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[ NOTE C, p. 52. The reason assigned by Sir Philip Warwick (p. 2) for this unusual measure of the commons, is, that they intended to deprive the crown of the prerogative which it had assumed, of varying the rates of the impositions, and at the same time were resolved to cut off the new rates fixed by James. These were considerable diminutions both of revenue and prerogative; and whether they would have there stopped, considering their present disposition, may be much doubted. The king, it seems, and the lords were resolved not to trust them; nor to render a revenue once precarious, which perhaps they might never afterwards be able to get reestablished on the old footing.]

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[ NOTE D, p. 80. Here is a passage of Sir John Davis’s Question concerning Impositions, (p. 131.) “This power of laying on arbitrarily new impositions being a prerogative in point of government, as well as in point of profit, it cannot be restrained or bound by act of parliament; it can not be limited by any certain or fixt rule of law, no more than the course of a pilot upon the sea, who must turn the helm or bear higher or lower sail, according to the wind or weather; and therefore it may be properly said, that the king’s prerogative, in this point, is as strong as Samson; it cannot be bound; for though an act of parliament be made to restrain it, and the king doth give his consent unto it, as Samson was bound with his own consent; yet if the Philistines come, that is, if any just or important occasion do arise, it cannot hold or restrain the prerogative; it will be as thread, and broken as easy as the bonds of Samson. The king’s prerogatives are the sunbeams of the crown, and as inseparable from it as the sunbeams from the sun. The king’s crown must be taken from him; Samson’s hair must be cut off, before his courage can be any jot abated. Hence it is that neither the king’s act, nor any act of parliament, can give away his prerogative.”]

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[ NOTE E, p. 121. We shall here make use of the liberty allowed in a note to expatiate a little on the present subject. It must be confessed, that the king in this declaration touched upon that circumstance in the English constitution which it is most difficult, or rather altogether impossible, to regulate by laws, and which must be governed by certain delicate ideas of propriety and decency, rather than by any exact rule or prescription. To deny the parliament all right of remonstrating against what they esteem grievances, were to reduce that assembly to a total insignificancy, and to deprive the people of every advantage which they could reap from popular councils. To complain of the parliament’s employing the power of taxation as the means of extorting concessions from their sovereign, were to expect that they would entirely disarm themselves, and renounce the sole expedient provided by the constitution for insuring to the kingdom a just and legal administration. In different periods of English story, there occur instances of their remonstrating with their princes in the freest manner, and sometimes of their refusing supply when disgusted with any circumstance of public conduct. It is, however, certain, that this power, though essential to parliaments, may easily be abused, as well by the frequency and minuteness of their remonstrances, as by their intrusion into every part of the king’s counsels and determinations. Under color of advice, they may give disguised orders; and in complaining of grievances, they may draw to themselves every power of government. Whatever measure is embraced without consulting them, may be pronounced an oppression of the people; and, till corrected, they may refuse the most necessary supplies to their indigent sovereign. From the very nature of this parliamentary liberty, it is evident that it must be left unbounded by law; for who can foretell how frequently grievances may occur, or what part of administration may be affected by them? From the nature, too, of the human frame, it may be expected, that this liberty would be exerted in its full extent, and no branch of authority be allowed to remain unmolested in the hands of the prince; for will the weak limitations of respect and decorum be sufficient to restrain human ambition, which so frequently breaks through all the prescriptions of law and justice?

But here it is observable, that the wisdom of the English constitution, or rather the concurrence of accidents, has provided, in different periods, certain irregular checks to this privilege of parliament and thereby maintained, in some tolerable measure, the dignity and authority of the crown.

In the ancient constitution, before the beginning of the seventeenth century, the meetings of parliament were precarious, and were not frequent. The sessions were short, and the members had no leisure either to get acquainted with each other, or with public business. The ignorance of the age made men more submissive to that authority which governed them. And above all, the large demesnes of the crown, with the small expense of government during that period, rendered the prince almost independent, and taught the parliament to preserve great submission and duty towards him.

In our present constitution, many accidents which have rendered governments every where, as well as in Great Britain, much more burdensome than formerly, have thrown into the hands of the crown the disposal of a large revenue, and have enabled the king, by the private interest and ambition of the members, to restrain the public interest and ambition of the body. While the opposition (for we must still have an opposition, open or disguised,) endeavors to draw every branch of administration under the cognizance of parliament, the courtiers reserve a part to the disposal of the crown; and the royal prerogative, though deprived of its ancient powers, still maintains a due weight in the balance of the constitution.

It was the fate of the house of Stuart to govern England at a period when the former source of authority was already much diminished, and before the latter began to flow in any tolerable abundance. Without a regular and fixed foundation, the throne perpetually tottered; and the prince sat upon it anxiously and precariously. Every expedient used by James and Charles in order to support their dignity, we have seen attended with sensible inconveniencies. The majesty of the crown, derived from ancient powers and prerogatives, procured respect, and checked the approaches of insolent intruders. But it begat in the king so high an idea of his own rank and station, as made him incapable of stooping to popular courses, or submitting, in any degree, to the control of parliament. The alliance with the hierarchy strengthened law by the sanction of religion; but it enraged the Puritanical party, and exposed the prince to the attacks of enemies, numerous, violent, and implacable. The memory, too, of these two kings, from like causes, has been attended, in some degree, with the same infelicity which pursued them during the whole course of their lives. Though it must be confessed, that their skill in government was not proportioned to the extreme delicacy of their situation, a sufficient indulgence has not been given them, and all the blame, by several historians, has been unjustly thrown on their side. Their violations of law, particularly those of Charles, are, in some few instances, transgressions of a plain limit which was marked out to loyal authority. But the encroachments of the commons, though in the beginning less positive and determinate, are no less discernible by good judges, and were equally capable of destroying the just balance of the constitution. While they exercised the powers transmitted to them in a manner more independent, and less compliant, than had ever before been practised, the kings were, perhaps imprudently, but as they imagined, from necessity, tempted to assume powers which had scarcely ever been exercised, or had been exercised in a different manner by the crown. And from the shock of these opposite pretensions, together with religious controversy, arose all the factions, convulsions, and disorders which attended that period.

“This footnote was in the first editions a part of the text.]