upon the Holy Gospels, shall say-"The things which I have here before promised I will perform and keep: So help me God!"-and then shall kiss the book (21).

(21) It is also ordained by the statute 1 Will. & Mary, s. 2, c. 2, that every king and queen, being of the age of twelve years, who shall succeed to the imperial crown of these realms, shall, on the first day of the meeting of their first parliament, or at their coronation (which shall first happen), make, subscribe, and audibly repeat the declaration against popery, as prescribed by stat. 30 Car. II. st. 2.The Act of Settlement requires both the declaration and oath by those who succeed under it. Hence, to speak here in reference to my observations in Book 2, ch. 5, sec. 2, the church and state must be kept united. The protestant persuasion is the tenure by which the sovereign holds the crown.-EDItor.

CHAPTER IX.

SECTION I.-Of Private Liberty, or the Liberty of
Individuals.

100 WE have hitherto treated only of general liberty, that is, of the rights of the nation as a nation, and of its share in the government. It now remains that we should treat particularly of a thing, without which this general liberty, being absolutely frustrated in its object, would be only a matter of ostentation, and even could not long subsist: I mean, the liberty of individuals.

Private liberty, according to the division of the English lawyers, consists, first, of the right of property, that is, of the right of enjoying exclusively the gifts of fortune, and all the various fruits of one's industry; secondly, of the right of personal security; thirdly, of the locomotive faculty, taking the word liberty in its more confined sense (1).

(1) Burlamaqui, in his principles of Politic Law, describes natural liberty to be the right which nature gives to all mankind, of disposing of their persons and property after the manner they judge most convenient to their happiness, on condition of their acting within the limits of the law of nature, and of their not abusing it to the prejudice of other men. To this right of liberty, there is a reciprocal obligation corresponding, by which the law of nature binds all mankind to respect the liberty of other men, and not to disturb them in the use they make of it, so long as they do not abuse it. (Part 1, chap. 3, sect. 15).

Each of these rights, say again the English lawyers, is inherent in the person of every Englishman; they are to him as an inheritance, and he cannot be deprived of them but by virtue of a sentence passed according to the laws of the land. And, indeed, as this right of in- 101 heritance is expressed in English by one word, (birthright), the same as that which expresses the king's title to the crown, it has, in times of oppression, been often opposed to him as a right, doubtless of less extent, but of a sanction equal to that of his own.

One of the principal effects of the right of property is, that the king can take from his subjects no part of what they possess; he must wait till they themselves grant it him; and this right, which, as we have seen

Civil liberty is the impartial administration of equal and expedient laws; and the restraints introduced should be equal to all, or as much so as the nature of things will admit. (See Paley, 136, c. 5; also Tacit. De Mor. Germ. c. 43).

Political liberty is defined by Professor Christian, in his Notes to 1 Blackst. Comm. 127, to be the security with which, from the constitution, form, and nature of the established government, the subjects enjoy civil liberty. He says, that no ideas or definitions are more distinguishable than those of civil and political liberty, yet they are generally confounded, and the latter cannot yet claim an appropriate name. But some, who are zealous to perpetuate the inestimable blessings of civil liberty enjoyed by the people of England, fancy that our political liberty may be augmented by reforms, or what they deem improvements, in the constitution of the government. Men of such opinions and dispositions there will be, and perhaps it is to be wished that there should be, in all times. But before any serious experiment is made, we ought to be convinced by little less than mathematical demonstration, that we shall not sacrifice substance to form, the end to the means, or exchange present possession for future prospects.

Political liberty is the direct end of the English constitution; and if we inquire into the principles in which it is founded, we shall find liberty appear in its highest perfection.-EDITOR.

before, is, by its consequences, the bulwark that protects all the others, has moreover the immediate effect of preventing one of the chief causes of oppression.

In regard to the attempts to which the right of property might be exposed from one individual to another, I believe I shall have said every thing, when I have observed, that there is no man in England, who can oppose the irresistible power of the laws; that, as the judges cannot be deprived of their employments but on an accusation by parliament, the effect of interest with the sovereign, or with those who approach his person, can scarcely influence their decisions: that, as the judges themselves have no power to pass sen102 tence, till the matter of fact has been settled by men nominated, we may almost say at the common choice of the parties (a), all private views, and consequently all respect of persons, are banished from the courts of justice. However, that nothing may be wanting which may help to throw light on the subject I have undertaken to treat, I shall relate, in general, what is the law in civil matters, that has taken place in England.

When the Pandects were found at Amalphi, the clergy, who were then the only men that were able to understand them, did not neglect that opportunity of increasing the influence they had already obtained, and caused them to be received in the greater part of Europe. England, which was destined to have a constitution so different from that of other states, was to be farther distinguished by its rejecting the Roman laws.

(a) Owing to the extensive right of challenging jurymen, which will be explained in the editor's observations upon the new Legal Constitution of England.

Under William the Conqueror, and his immediate successors, a multitude of foreign ecclesiastics flocked to the court of England. Their influence over the mind of the sovereign, which, in the other states of Europe, as they were then constituted, might be con- 103 sidered as matter of no great importance, was not so in a country, where, the sovereign being all-powerful, to obtain influence over him was to obtain power itself. The English nobility saw, with the greatest jealousy, men of a condition so different from their own vested with a power, to the attacks of which they were immediately exposed; and thought that they would carry that power to the height, if they were ever to adopt a system of laws which those same men sought to introduce, and of which they would necessarily become both the depositories and the interpreters.

It happened, therefore, by a somewhat singular conjunction of circumstances, that, to the Roman laws, brought over to England by monks, the idea of ecclesiastical power became associated, in the same manner as the idea of regal despotism was afterwards annexed to the religion of the same monks, when favoured by kings who endeavoured to establish an arbitrary government. The nobility at all times rejected these laws, even with a degree of ill humour (b): and the usurper

(b) The nobility, under the reign of Richard II., declared in the French language of those times, “Purce que le roialme d'Engleterre n'etoit devant ces heures, ne a l'entent du roy notre seignior, et seigniors du parlement, unques ne sera, rulé ne governé par la ley civil;" viz.-Inasmuch as the kingdom of England was not before this time, nor, according to the intent of the king our lord, and lords of parliament, ever shall be, ruled or governed by the civil law. (In Rich. Parlamento Westmonasterii, Feb. 3, anno 2, (1379)).