There is no person who is ignorant of the first origin of the free institutions of England, or how the coalition of the great barons, in 1215, wrested from King John _Magna Charta_. It is not so generally known that the great charter was renewal and confirmed at repeated intervals by the majority of the kings. There were more than thirty confirmations of it between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries. And not only was the charter confirmed, but new statutes were made in order to strengthen and develop it. It continued to subsist, therefore, without break or interval. At the same time the House of Commons was formed, and had taken its place in the supreme institutions of the country. {215} It was under the race of the Plantagenets that it veritably took root; not that it played any great part in the state at that epoch, for the government, properly so called, did not come within the scope of its functions, even as a mere influence; it interfered only when it was called upon by the king, and almost always did so with reluctance and hesitation, as if fearing to engage and compromise itself, and displaying no eagerness to augment its power. But when it concerned the defence of private rights, the fortunes or dwellings of the citizens, individual liberty, in a word, the House of Commons upon such occasions performed its mission with great energy and constancy, and established all the principles which have become the basis of the English constitution. After the Plantagenets, and especially under the Tudors, the House of Commons, or rather the whole parliament, presents itself under another aspect. It ceased to defend individual liberty so strenuously as under the Plantagenets. Arbitrary arrests, and violations of private rights, became much more frequent, and were oftener passed over in silence. As a counterpoise, the parliament held a greater place in the general government of the state. Henry VIII., for instance, needing a public support or instrument in order to change the religion of the country, and to regulate the succession to the throne, made use of the parliament, and especially of the House of Commons. Under the Plantagenets it had been an instrument of resistance, an assertor of private rights; under the Tudors it became an instrument of government, a participator in general politics; so that, at the end of the sixteenth century, although it had served or suffered almost all descriptions of tyranny, its importance had nevertheless greatly increased; its power was founded--that power upon which, in truth, representative government is based.