*16. The Permanent Council.*--One line, thus, along which were laid the foundations of the English governmental system of to-day comprised the transformation of the Norman Great Council into the semi-aristocratic, semi-democratic assemblage known as Parliament. A parallel line (p. 017) was the development from the Great Council of a body designated after the thirteenth century as the Permanent, after the fifteenth as the Privy, Council, and likewise of the four principal courts of law. By a very gradual process those members of the original Council who were attached in some immediate manner to the court or to the administrative system acquired a status which was different from that of their colleagues. The Great Council met irregularly and infrequently. So likewise did Parliament. But the services of the court and the business of government must go on continuously, and for the care of these things there grew up a body which at first comprised essentially a standing commission, an inner circle, of the Council, but which in time acquired a virtually independent position and was designated, for purposes of distinction, as the Permanent Council. The composition of this body varied from time to time. Certain functionaries were included regularly, while the remaining members owed their places to special summons of the crown. Its powers were enormous, being at the same time administrative, judicial, and financial, and the mass of business to which it was required to give attention was increasingly great.