are taken from each pound of coins, one of which is assayed by the king's assay master for the security of the master of the mint against the company of moneyers, who are a sub-corporation in the mint, and the other is sealed in a packet and locked in a box called the pix, under three keys kept respectively by the master, the warden, and the comptroller of the mint, until the trial of the pix takes place at Westminster in the following manner. Upon a memorial of the master of the mint brought before the sovereign in council, by the chancellor of the exchequer, certain privy councillors are summoned to form a court for the trial of the pix. A panel of twenty-five members of the goldsmiths' company, of whom the assay master of the company is one, is returned by the wardens of the company in obedience to a precept of the Lord Chancellor, and twelve are sworn before the court as a jury of the pix. The president of the court then gives his charge to the jury. The pix is then delivered to them together with a piece of metal cut from the trial pieces, which is the standard according to the fineness of which the master of the mint is bound by indentures with the treasury to coin the money. The jury retire and try the weight of the coin by the weights of the exchequer and mint, and also the fineness of the metal. The weight must correspond by computation with the quantity of bullion delivered to the master of the mint, allowing a remedy or margin to that officer, and the fineness of the metal, that is to say, the proportion of the fine gold or silver to the alloy, must correspond with that of the trial pieces, specified in the indentures. The jury then return their verdict. If the fineness of the metal agrees with the indentures and trial pieces, and the weight does not fall short of the remedy, the master receives his quietus, but if not, he must recoin the money at his own cost.

VI. The queen is, lastly, considered by the laws of England as the head and supreme governor of the national church.

By statute 26 Hen. VIII. c. i. (reciting that the king's majesty justly and rightfully is and ought to be the supreme head of the church of England, and so had been recognised by the clergy of this kingdom in their convocation), it is enacted that the king shall be reputed the only supreme head on earth of the church of England, and shall have annexed to the imperial crown of this realm, as well the style and title thereof, as all jurisdictions, authorities, and commodities, to the said dignity of supreme head of the church appertaining. And another statute to the same purpose was made 1 Eliz. c. i.1

But the statute of appeals, 24 Hen. VIII. c. 12., will afford us a clearer view of the nature of the royal supremacy. In that statute it is recited, that "by divers sundry old authentic histories and

1 Blackst. Com. ch. vii. 278, 279.

t

chronicles it is manifestly declared and expressed that this realm of England is an empire, and so hath been accepted in the world, governed by one supreme head and king, having the dignity and royal estate of the imperial crown of the same; unto whom a body politic, compact of all sorts and degrees of people, divided in terms and by the names of spirituality and temporality, been bounded and owen to bear, next to God, a natural and humble obedience; he being also institute and furnished, by the goodness and sufferance of Almighty God, whose plenary, whole, and entire power, pre-eminence, authority, prerogative, and jurisdiction, to render and yield justice and final determination to all manner of folk, resients, or subjects, within this his realm, and in all causes, matters, debates, and contentions, happening to occur, insurge, or begin, within the limits thereof, without restraint, or provocation to any foreign princes or potentates of the world; the body spiritual whereof having power, when any cause of the law divine happened to come in question, or of spiritual learning, then it was declared, interpreted, and showed by that part of the said body politic, called the spirituality, now being usually called the English church, which always hath been reputed, and also found of that sort, that both for knowledge, integrity, and sufficiency of number, it hath been always thought, and also is at this hour, sufficient and meet of itself, without the intermeddling of any exterior person or persons, to declare and determine all such doubts, and to administer all such offices and duties, as to their rooms spiritual doth appertain; for the due administration whereof, and to keep them from corruption and sinister affection, the king's most noble progenitors, and the antecessors of the nobles of this realm, have sufficiently endowed the said church both with honour and possessions; and the laws temporal for the trial of property of lands and goods, and for the conservation of the people of this realm in unity and peace, without rapine or spoil, was and yet is administered, adjudged, and executed, by sundry judges and ministers of the other part of the said body politic, called the temporalty; and both their authorities and jurisdictions do conjoin together in the due administration of justice, the one to help the other."

Here we find a solemn recognition, by the supreme authority of parliament, of the existence of the Anglican church as a body distinct and separate from the state; the particular province allotted to each of those societies; and the duty of both to conjoin together in the due administration of the power committed to them respectively, the one to help the other.

We shall find these principles confirmed in the thirty-nine articles and the canons of 1603.

The article 37 says, "The King's Majesty hath the chief power in

this Realm of England, and other his Dominions, unto whom the chief Government of all Estates of this Realm, whether they be Ecclesiastical or Civil, in all causes doth appertain, and is not, nor ought to be, subject to any foreign Jurisdiction. Where we attribute to the King's Majesty the chief government, by which Titles we understand the minds of some slanderous folks to be offended, we give not to our Princes the ministering of God's Word, or of the Sacraments, the which thing the injunctions also lately set forth by Elizabeth our Queen do most plainly testify; but that only prerogative which we see to have been given always to all godly Princes in holy Scriptures by God himself; that is, that they should rule all states and degrees committed to their charge by God, whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal, and restrain with the civil sword the stubborn and evil-doers." The canon 2 asserts, that the king has the same authority in causes ecclesiastical that godly kings had amongst the Jews and Christian emperors of the primitive church.

The thirty-nine articles and the canons, as we have seen, affirm the royal supremacy to be the same which was enjoyed by ancient kings and princes among the Jews and early Christians; and, with this position, the law of England is in every particular consistent.

