνον. Aristotle also (Pol. v. 11) tells the story to the same effect, bringing it in with the comment, ὅσῳ γὰρ ἂν ἐλαττόνων ὦσι κύριοι, πλείω χρόνον ἀναγκαῖον μένειν πᾶσαν τὴν ἀρχήν· αὐτοί τε γὰρ ἧττον γίνονται δεσποτικοὶ καὶ τοῖς ἤθεσιν ἴσοι μᾶλλον, καὶ ὑπὸ τῶν ἀρχομένων φθονοῦνται ἧττον. διὰ γὰρ τοῦτο καὶ ἡ περὶ Μολοττοὺς πολὺν χρόνον βασιλεία διέμεινεν, καὶ ἡ Λακεδαιμονίων διὰ τὸ ἐξ ἀρχῆς τε εἰς δύο μέρη διαιρεθῆναι τὴν ἀρχήν, καὶ πάλιν Θεοπόμπου μετριάσαντος τοῖς τε ἄλλοις καὶ τὴν τῶν ἐφόρων ἀρχὴν ἐπικαταστήσαντος· τῆς γὰρ δυνάμεως ἀφελὼν ηὔξησε τῷ χρόνῳ τὴν βασιλείαν, ὥστε τρόπον τινὰ ἐποίησεν οὐκ ἐλάττονα ἀλλὰ μείζονα αὐτήν. The kingdom of the Molossians, referred to in the extract from Aristotle, is one of those states of antiquity of which weshould be well pleased to hear more. Like the Macedonian kingdom, it was an instance of the heroic kingship surviving into the historical ages of Greece. But the Molossian kingship seems to have been more regular and popular than that of Macedonia, and to have better deserved the name of a constitutional monarchy. The Molossian people and the Molossian King exchanged oaths not unlike those of the Landesgemeinde and the Landammann of Appenzell-Ausserrhoden, the King swearing to rule according to the laws, and the people swearing to maintain the kingdom according to the laws. In the end the kingdom changed into a Federal Republic. See History of Federal Government, i. 151.

(51)It is simply frivolous in the present state of England to discuss the comparative merits of commonwealths and constitutional monarchies with any practical object. Constitutional monarchy is not only firmly fixed in the hearts of the people, but it has some distinct advantages over republican forms of government, just as republican forms of government have some advantages over it. It may be doubted whether the people have not a more real control over the Executive, when the House of Commons, or, in the last resort, the people itself in the polling-booths (as in 1868), can displace a Government at any moment, than they have in constitutions in which an Executive, however much it may have disappointed the hopes of those who chose it, cannot be removed before the end of its term of office, except on the legal proof of some definite crime. But in itself, there really seems no reason why the form of the Executive Government should not be held to be as lawful a subject for discussion as the House of Lords, the Established Church, the standing army, or anything else. It shows simple ignorance, if it does not show something worse, when the word “republican” is used as synonymous with cut-throat or pickpocket. I do not find that in republicancountries this kind of language is applied to the admirers of monarchy; but the people who talk in this way are just those who have no knowledge of republics either in past history or in present times. They may very likely have climbed a Swiss mountain, but they have taken care not to ask what was the constitution of the country at its foot. They may even have learned to write Greek iambics and to discuss Greek particles; but they have learned nothing from the treasures of wisdom taught by Grecian history from Herodotus to Polybios.I have discussed the three chief forms of executive government, the constitutional King and his Ministry, the President, and the Executive Council, in the last of my first series of Historical Essays.

I have discussed the three chief forms of executive government, the constitutional King and his Ministry, the President, and the Executive Council, in the last of my first series of Historical Essays.

(52)Iliad, i. 250:—τῷ δ' ἤδη δύο μὲν γενεαὶ μερόπων ἀνθρώπωνἐφθίαθ', οἵ οἱ πρόσθεν ἅμα τράφεν ἠδ' ἐγένοντοἐν Πύλῳ ἠγαθέῃ, μετὰ δὲ τριτάτοισιν ἄνασσεν.

(52)Iliad, i. 250:—

τῷ δ' ἤδη δύο μὲν γενεαὶ μερόπων ἀνθρώπωνἐφθίαθ', οἵ οἱ πρόσθεν ἅμα τράφεν ἠδ' ἐγένοντοἐν Πύλῳ ἠγαθέῃ, μετὰ δὲ τριτάτοισιν ἄνασσεν.

τῷ δ' ἤδη δύο μὲν γενεαὶ μερόπων ἀνθρώπων

ἐφθίαθ', οἵ οἱ πρόσθεν ἅμα τράφεν ἠδ' ἐγένοντο

ἐν Πύλῳ ἠγαθέῃ, μετὰ δὲ τριτάτοισιν ἄνασσεν.

LONDON: R. CLAY, SONS, AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

HISTORICAL ESSAYS.First Series.Second Edition, 8vo. 10s.6d.

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