Selected quad for the lemma: land_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
land_n	hold_v	king_n	tenant_n	4,936	5	10.1458	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93441	The antiquity & original of the Court of Chancery and authority of the lord chancellor of England being a branch of Serjeant Snagg's reading, upon the 28 chapter of Magna Charta, at the Middle Temple, in Lent, 13 Eliz. : with his congratulatory epistle, (by way of preface) to the Lord Chancellor Hatton, in 29 Eliz.	Snagg, Robert.	1654 (1654)	Wing S4381A; ESTC R42651	18,654	95

THE ANTIQUITY ORIGINAL Of the COURT of CHANCERY And AUTHORITY of the LORD CHANCELLOR OF ENGLAND BEING A Branch of Serjeant Snagg's Reading upon the 28 Chapter of Magna Charta at the Middle Temple in Lent 13 Eliz. WITH His Congratulatory Epistle by way of Preface to the Lord CHANCELLOR Hatton in 29 Eliz. Major haeredit as à Legibus quam à parentibus Cicero LONDON Printed for Henry Seile over against Saint Dunstans Church in Fleetstreet 1654. To the Right Honourable the Lords Commissioners for Custody of the Great Seal of England My Lords WHat an eminent and a learn'd Professor of the Laws of England heretofore in Manuscript presented to an Honourable Predecessor of your Lordships at his first entrance to that high place Be pleased to give a Puisnè leave to present in print unto your Lordships at your Investiture A small fragment I confess yet such I hope as will appear neither unworthy of your approbation nor improper for your Patronage and Protection The subject-matter as well of the Authors Epistle as of his Readers observations being a little Map and Modell of your Lordships great Office and Jurisdiction and rarely to be found in our printed Authorities which peradventure may be the Reason why that antient and excellent Judicatory hath lately met with such great Envy and Opposition Learning having no other Enemy but Ignorance and most Men being naturally inclin'd to apprehend amisse of that they comprehend not Though it will not be denied but that any Court of Iustice in England may admit of Regulation My Lords I shall not say any thing for the Piece it speaks Reason and can best speak for it self I shall only crave your Honours pardon for this great presumption of Your Lordships Most humbly devoted T. L. To the Right Honourable Sir Christopher Hatton Knight Lord Chancellor of England Robert Snagg an Apprentice of the Common Laws of that Realm wisheth all increase of Grace Mercy and Peace Honour and Prosperity in this World and perfect Felicity in the World to come WHen Right Honourable it came to my course to Read in the Middle Temple after I had there continued a Puisnè full 20 years and more for so they are called till they Read and then I was to become an Apprentice of the Common Law and in my Reading to deliver to my Fellows of that House such Notes as I had collected in the course of my Study that I thought to be most profitable to be opened for the exercise and use of Law in our time And whē I had looked into some other mens Travels that had Read before me and other Writers and found many several Conceipts and sundry Incertainties touching the Commencement of our Law and whence it came and what it was and I thought it as meet as Tully teacheth that it should be understood Quid est de quo disputetur as to enter into argument of particular cases which were to be decided thereby which is the manner of that exercise well known to your Lordship as one that entred by that Gate into the happy and honourable Course of life that God of his great Goodness hath most graciously led you in from Grace to Grace and Honor to Honor to the highest Honor and most absolute Office that is in England under her Majesty who is immediate in all Dignity Honor and Authority under God in this Land But when I had considered according to my capacity of all the Reports that be in print of the practice of the Law and of some other that I have I could find no certainty of the Commencement of it what it was nor whence it came For some said it was the Custom of Normandy that the Conquerour brought in and placed here Some that it came out of Germany brought by those people that were called Angli that came hither to inhabit of whō this Land took the name of Angolia and the Law the name of Lex Angliae which savoured more of Reason that is the ground of our Law And some imagined one thing and some another But that great learned Judge Mr. Littleton in his first Book satisfied me that it could neither be the Law of Normandy nor of any other Country in Germany nor elsewhere but peculiar to this Land For he saith That Tenant by the Courtesy of England is to hold the Land if his Wife die during his life by the Law of England is called Tenant by the Courtesy of England for this that this is not used in any other Realm but only in England whereof I collected that if the same Law had been in any other Realm that Tenure by the Law had likewise been there And I found in stories that presently after the Conquest there were divers Insurrections not only of the people that did rise without Reason but of divers of the Nobility of the best sort who endured Famin and that so far as they did ear the vilest vermin yea and the utter overthrow of their Houses and Posterity And all their cause was but to be restored to their antient Laws Liberties And that civil dissention continued long for that cause and the Nobility without restitution of them would not yield to their Kings as men that shewed themselves to be made of the right English mould ready to endure any pain and loss rather than the loss of their native Laws Liberties and to subject themselves to the Will-government of their new Lords and new Laws that the Conqueror brought in and the pleasures and oftentimes the displeasures of their Kings who did all and took all as pleased themselves under pretence of their Prerogative which Prerogative rightly used and truly understood is a thing most honorable to the Crown and not prejudicial to the Law nor hurtful to the Realm nor any Subjects lawful Interest or Liberty But that Will-government in the Kings discontentment in the Nobility continual Wars within the Realm continued until K. Henry the 3. who being by that time by divers descents purged and purified by our English Air and by Education after the order of our Nation and so become English and of a better nature than the Aliens and their offspring of love to his subjects was content to allow Englishmen their English Laws And thereupon the 10th day of Febr. in the 9th year of his Reign granted under his great Seal the Great Charter thereby to restore the Laws of the Land the Liberties of the Subjects and to limit his Prerogatives so as they should be prejudicial to neither But after kindled as it seemed by the heat of his youth he continued not in that good mind but infringed the same Charter and chose his Will for his direction as others his late Predecessors had don and left that Law of the Land which he had granted to be Restored and Revived Whereupon 40 years wars after that followed between him and his Barons as they be generally Termed though the greatest Earls others

