It was perceived, however, by the assertors of the popular cause under James I. that, by this narrowing of the electoral franchise, many boroughs were subjected to the influence of the privy council, which, by restoring the householders to their legitimate rights, would strengthen the interests of the country. Hence Lord Coke lays it down in his fourth institute, that "if the king newly incorporate an ancient borough, which before sent burgesses to parliament, and granteth that certain selected burgesses shall make election of the burgesses of parliament, where all the burgesses elected before, this charter taketh not away the election of the other burgesses. And so, if a city or borough hath power to make ordinances, they cannot make an ordinance that a less number shall elect burgesses for the parliament than made the election before; for free elections of members of the high court of parliament are pro bono publico, and not to be compared to other cases of election of mayors, bailiffs, etc., of corporations.[72] He adds, however, "by original grant or by custom, a selected number of burgesses may elect and bind the residue." This restriction was admitted by the committee over which Glanville presided in 1624.[73] But both they and Lord Coke believed the representation of boroughs to be from a date before what is called legal memory, that is, the accession of Richard I. It is not easy to reconcile their principle, that an elective right once subsisting could not be limited by anything short of immemorial prescription, with some of their own determinations, and still less with those which have subsequently occurred, in favour of a restrained right of suffrage. There seems, on the whole, great reason to be of opinion, that where a borough is so ancient as to have sent members to parliament before any charter of incorporation proved, or reasonably presumed to have been granted, or where the word burgensis is used without anything to restrain its meaning in an ancient charter, the right of election ought to have been acknowledged either in the resident householders paying general and local taxes, or in such of them as possessed an estate of freehold within the borough. And whatever may have been the primary meaning of the word burgess, it appears consonant to the popular spirit of the English constitution that, after the possessors of leasehold interests became so numerous and opulent as to bear a very large share in the public burthens, they should have enjoyed commensurate privileges; and that the resolution of Mr. Glanville's committee in favour of what they called the common-law right should have been far more uniformly received, and more consistently acted upon, not merely as agreeable to modern theories of liberty, from which some have intimated it to have sprung, but as grounded on the primitive spirit and intention of the law of parliament.