The people and the parliament, without abandoning forever all their liberties and privileges, could acquiesce in none of these precedents, how ancient and frequent soever.

And were the authority of such precedents admitted, the utmost that could be inferred is, that the constitution of England was, at that time, an inconsistent fabric, whose jarring and discordant parts must soon destroy each other, and from the dissolution of the old, beget some new form of civil government, more uniform and consistent.
* See note AAA, at the end of the volume.
** Kennet, p.

696.
In the public and avowed conduct of the king and the house of commons, throughout this whole reign, there appears sufficient cause of quarrel and mutual disgust; yet are we not to imagine that this was the sole foundation of that jealousy which prevailed between them.

During debates in the house, it often happened that a particular member, more ardent and zealous than the rest, would display the highest sentiments of liberty, which the commons contented themselves to hear with silence and seeming approbation; and the king, informed of these harangues, concluded the whole house to be infected with the same principles, and to be engaged in a combination against his prerogative.

The king, on the other hand, though he valued himself extremely on his kingcraft, and perhaps was not altogether incapable of dissimulation, seems to have been very little endowed with the gift of secrecy; but openly at his table, in all companies, inculcated those monarchical tenets which he had so strongly imbibed.