d liberties of the people: there
remains evidence sufficient to ascertain the most noted acts of her
administration: and though that evidence must be drawn from a source
wide of the ordinary historians, it becomes only the more authentic
on that account, and serves as a stronger proof, that her particular
exertions of power were conceived to be nothing but the ordinary course
of administration, since they were not thought remarkable enough to be
recorded even by contemporary writers. If there was any difference in
this particular, the people in former reigns seem rather to have been
more submissive than even during the age of Elizabeth;[**] it may not
here be improper to recount some of the ancient prerogatives of the
crown, and lay open the sources of that great power which the English
monarchs formerly enjoyed.

* By the ancient constitution, is here meant that which
prevailed before the settlement of our present plan of
liberty. There was a more ancient constitution, where,
though the people had perhaps less liberty than under the
Tudors, yet the king had also less authority: the power of
the barons was a great check upon him, and exercised great
tyranny over them. But there was still a more ancient
constitution, viz., that before the signing of the charters,
when neither the people nor the barons had any regular
privileges; and the power of the government during the reign
of an able prince was almost wholly in the king. The English
constitution, like all others, has been in a state of
continual fluctuation.

** In a memorial of the state of the realm, drawn by
Secretary Cecil in 1569, there is this passage: "Then
followeth the decay of obedience in civil policy, which
being compared with the fearfulness and reverence of all
inferior estates to their superiors in times past, will
astonish any wise and considerate person, to behold the
desperation of reformation," Haynes, p, 586. Again, p. 538.

One of the most ancient and most established instruments of power was
the court of star chamber, which possessed an unlimited discretionary
authority of fining, imprisoning, and inflicting corporal punishment;
and whose jurisdiction extended to all sorts of offences, contempts, and
disorders that lay not within reach of the common law. The members of
this court consisted of the privy council and the judges; men who all of
t