The History of the Common Law of England [2]
call those the Old Statutes which end with the Reign of King Edward 2 and those I shall call the New or later Statutes which begin with the Reign of King Edward 3 and so are derived through a Succession of Kings and Queens down to this Day, by a continued and orderly Series. Touching these later Sort I shall say nothing, for they all keep an orderly and regular Series of Time, and are extant upon Record, either in the Parliament Rolls, or in the Statute Rolls of King Edward 3 and those Kings that follow: For excepting some few years in the Beginning of K. Edward 3. i.e. 2, 3, 7, 8 & 9 Edw. 3. all the Parliament Rolls that ever were since that Time have been preserved, and are extant; and, for the most Part, the Petitions upon which the Acts were drawn up, or the very Acts themselves. Now therefore touching the elder Acts of Parliament, viz. Those that were made between the First Year of the Reign of K. Richard I and the last year of K. Edward 2 we have little extant in any authentical History; and nothing in any authentical Record touching Acts made in the Time of K. Rich. I unless we take in those Constitutions and Assizes mentioned by Hoveden as aforesaid. Neither is there any great Evidence, what Acts of Parliament pass'd in the Time of King John, tho' doubtless many there were both in his Time, and in the Time of K. Rich. I. But there is no Record extant of them, and the English Histories of those Times give us but little Account of those Laws; only Matthew Paris gives us an Historical Account of the Magna Charta, and Charta de Foresta, granted by King John at Running Mead the 15th of June, in the Seventeenth Year of his Reign. And it seems, that the Concession of these Charters was in a Parliamentary Way; you may see the Transcripts of both Charters verbatim in Mat. Paris, and in the Red Book of the Exchequer. There were seven Pair of these Charters sent to some of the Great Monasteries under the Seal of King John, one Part whereof sent to the Abby of Tewkesbury I have seen under the Seal of that King; the Substance thereof differs something from the Magna Charta, and Charta de Foresta, granted by King Henry 3 but not very much, as may appear by comparing them. But tho' these Charters of King John seem to have been passed in a kind of Parliament, yet it was in a Time of great Confusion between that King and his Nobles; and therefore they obtained not a full Settlement till the Time of King Henry 3 when the Substance of them was enacted by a full and solemn Parliament. I therefore come down to the Times of those succeeding Kings, Henry 3. Edw. I. and Edw. 2. and the Statutes made in the Times of those Kings, I call the Old Statutes; partly because many of them were made but in Affirmance of the Common Law; and partly because the rest of them, that made a Change in the Common Law, are yet so ancient, that they now seem to have been as it were a Part of the Common Law, especially considering the many Expositions that have been made of them in the several Successions of Times, whereby as they became the great Subject of Judicial Resolutions and Decisions; so those Expositions and Decisions, together also with those old Statutes themselves, are as it were incorporated into the very Common Law, and become a Part of it. In the Times of those three Kings last mentioned, as likewise in the Times of their Predecessors, there were doubtless many more Acts of Parliament made than are now extant of Record, or otherwise, which might be a Means of the Change of the Common Law in the Times of those Kings from what it was before, tho' all the Records of Memorials of those Acts of Parliament introducing such a Change, are not at this Day extant: But of those that are extant, I shall give you a brief Account, not intending a large or accurate Treatise touching that matter. The Reign of Henry 3 was a troublesome Time, in respect of the Differences between him and his Barons, which were not composed till his 51st year, after the Battle of