Page:A History and Defence of Magna Charta.djvu/120

74 will enlarge the term of years for the grant of the tenth, and will throw you in a year or two?” Which accordingly afterwards came to paſs, as the following narration ſhall declare. Here is a loſt King and a loſt nation: Why ſhould we read any farther?

years after, having ſpent moſt of that time in the wars in, for to the Holy Land he never went, he calls a parliament at London upon Hoke day, which was the fulleſt aſſembly that ever was there ſeen. In ſhort, the King wants money, was in debt, and would have the aid from the baronies to be continued in proportion to the tenths, and ſo, completing their tax, he might be bound to give them his thanks in full. This would have amounted to ſuch a ſum as would have impoveriſhed the realm, and made it defenceleſs, and expoſed it to foreigners. Upon conſultation therefore, becauſe that propoſal was impoſſible, they came to this conceſſion, “That they would charge and burden themſelves much, for to have Magna Charta to be honeſtly kept, from that time forth hereafter, without pettifogging quirks, which he had ſo often promiſed, and ſworn and bound himſelf to it, under the ſtricteſt ties that could be laid upon