"Thus these famous charters were brought nearly to the shape in which they have ever since stood; and they were, during many generations, the peculiar favorites of the English nation, and esteemed the most sacred rampart to national liberty and independence. As they secured the rights of all orders of men, they were anxiously defended by all, and became the basis, in a manner, of the English monarchy, and a kind of original contract, which both limited the authority of the king and ensured the conditional allegiance of his subjects. Though often violated, they were still claimed by the nobility and people; and, as no precedents were supposed valid that infringed them, they rather acquired than lost authority, from the frequent attempts made against them in several ages, by regal and arbitrary power."--_Hume_, ch. 12. Mackintosh says, "It was understood by the simplest of the unlettered age for whom it was intended. It was remembered by them.... For almost five centuries it was appealed to as the decisive authority on behalf of the people.... To have produced it, to have preserved it, to have matured it, constitute the immortal claim of England on the esteem of mankind. Her Bacons and Shakspeares, her Miltons and Newtons, with all the truth which they have revealed, and all the generous virtues which they have inspired, are of inferior value when compared with the subjection of men and their rulers to the principles of justice; if, indeed, it be not more true that these mighty spirits could not have been formed except under equal laws, nor roused to full activity without the influence of that spirit which the Great Charter breathed over their forefathers."--_Mackintosh's Hist. of Eng._, ch. 3.[110] Of the Great Charter, the trial by jury is the vital part, and the only part that places the liberties of the people in their own keeping. Of this Blackstone says: "The trial by jury, or the country, _per patriam_, is also that trial by the peers of every Englishman, which, as the grand bulwark of his liberties, is secured to him by the Great Charter; _nullus liber homo capiatur, vel imprisonetur, aut exuletur, aut aliquo modo destruatur, nisi per legale judicium parium suorum, vel per legem terrae...._ The liberties of England cannot but subsist so long as this palladium remains sacred and inviolate, not only from all open attacks, which none will be so hardy as to make, but also from all secret machinations which may sap and undermine it."[111] "The trial by jury ever has been, and I trust ever will be, looked upon as the glory of the English law.... It is the most transcendent privilege which any subject can enjoy or wish for, that he cannot be affected in his property, his liberty, or his person, but by the unanimous consent of twelve of his neighbors and equals."[112]