Constitutional history -- England -- Sources; Magna Carta
we shall never forbid any one to swear. All those, moreover, in the
land who of themselves and of their own accord are unwilling to swear
to the twenty-five to help them in constraining and molesting us, we
shall by our command compel the same to swear to the effect aforesaid.
And if any one of the five-and-twenty barons shall have died or
departed from the land, or be incapacitated in any other manner which
would prevent the foresaid provisions being carried out, those of the
said twenty-five barons who are left shall choose another in his place
according to their own judgment, and he shall be sworn in the same way
as the others. Further, in all matters, the execution of which is
intrusted to these twenty-five barons, if perchance these twenty-five
are present, that which the majority of those present ordain or command
shall be held as fixed and established, exactly as if the whole
twenty-five had concurred in this; and the said twenty-five shall swear
that they will faithfully observe all that is aforesaid, and cause it
to be observed with all their might. And we shall procure nothing from
any one, directly or indirectly, whereby any part of these concessions
and liberties might be revoked or diminished; and if any such thing has
been procured, let it be void and null, and we shall never use it
personally or by another.
62. And all the ill-will, hatreds, and bitterness that have arisen
between us and our men, clergy and lay, from the date of the quarrel,
we have completely remitted and pardoned every one. Moreover, all
trespasses occasioned by the said quarrel, from Easter in the sixteenth
year of our reign till the restoration of peace, we have fully remitted
to all, both clergy and laymen, and completely forgiven, as far as
pertains to us. And, on this head, we have caused to be made for them
letters testimonial patent of the lord Stephen, archbishop of
Canterbury, of the lord Henry, archbishop of Dublin, of the bishops
aforesaid, and of Master Pandulf as touching this security and the
concessions aforesaid.
63. Wherefore it is our will, and we firmly enjoin, that the English
Church be free, and that the men in our kingdom have and hold all the
aforesaid liberties, rights, and concessions, well and peaceably,
freely and quietly, fully and wholly, for themselves and their heirs,
of us and our heirs, in all respects and in all places for ever, as is
aforesaid. An oath, moreover, has been taken, as well on our part as on
the part of the barons, that all these conditions aforesaid shall be
kept in good faith and without evil intent. Given under our hand—the
above-named and many others being witnesses—in the meadow which is
called Runnymede, between Windsor and Staines, on the fifteenth day of
June, in the seventeenth year of our reign.
The text of THE MAGNA CARTA
The Magna Carta (The Great Charter):
Preamble:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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