"The king hath superiors--viz., God and the law by which he is made king; also his court--viz., his earls and barons. Earls are the king's associates, and he that hath an associate hath a master; and therefore, if the king be unbridled, or (which is all one) without law, they ought to bridle him, unless they will be unbridled as the king, and then the commons may cry, Lord Jesus, pity us," etc. An eminent lawyer, time of Edward I., writes: "Although the king ought to have no equal in the land, yet because the king and his commissioners can be both judge and party, the king ought by right to have companions, to hear and determine in Parliament all writs and plaints of wrongs done by the king, the queen, or their children." These views found expression in the coronation oath. Edward II. was forced to swear: "Will you grant and keep, and by your oath confirm to the people of England the laws and customs to them, granted by the ancient kings of England, your righteous and godly predecessors; and especially to the clergy and people, by the glorious King St. Edward, your predecessor?" The king's answer--"I do them grant and promise." "Do you grant to hold and keep the laws and rightful customs which the commonalty of your realm shall have chosen, and to maintain and enforce them to the honor of God after your power?" The king's answer--"I this do grant and promise." I shall not dwell upon the event most frequently quoted with reference to the era of the Plantagenets--I mean King John's "Magna Charta." It was more social than territorial, and tended to limit the power of the Crown, and to increase that of the barons. The Plantagenets had not begun to call Commons to the House of Lords. The issue of writs was confined to those who were barons-by-tenure, the PATRICIANS of the Norman period. The creation of NOBLES was the invention of a later age. The baron feasted in his hall, while the slave grovelled in his cabin. Bracton, the famous lawyer of the time of Henry III., says: "All the goods a slave acquired belonged to his master, who could take them from him whenever he pleased," therefore a man could not purchase his own freedom. "In the same year, 1283," says the Annals of Dunstable, "we sold our slave by birth, William Fyke, and all his family, and received one mark from the buyer." The only hope for the slave was, to try and get into one of the walled towns, when he became free. Until the Wars of the Roses, these serfs were greatly harassed by their owners. In the reign of Edward I., efforts were made to prevent the alienation of land by those who received it from the Norman sovereigns. The statute of mortmain was passed to restrain the giving of lands to the Church, the statute DE DONIS to prevent alienation to laymen. The former declares: