The years of Simon of Montfort and Edward I., which saw the beginnings of a representative national assembly, were not a time of theoretical discussion on political rights. The English nation, indeed, has ever been averse from political theories. The notion of a carefully balanced constitution was outside the calculations of medieval statesmen, and the idea of political democracy was not included among their visions. "Even the scholastic writers, amid their calculations of all possible combinations of principles in theology and morals, well aware of the difference between the 'rex politicus' who rules according to law, and the tyrant who rules without it, and of the characteristics of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy, with their respective corruptions, contented themselves for the most part with balancing the spiritual and secular powers, and never broached the idea of a growth into political enfranchisement. Yet, in the long run, this has been the ideal towards which the healthy development of national life in Europe has constantly tended, only the steps towards it have not been taken to suit a preconceived theory."[32] Each step towards democracy has been taken "to suit the convenience of party or the necessities of kings, to induce the newly admitted classes to give their money, to produce political contentment." The only two principles that are apparent in the age-long struggles for political freedom in England, that are recognised and acknowledged, are: (1) That that which touches all shall be approved by all; (2) that government rests on the consent of the governed. Over and over again these two principles may be seen at work. * * * * * CHAPTER III POPULAR INSURRECTION IN ENGLAND GENERAL RESULTS OF POPULAR RISINGS Popular insurrection has never been successful in England; a violent death and a traitor's doom have been the lot of every leader of the common people who took up arms against the Government. The Civil War that brought Charles I. to the scaffold, and the Revolution that deposed James II. and set William of Orange on the throne, were the work of country gentlemen and Whig statesmen, not of the labouring people. But if England has never seen popular revolution triumphant and democracy set up by force of arms, the earlier centuries witnessed more than one effort to gain by open insurrection some measure of freedom for the working people of the land. No other way than violent resistance seemed possible to peasants and artisans in the twelfth, fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries, if their wrongs were to be mitigated and their rulers to be called to account.