Thus, for the first time, the interests of all classes were protected, and for the first time the English people appear in the constitutional history of the country as a united body. So highly was this charter esteemed, that in the course of the next two centuries it was confirmed no less than thirty-seven times; and the very day that Charles II entered London, after the civil wars of the seventeenth century, the House of Commons asked him to confirm it again (1660). Magna Carta was the first great step in that development of constitutional government in which England has taken the lead. 200. John's Efforts to break the Charter (1215). But John had no sooner set his hand to this document than he determined to repudiate it. He hired bands of soldiers on the Continent to come to his aid. The charter had been obtained by armed revolt; for this reason the Pope opposed it. He suspended Archbishop Langton (S196), and threatened the barons with excommunication (S167), if they persisted in enforcing the provisions of the charter. 201. The Barons invite Louis of France to aid them (1215). In their desperation,--for the King's hired foreign soldiers were now ravaging the country,--the barons dispatched a messenger to John's sworn enemy, Philip, King of France. They invited him to send over his son, Prince Louis, to free them from tyranny, and become ruler of the kingdom. He came with all speed, and soon made himself master of the southern counties. 202. King John's Death (1216). John was the first sovereign who had styled himself, on his great seal, "King of England,"[1] thus formally claiming the actual ownership of the realm. He was now to find that the sovereign who has no place in his subjects' hearts has small hold of their possessions. [1] The late Professor E. A. Freeman, in his "Norman Conquest," I, 85, note, says that though Richard Coeur de Lion had used this title in issuing charters, yet John was the first king who put this inscription on the great seal. The rest of his ignominious reign was spent in war against the barons and Prince Louis of France. "They have placed twenty-five kings over me!" he shouted, in his fury, referring to the twenty-five leading men who had been appointed to see that the Great Charter did not become a dead letter. But the twenty-five did their duty, and the war was on. In the midst of it John suddenly died. The old record said of him--and said rightly--that he was "a knight without truth, a king without justice, a Christian without faith."[2] The Church returned good for evil, and permitted him to be buried in front of the high altar of Worcester cathedral.