HISTORY OF EUROPE. 
particulstly on the desire which was 
so generally manifested by themall, 
of transmitting the crawn, through 
the concurrence of the nobles, to 
‘their sons, or other near relations, 
they procured a renunciation, on 
the part of the crown, ‘of the right 
of coining money, without the con- 
sent of the states; and anexemption 
to the nobility from arrest, till after 
legal conviction of the crime with 
which they were charged. 
Various pretences were furnish- 
ed to the nobles for increasing their 
power, by the long and unquiet 
reign of Casimir 1V. who governed 
Poland for near half a century, and 
died in 1492. Although he had suc- 
ceeded in uniting the sovereignty of 
several rival states in his own fa- 
mily, Poland felt her internal strength 
debilitated, and her resources ex. 
hausted, by the “splendour of her 
monarch. Accordingly, the nobles 
eagerly seized every occasion which 
the king’s necessities afforded them 
of farther abridging his power, and 
establishing in their own hands a 
more general and immediate influ- 
ence on all the measures of govern. 
ment. 
Previously to this period, all who 
were comprehended in the class of 
nobles, together witha certain num- 
ber of the inhabitants of cities, pos- 
sessed the right of voting in the ge- 
neral diet. Hence those meetings 
generally bore a nearer resemblance 
to the tumultuousness of a mob, than - 
to the solemnity of a great national 
assembly. Too numerous to be com- 
prehended within the limits of any 
regular forms of procedure, and too 
much broken by party distinétions 
to be capable of calm and rational 
discussion, they could only give or 
[37 
refuse a general sanétion to the ob. 
jects that were laid. before them. 
To remedy these radical defects, 
and prevent the confusion insepas 
rable from universal suffrage, the 
nobles agreed to wave this right, 
and te vote by representation. 
The general diet thus constituted, 
preserved its form to the present 
times, with one material excep- 
tion, which, as it marks the con- 
tinued usurpation of the nobles 
on every branch of government, 
and order of society besides their 
own, is worthy, in this review, of 
being mentioned. At the time 
when the general diet was esta- 
blished in its present form, and dur- 
ing the reigns of all the Jaghello 
family, the right of representation 
was possessed by the free towns. 
The first attempt to procure their 
exclusion was made by the nobles, 
in the reign of Sigismond I. At 
that time, however, they were un- 
successful: but as soon as all ideas 
of hereditary. right to the throne 
were not only, in faét, given up, 
but formally renounced and pre. 
scribed by statute, there was no 
longer any power to check their con- 
tinued encroachments, The whole 
authority of the state was, at every 
vacancy, actually lodged in their 
hands ; and one of the first uses 
they made of it was, to strip the 
towns of their right of representa. 
tion in the general diet. : 
The general diet, constituted on 
these principles, proved highly fa. 
yourable to the designs of the aris. 
tocracy, By condensing and con. 
centrating their power, it enabled 
them to a¢t with unanimity and con- 
cert. It formed a constitutional 
body, neither too unwieldy to be 
[D3] actuated 
