244              Constitutional History.           [chap.

Henry V leads and impersonates national spirit, and so leads
the action of parliament ; Henry VI throughout the earlier
and happier part of his reign is ruled by a council which to
a great extent represents the parliament ; and during the later
years he retains such a hold on the parliament as to foil the
attempt made by the duke of York to supplant him ; nor is
his deposition recognised by the parliament until Edward has
claimed, won, and worn the crown. We may set aside, how-
ever, the question of the constitutional title, the reality of
which was more completely recognised in later times than in
the age in which it was practically vindicated, and which, as
we have seen, was imperfectly realised by Henry IV himself,
in consequence of the oaths by which he was bound to Richard,
and the conviction which compelled him to advance a factitious
hereditary claim. The questions that arise upon this subject
will always be answered more or less from opposite points of
view. It will be more instructive if we attempt first to collect
and arrange the particular instances in which the theory of
parliamentary institutions was advanced and accepted by the
different factors in the government, then to show that that
theory was acted upon to a very great extent throughout the
first half at least of the fifteenth century, and to note as we
proceed the points in which the accepted theory went even
beyond the practice of the times, and anticipated some of the
later forms of parliamentary government. This view will
enable us summarily to describe the character of the legislative,
economical, and administrative policy pursued by the two rival
houses, and so to strike the balance between them upon a
material as well as a formal issue.

Archbishop Arundel’s declaration, made on behalf of Henry IV
in his first parliament, was a distinct undertaking that the new
king would reign constitutionally. Richard II had declared
himself possessed of a prerogative practically unlimited, and
had enunciated the doctrine that the law was in the heart and
mouth of the king, that the goods of his subjects were his own¹.
Henry wished to be governed and counselled by the wise and
ɪ Rot. Parl. ɪiɪ. 419.

ancient of the kingdom for the aid and comfort of himself and
of the whole realm ; by their common counsel and consent he
would do the best for the governance of himself and his
kingdom, not wishing to be governed according to his proper
will, or of his voluntary purpose and singular opinion, ‘ but by
the common advice, counsel, and consent,’ and according to the
sense and spirit of the coronation oath¹. Again, when in the
same parliament the commons ^ζ of their own good grace and
will trusting in the nobility, high discretion, and gracious
governance ’ of the king, granted to him ^ζ that they would that
he should be in the same royal liberty as his noble progenitors
had been,’ the king of his royal grace and tender conscience
vouchsafed to declare in full parliament ‘ that it was not his
intent or will to change the laws, statutes, or good usages, or to
take any other advantage by the said grant, but to guard the
ancient laws and statutes ordained and used in the time of his
noble progenitors, and to do right to all people, in mercy and
truth according to his oath ².' Nor did this avowal stand alone.
In the commission of inquiry into false rumours, issued in 1402,
Henry ordered that the counties should be assured ‘ that it
always has been, is, and will be, our intention that the republic
and common weal, and the laws and customs of our kingdom be
observed and kept from time to time,’ and that the violators of
the same should be punished according to their deserts, ‘ for to
this end we believe that we have come by God’s will to our

kingdom ³.’ It is true that these and many similar declarations DeciaratioM
^{o                                                   v}                             of constitu-

owe some paɪ t of their force to the fact that they presented a tɪoɪɪai

strong contrast to Richard’s rash utterances, and that they
were at the time prompted by a desire to set such a contrast
before the eyes of the people. But as time went on and the
alarm of reaction passed away, they were repeated in equally
strong and even more elaborate language. Sir Arnold Savage
in 1401 told the king that he possessed what was the greatest
treasure and riches of the whole world, the heart of his people ;
and the king in his answer prayed the parliament to counsel
him how that treasure might be kept longest and best spent to
^l Above, p. 15. ² Kot. Parl. ɪɪɪ. 434 ; above, p. 24. ³ Rymer, vɪii. 253.

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