all sections of the opposition.

Such a measure is never once discussed on its merits. If there is the smallest flaw in it, neither side will make any attempt to improve it; its defects, whether few or many, trifling or serious, will be exaggerated by the one side and defended by the other with all the bitterness of party spirit. Then follow weeks or months in dreary debates, in first, second, and third readings, in postponements and adjournments without end, till the public become sick of delay, their enthusiasm dies out from sheer exhaustion, and the measure is left to be mutilated by the House at its leisure, or to be disposed of in a more summary fashion at the close of the session.

So far I have only enumerated a few of the dangers which beset a popular measure in one branch of the Legislature only; and if it was difficult to carry such a measure safely through the popular assembly, where it was amongst professed friends, what chance is it likely to have in the hereditary chamber, where it would be amongst avowed enemies, where a Liberal ministry is always in a minority, where even the principles of party government are not recognized, and where no responsibility attaches to any vote whatever, no matter what the consequence of that vote may be? As a matter of fact, popular measures have always been treated with scant courtesy by the

members of that House, and if they have not rejected them off-hand, or mutilated them beyond recognition, it was only the fear of evil consequences to themselves that prevented them. Is it then to be wondered at that the work of legislation proceeds otherwise than slowly, or suddenly stops altogether, when attempted to be carried on under such conditions?

Perhaps enough has been said to show the practical working of our Constitution. We cannot say that results justify any extravagant amount of admiration. That it is such an exquisite piece of mechanism as Earl Grey pronounces it to be, we confess we believe to be a delusion. It is at best a cumbrous and unwieldy piece of machinery. What little work it does, it does slowly and badly. In order to start it, there is sometimes required an amount of external force which is sufficient to overturn it. The machine moves, certainly, after a time, if sufficient force be steadily applied; but the friction of its parts is enormous, and the work it produces is out of all proportion to the labour and time expended in putting it in motion. Whether the machine has been constructed on a wrong principle, or has simply got out of order, we shall discover when we come to examine the working of our early parliamentary institutions.

1 Parliamentary Government, p. 67.

CHAPTER I.

EARLY REPRESENTATIVE PARLIAMENTS.

THE history of representative government in England may be divided into three periods. The first extends from the assembling of the first representative Parliament in 1295 to the close of the third quarter of the fourteenth century; the second, from the beginning of the fourth quarter of the fourteenth century to the Revolution; the third, from the Revolution to the present day. In the first period, the representative body had little or no influence on the government, which was almost a pure despotism; in the second period, the Commons had acquired great power, and we had government by king and Parliament; in the third period Parliament was supreme, and we had Government by Party.

During the first period the functions of the newly constituted Parliament were not clearly defined. The

B

Commons appear to have been a consultative rather than a legislative body. They exercised little or no control over the administration. The sovereign was supreme. All legislative and administrative power centred in the Crown. The barons, and not the Commons, took the initiative in actively resisting the power of the Crown, which was often exercised in an arbitrary and despotic manner. The Commons were too weak to be aggressive. Their attitude towards the Crown was that of passive resistance. Their position as a third estate of the realm was, as yet, scarcely recognized by either king or barons. They had not yet made themselves a power in the State, and they could hardly have felt that they possessed any power. But although they did not at this time exhibit an aggressive spirit, the Commons showed that they were as tenacious of their rights as the sovereign was of his, or the peers were of theirs. Good Catholics and loyal subjects as they were, they nevertheless boldly resisted the encroachments of the Holy See; they protested against "the men of the Church" monopolizing the high offices of state to the exclusion of laymen; they complained of the delay in the assembling of Parliament; they evinced a dogged determination to uphold national independence and to maintain the legislative functions of Parliament by withholding aids from the Crown till their grievances