Note 66 — Chapter III · (continued 2)

It would be wholly erroneous, I think, to infer from this statement of Stuart, that either the "priests, princes, earls, or eorldormen" exercised any authority over the jury in the trial of causes, in the way of dictating the law to them. Henry's account of this matter doubtless gives a much more accurate representation of the truth. He says that anciently

"The meeting (the county court) was opened with a discourse by the bishop, explaining, out of the Scriptures and ecclesiastical canons, their several duties as good Christians and members of the church. After this, the alderman, or one of his assessors, made a discourse on the laws of the land, and the duties of good subjects and good citizens. When these preliminaries were over, they proceeded to try and determine, first the causes of the church, next the pleas of the crown, and last of all the controversies of private parties."—3 Henry's History of Great Britain, 348.

This view is corroborated by Tyrrell's Introduction to the History of England, p. 83-84, and by Spence's Origin of the Laws and Political Institutions of Modern Europe, p. 447, and the note on the same page. Also by a law of Canute to this effect, In every county let there be twice a year an assembly, whereat the bishop and the earl shall be present, the one to instruct the people in divine, the other in human, laws.—Wilkins, p. 136.