Page:The Leveller movement; a study in the history and political theory of the English Great Civil War (IA levellermovement01peas).djvu/55

 upon the fundamentall Law of the Kingdome, and constitution of Parliament.” The same phrase recurred again and again as the demands of Parliament rose higher. It was the king’s answer to Parliament’s demand for the power over the militia; to its demand regarding the appointment of governors of castles. The declarations drawn for his use by Edward Hyde steadily protested against the Parliament’s enlarged use of its law-declaring powers. Thus in the answer to the Declaration of May 5, Hyde made the king ask that Parliament state specifically the laws on which it based its militia ordinance, and tell where they were to be found. If Parliament’s marvellous secret now proved sufficient to divest the king of his rights, it might next be employed to take away the liberties of the subjects; for if the votes of the two Houses had such virtue in declaring new laws, they must be equally efficacious in repealing old ones.

The Royalists, however, were strongest in appealing to common sense against the inconsistencies of Parliament’s theory and practice. They subjected the Parliament’s somewhat inconsistent claims to searching analysis. Royalists put aside the theory that Parliament could do no wrong because it was the kingdom incarnate. They