The Life and Reign of Edward I.

by Robert Benton Seeley

“The king ought not to be subject to man, but to God, and to the law; for the law maketh the king. Let the king, therefore, render to the law what the law hath invested in him with regard to others, dominion and power; for he is not truly king where will and pleasure rule, and not the law.” And again, “The king also hath a superior, namely, God, and also the law, by which he was made a king.”

Just while Edward was rising into early manhood, did this great lawyer appear, and the probability surely approaches to something like a certainty, that Robert Burnel had been a student of Bracton’s writings, had felt the truth and force of the above words, and had made the young prince acquainted with those invaluable pages.

Edward’s coronation had taken place in August. His four years’ absence on the Continent must have occasioned an accumulation of matters needing regulation; his castles and palaces, his forests and royal domains, would require to be visited and brought into order. A new state of things must be established. We see immediately an important change in the “Exchequer Issues.” In Henry’s reign, we read: “To Humphrey de Rohan, earl of Hereford, £120 for 50 casks of wine, taken from him by Imbert Pugeis (a soldier), for the king’s use.” “To Gerard de Bosco, a merchant of Bordeaux, 70 marks, for 20 casks of wine taken from him for the queen’s use.” But on Edward’s accession these seizures disappear, and the entries run thus, “To Raymund de Alemaunt, of Bordeaux, £46 13s. for 20 casks of wine, purchased from him, for the king’s use, by Gregory de Rokesle and Matthew de Columbius, the king’s butlers.”

The royal revenues and the royal expenditure were now, for the first time for a century, to be brought into order and under proper regulation. Christmas would naturally approach, long before all this business could be despatched, and it is not surprising that, however he may have desired it, Edward found it impossible to convene his first parliament earlier than the February of 1275.

In that month—the same which, in modern times, has been found the most suitable and convenient, did this first of English parliaments assemble.[20] And when the clerk, sitting at the chancellor Burnel’s feet, took pen in hand to record its proceedings, his entry ran in the following terms:—

“These be the acts of king Edward, made at Westminster, at the first parliament‐general after his coronation; by his council, and by the assent of archbishops, bishops, earls, barons, and all the commonalty of the realm, thither summoned.”

Here we find, set forth rather more fully, the same idea and purpose which we had seen expressed at Marlborough in 1267;—a legislature, a council summoned for the purpose of making and establishing laws; which council was not to consist of great barons only, or of barons and prelates only, but, “of the lower as well as of the higher degree,” of “bishops, earls, barons, and all the commonalty of the realm.”

This idea was, as yet, but vaguely expressed. In Edward’s after years we shall see it more fully worked out, until the whole British Constitution rises to completeness under his creative hand. In this first attempt he merely recognizes the principle that the “lower degree as well as the higher” ought to be present,—ought to be consulted. What “the commonalty of the realm, hither summoned,” may mean, we cannot now define with any certainty. The most probable view of the matter is, that the London corporation, then fully existing and on the spot, was invited to represent “the commonalty of the realm,” and did appear, doubtless with awe and reverence, as a portion of the first parliament, the first real legislature, that had been assembled in England in Anglo‐Norman times.

But what was the work which this first “parliament of England” had to do? And the answer to this question reveals to us the real greatness of Edward’s wise counsellor. Robert Burnel, who had accompanied his master to Palestine, and who had, at Acre, been named one of his executors, seems to have been despatched to England, when the king, on his homeward journey, was delayed by business in Gascony and in Flanders. We find him in England, acting as one of the regents or guardians of the realm, several months before the king landed at Dover. He, doubtless, possessed his master’s entire confidence, maintained a regular correspondence with him, and was fully occupied in bringing all things into order, before Edward himself appeared at Dover. To some such mind as this we owe it, that so soon as the king had landed, and had conferred on two of his greatest nobles the honour of a visit while passing from the coast to London, he found, on reaching the metropolis, the whole ceremony of the coronation, with its great banquet and rejoicings, only awaiting his arrival. Can we see there assembled, awaiting the king’s arrival, the king of Scotland, the duke of Bretagne, all the nobles of the land, with their countless retinues; can we remark the new buildings prepared, and the vast provision for the banquet, and all these and many other preparations, all concentrating to one point, and all involving a large expenditure—without acknowledging that in bringing such a variety of affairs to a ripeness on a day before appointed, there is visible the mind of a man of vast ability? All, at last, is in readiness. The king arrives at Dover, passes on with kingly state and deliberation to the castle of his greatest subject, the earl of Gloucester; then to Reigate, to earl Warenne’s,—then to the metropolis, and to his own palace of Westminster. He rests apparently but a single night, and then proceeds from his palace into the abbey, and is at once crowned king. And his very first act, after thus taking his rightful place, is, to make his trusted friend and most able counsellor, Robert Burnel, the chancellor of England.

To this great man, we doubtless owe that noble production, the “Statute of Westminster.” In the five or six months which intervened before the meeting of parliament; while the king was examining and regulating the condition of his castles, palaces, establishments, and household, his chancellor, looking forward to the great event which was to follow immediately after Christmas, was occupied, we may safely assert, with the preparation of the work of legislation; a work then to be commenced, but never afterwards to be discontinued in this realm.