of the chief of the Nobility were Partners therin which were never fully appeased until the Parliament was holden at Marlebridge about the 52 year of his Reign when and where that Charter was enacted in that Parliament and thereby the antient Laws and Liberties revived and restored which Charter so enacted sithence hath been by all Kings Queens solemnly sworn at their Coronations to be kept and so hath been sacredly Observed to this day unless some Forgetfulness in some Kings and Ignorance in some Officers hath infringed the same But now by Gods blessing plentifully powred upon us it is in sull Use to the great Comfort of all good Subjects and immortal fame of her most Excellent Majesty And in the 28 Chapter of that Charter and Act of Parliament I find it set down in Latine in excellent and significant brief words to this effect That no Freeman shall be dealt with either in Life Liberty Lands Liberties Body or Goods nor that the King would send for any nor proceed against any Nisi per legale judiciū parium suorum aut per legem terrae And that the King would not defer deny nor sell Justice or Right to any which is as it were the sum of all the Charter Act and the whole mark that was shot at to revive the antient Laws and restore the antient Liberty and Liberties to the Subjects Wherein I noted That both how far the Prerogative should go and what is Right and Justice common to all is referred to be decided per legem terrae what therefore that Lex terrae was which was so carefully sought dearly bought with so much Noble blood which was then thereby revived I thought if I could find I had that I sought for And therfore I thought it best to begin with such Reporters or Writers of our Law as writ nearest the time of that Charter and looked into Mr. Bracton that wrote about 9 H. 3. the very time of the first granting of the Charter who was one of the chief that were appointed as it is delivered by Traditiō to find out again the antient Laws of the Land when the King was pleased to put thē again into the force that they had lost by the Conquest And in his Book in print I find it thus written Cum autem ferè in omnibus Regionibus utatur legibus jure scripto sola Anglia usa est in suis fmibus jure non scripto consuetudine in ea quidem ex non scripto jus venit quod usus comprobavit And after that he saith in the next Chapter these words Leges Anglicanae fuerunt approbatae consensu utentium Sacramento Regum confirmatae And Cap. 3. Consuetudo more utentium approbata vicem Legis obtinet consuetudinis non vilis est authoritas And he saith further Lib. 1. Cap. 8. treating of that Law which he calleth the Custom of the Land Lex autem facit Regem attribuat igitur Rex Legi quod Lex attribuit ei id est dominationem potestatem nam ubi dominatur voluntas non Lex ibi non est Rex Whereof may be aptly collected that before this Law was there was no King here in this Land for if the Law of the Land made the King there was none before it But Kings we find by all Stories to be of a great antiquity here in this Land and so by consequence the Law must And then looking for that matter in the Reports of the Law I found a Book Case in 2 H. 4. fol. 18. That it was agreed by the Judges that the Common Custom of the Realm was the Law of the Land And in that point looking further I found all Books of Law agree which Judgement of the Judges from time after the Enacting of that Charter and the judgement of Mr. Bracton before at the time of the penning of the Charter concurring in one satisfied me That Lex terrae which is there set down and thereby revived and now holden by the great Charter whereto every King and Queen is sworn at the Coronation was the antient Custom of the Land that all People of several Nations that at several times inhabited here liked best of as fittest for this place whereby the Kings lived in greatest Honor and Ease and the People in greatest Quietnes and Freedom wherfore thereto the Kings were content to bind themselves and the Subjects could abide no other And so I drew that travel to this conclusion That our Law is the antient Custom of the Country or Land and of that Antiquity that there is no Record nor Matter that can shew the Commencement thereof nor any man can tell it but it was before all memory of Man that remaineth in the world consisting of Maxims General Grounds Rules received approved allowed as just good necessary for the Governmēt of this Land begun when this Land first became a Common-wealth under a King and ever sithence used approved and allowed from time to time time out of mind of Man and by experience found in all Ages to be fittest for the place and to be necessary honest and profitable both for the Prince and People and being so found fit and continued it became a Custom to be observed of all that should inhabit or remain here and when it was lost by the Conquest it was again restored by Common consent of Parliament as was necessary it should be for that the force it had by Custom and Usage was interrupted by the Conquest So as the Custom of the Realm revived by Parliament is the Law of the Land which is the Genus to all And the Parliament and the Acts thereof and the Prerogative of the Prince and the particular Customs of several Counties Cities Boroughs Manors be all but Species of it For that General Custom of the Realm which is the Law of the Land authorizeth the Parliament limiteth the Prerogative alloweth and disalloweth of Private Customs and whatsoever in England is to be allowed and not to be allowed as they are consonant or dissonant to the reason thereof But when I had found out this by Reading then looking into the course of Practice I found the Lord Chancellor fitting highest in Westminster-Hall and had most to do bare the greatest rule and yet gave his judgement as it seem'd to me as it pleased himself whatsoever the Law of the Land required in the case And seeing Men of great Honor Learning Integrity sit in that place and so judge I was in a maze not finding at the first how it could stand with the Great Charter that referred all judgement ad Legem terrae and how any thing different from that Law could be allowable in the Land sith the Kings were all sworn to maintain the Charter that restored the Law and his Lordship and all the Judges were placed by the King But when I looked further and perused it well I found that the Custom of the