In virtue of the queen's authority as the head and supreme governor of the established church, she convenes, prorogues, restrains, and dissolves all ecclesiastical synods and convocations. This prerogative is agreeable to the practice of the primitive church. Thus the first oecumenical synod was convened by the emperor Constantine, who was himself present during its proceedings, and at the close of them addressed a letter to all churches, exhorting them to receive the decrees of the council.

The convocations of England are two: that of the province of Canterbury, and that of the province of York. Those assemblies have power to make canons with the Royal assent, which are binding on the clergy', provided they be not against the prerogative of the crown, nor the common or statute law, nor against any custom of the realm2; but their canons are not binding on the laity unless ratified by Parliament.3

The convocation of Canterbury is called together by virtue of the queen's writ, and is a miniature of the parliament, wherein the archbishop presides with regal state: the upper house of bishops represents the House of Lords; and the lower house, composed of representatives of the beneficed clergy of the several dioceses at large, and of each particular chapter therein, resembles the

1 1 Salk. 134. 2 Atk. 158. 26. 605. 2 Salk. 673. Carthew, 485. 1 Lev. 436. 2 Stat. 25 Hen. VIII. c. 19. 5 Rep. Intr. 12 Rep. 72.

3 Middleton v. Crofts, 2 Atk. 605. Stra. 1056.

House of Commons, with its knights of the shire and burgesses. In the province of York, the convocation differs from that of Canterbury in one respect; for the clergy assembled therein sit together in one house. The two convocations are always summoned by the archbishops of the respective provinces, on receipt of the queen's writ for that purpose, at the commencement of each parliament. This constitution, as Blackstone informs us, is said to be owing to the policy of Edward I., who thereby, at one and the same time, let in the inferior clergy to the privileges of forming ecclesiastical canons (which before they had not), and also introduced a method of taxing ecclesiastical benefices, by consent of convocation.' To these assemblies, the statute 25 Hen. VIII. c. xix. refers, wherein it is recited, that all convocations had been, and ought to be, assembled by the king's writ, and that the clergy had promised, in verbo sacerdotii, never, in future, to enact any new canons in their convocations without the king's license. The statute speaks of the convocation; and it is questionable whether it applies to provincial and national synods, strictly so called, which are constituted in a perfectly different manner from the convocation, being composed entirely of bishops. 2

From the same prerogative, of being the head of the Anglican church, arises the queen's right of nomination to vacant bishoprics, and certain other ecclesiastical preferments. This is now done in consequence of the statute 25 Hen. VIII. c. xx. ; but the statute of provisors, 25 Edward III., enacted that the king should appoint to all archbishoprics, and other dignities: and this right has been enjoyed by the kings of England for many ages: so that the statute of Henry VIII. was only declaratory of the ancient law.

3

Blackstone informs us, that, as the head of the church, the sovereign is likewise the dernier ressort in all ecclesiastical causes; an appeal lying ultimately to the queen in chancery and now to the queen in council from the sentence of every ecclesiastical judge. This appellate jurisdiction is, as we have already seen, exercised by the sovereign with the advice of the judicial committee of her majesty's privy council, by virtue of stat. 3 and 4 Will. IV. c. xli. To these matters we shall have occasion to return, in treating of the clergy and of ecclesiastical courts.

The crown also has power to dispense with the ecclesiastical law of the established church in matters not repugnant to the word

Blackst. Com. b. i. c. vii. p. 279, 280.

2 Palmer, Treat. of the Ch. vol. ii. p. 354–356. As to the convocation, see 4 Inst. 322. Gilbert, Exch. c. iv. Burn, Eccles. Law, Convoc. Comyn, Dig.,

Convoc.

3 St. 25 Hen. VIII. c. xix. St. 2 & 3 W. IV. c. xcii.

of God, notwithstanding the stat. 25 Hen. VIII. c. xxi., which vests a right to grant dispensations in the archbishop of Canterbury', so the king may by proclamations appoint fasts and days of thanksgiving and humiliation, and issue proclamations for preventing and punishing immorality, and profaneness, and enjoin the reading of the same in churches and chapels.2

CHAPTER XIII.

OF THE QUEEN'S REVENUE.

OF THE QUEEN'S ORDINARY
REVENUE.

"HAVING in the two preceding chapters considered at large those branches of the queen's prerogative which contribute to her royal dignity, and constitute the executive power of the government, we proceed now to examine the queen's fiscal prerogatives, or such as regard her revenue, which the British constitution hath vested in the royal person, in order to support her dignity and maintain her power, being a portion which each subject contributes of his property in order to secure the remainder." This will be done chiefly (though with certain necessary alterations) in the words of Blackstone.

Grotius holds that the state has a right over the citizens who compose it, so far as the public welfare demands. This right is the chief part of what is commonly called by the civilians and writers on public law dominium eminens3, or superior dominion. The affairs of the state necessarily require considerable expense both in time of and of war. peace It is therefore necessary that there should reside in the sovereign a power of reserving part of the property of the citizens, or of the produce of the country, or of obliging the citizens to contribute what is requisite to supply the public expenses. Under the same head must also be placed the power of using the means which are necessary to augment the riches of the state, of which the principal is the right of taxing merchandises imported into or exported from the country, and also taking a small part of the

1 Chitty, Prerog. ch. v. p. 53. Comyn, Dig. Prerog. D. 29. Viner, Abridg. Prerog. k. f. 17. vol. 255.

2 Chitty, Prerog. p. 54. See 10 Anne, c. vii. s. 11. 32 Geo. III. c. lxiii. s. 5., as to prayers for the Royal Family.

3 Grot. D. de la G. et de la P. 1. i. c. iii. § 6; and 1. i. c. i. § 6.