reason for so doing. As the
senate of Rome was wont to have recourse to a dictator, a magistrate
of absolute authority, when they judged the republic in any imminent
danger. The decree of the senate, which usually preceded the
nomination of this magistrate, "_dent operam consules, nequid
respublica detrimenti capiat_," was called the _senatus consultum
ultimae necessitatis_. In like manner this experiment ought only to be
tried in cases of extreme emergency; and in these the nation parts
with it's liberty for a while, in order to preserve it for ever.

THE confinement of the person, in any wise, is an imprisonment. So
that the keeping a man against his will in a private house, putting
him in the stocks, arresting or forcibly detaining him in the street,
is an imprisonment[i]. And the law so much discourages unlawful
confinement, that if a man is under _duress of imprisonment_, which we
before explained to mean a compulsion by an illegal restraint of
liberty, until he seals a bond or the like; he may alledge this
duress, and avoid the extorted bond. But if a man be lawfully
imprisoned, and either to procure his discharge, or on any other fair
account, seals a bond or a deed, this is not by duress of
imprisonment, and he is not at liberty to avoid it[k]. To make
imprisonment lawful, it must either be, by process from the courts of
judicature, or by warrant from some legal officer, having authority
to commit to prison; which warrant must be in writing, under the hand
and seal of the magistrate, and express the causes of the commitment,
in order to be examined into (if necessary) upon a _habeas corpus_. If
there be no cause expressed, the goaler is not bound to detain the
prisoner[l]. For the law judges in this respect, saith sir Edward
Coke, like Festus the Roman governor; that it is unreasonable to send
a prisoner, and not to signify withal the crimes alleged against him.

[Footnote i: 2 Inst. 589.]

[Footnote k: 2 Inst. 482.]

[Footnote l: 2 Inst. 52, 53.]

A NATURAL and regular consequence of this personal liberty, is, that
every Englishman may claim a right to abide in his own country so long
as he pleases; and not to be driven from it unless by the sentence of
the law. The king indeed, by his royal prerogative, may issue out his
writ _ne exeat regnum_, and prohibit any of his subjects from going
into foreign parts without licence[m]. This may be necessary for the
public service, and safeguard of the commonwealth