130 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 119. 



be drawn from them appear quite to support my 

 positions : 



1. The Three Estates of the Realm are, the 

 Spiritualtv, the Nobility, and the Commonalty : on 

 this fact there is no dispute. The last is as cer- 

 tainly the third estate (tiers Stat). But Mr. 

 Fraser demurs to my ranking the Spiritual 

 Estate as the Jirst, quoting the Collect in the 

 Service for the fifth of November, which runs, 

 " the Nobility, Clergy, and Commonalty." On 

 this point I am not prepared with a decisive au- 

 thority ; but certainly the language and practice 

 of Parliament is with me. The Lords Spiritual 

 are always named before the Lords Temporal, and 

 precedence is allotted to them accordingly ; the 

 Archbishops ranking above the Earls (with the 

 more recent distinctions of Marquess and Duke), 

 and the Bishops above the Tempoi-al Barons [Qy. 

 What was the relative rank of the other " prelates" 

 who were formerly in Parliament ?]. To the 

 same effect is the language of the celebrated pre- 

 amble to the act 24 Henry VIIL c. 12. : — 



" This realm of England is an empire .... governed 

 by one supreme head and King .... unto whom a body 

 politic compact of all sorts and def^rees of people di- 

 vided in terms and by names of Spiritualty and Tempo- 

 rally , be bounden and ovven." 



2. The Convocations of the Clergy (which are 

 two synods sitting in three houses) are no part of 

 the Parliament. Mr. Eraser thinks " this point 

 was settled somewhat late in our history ; " but it 

 is proved (I submit) in the very extracts which 

 he produces from ancient statutes. Since there 

 is no doubt that the Clergy sat regularly in Con- 

 vocation, we should not hear of their occasional 

 presence in the House of Commons had the Con- 

 vocation been deemed a part of Parliament. It 

 is certain that Convocation never exercised the 

 powers which belong to a chamber of Parliament ; 

 even their own subsidies to the Crown were ra- 

 tified and passed in Parliament before they became 

 legally binding. [See on the whole of this subject, 

 Burn's Eccl. Law (Phillimore's ed.), tit. " Con- 

 vocation," vol. ii. pp. 19 — 23.] Mr. Eraser has 

 certainly adduced instances in which the assent of 

 the Clergy was given to particular statutes ; he 

 might have added the recital of their submission i 

 to the Crown, in the Act of Supremacy, 26 Henry 

 VIIL c. 1. He has shown also that clerical 

 proctors were occasionally intro luced into the 

 House of Commons, like the judges (he says) 

 in the House of Lords. But this is far from 

 making those proctors, or the Convocation which 

 sent them, a part of the Parliament. Indeed it is 

 shown that they were not by the petition of the 

 Lower House of Convocation (cited by Mr. 

 Eraser), in which they desire " to be admitted to 

 sit in Parliament with the House of Commons, 

 according to antient usage." It is clear that they 

 who so petitioned did not esteem themselves to 



be, as a Convocation, already part of the Par- 

 liament. The Convocation would indeed have 

 become the Spiritual Estate in Parliament, if the 

 Clergy had acceded to the wise and patriotic 

 design of King Edward I. But they, affecting an 

 imperium in imperio, refused to assemble at the 

 King's writ as a portion of the Parliament of their 

 countrv, and chose to tax themselves apart in 

 their Provincial Synods, where they used the 

 forms of a separate Parliament for the Church. 



3. Hence the Spiritual Estate was, and still is, 

 represented in Parliament by the Spiritual Lords. 

 William the Conqueror having converted their 

 sees into baronies, they were obliged, like other 

 tenants in capite, to obey the royal summons to 

 Parliament. When I called it a mistake to sup- 

 pose that our Bishops sit in the Upper House- 

 only as Barons, I did not mean that they are not 

 so, in the yjresent constitution of Parliament, but 

 that such was not the origin of the prelates being 

 called to share in the legislation of the realm. 

 The other clergy, however, retained their tenure 

 of frankalmoigne, and stood aloof alike from the 

 councils and from the burdens of the state. 

 Attendance in Parliament being chiefly given for 

 the purpose of voting taxes, the Commons, as well as 

 the Clergy, looked upon it as a burden more than 

 a privilege. But while the Clergy were quickly 

 compelled to bear their share of the public bur- 

 dens, their short-sighted policy deprived them of 

 the voice which is now enjoyed by other degrees 

 of Englishmen in the affairs of the country. 

 Wliile Convocation was sitting, the Clergy could 

 make their sentiments known by the Bishops who 

 represented their Estate in Parliament ; and we 

 often find the Lower House of Convocation pe- 

 titioning their lordships to make statements of this 

 kind in their places in Parliament. But in the 

 present suspension of Convocation and the. disuse 

 of diocesan synods, the Clergy have lost their 

 Aveight with the Bishops themselves ; and that 

 once formidable Estate of the Realm retains but 

 the shadow of a representntion in Parliament. 



Mr. Eraser will find this accoun^of the matter 

 fully borne out by the extract he has given fron^ 

 Bennet's Narrative. " The King in full Parlia- 

 ment charged the Prelates, Earls, Barons, and 

 other great men, and the Knights of the shire, and 

 the Commons," to give him counsel. Here we 

 have a description of Parliament precisely as it is 

 constituted at this day, and the " Prelates " are 

 the only members of the Spiritualty. Then we 

 read " the Prelates deliberated ' with the clergy by 

 themselves' (i.e. in Convocation), and the Earls 

 and Barons by themselves, and the Knights and 

 others of the Commons by themselves ; and then, 

 ' in full Parliament' (as before), each by them- 

 selves, and afterwards all in common answered," 

 i.e. the Clergy deliberated in Convocation, but 

 answered in Parliament by their Prelates. 



