ousand marks;[*******] Jurnet, two thousand; Bennet, five hundred: at
another, Licorica, widow of David the Jew, of Oxford, was required to
pay six thousand marks; and she was delivered over to six of the
richest and discreetest Jews in England, who were to answer for the
sum.[********]

[** Hoveden, Chron. Gerv. p. 1410.]

[*** Madox, chap. xiv.]

[**** Spel. Gloss, in verbo Forests.]

[***** Madox, Hist. of the Exch. p. 151. This
happened in the reign of King John.]

[****** Madox, Hist. of the Exch, p. 151]

[******* Madox, Hist. of the Exch, p. 153.]

[******** Madox, Hist. of the Exch, p, 168.]

Henry III borrowed five thousand marks from the earl of Cornwall; and
for his repayment consigned over to him all the Jews in England. The
revenue arising from exactions upon this nation was so considerable,
that there was a particular court of exchequer set apart for managing
it.

We may judge concerning the low state of commerce among the English,
when the Jews, notwithstanding these oppressions, could still find
their account in trading among them, and lending them money. And as
the improvements of agriculture were also much checked by the immense
possessions of the nobility, by the disorders of the times, and by the
precarious state of feudal property, it appears that industry of no kind
could then have place in the kingdom.

It is asserted by Sir Harry Spelman,[*] as an undoubted truth, that,
during the reigns of the first Norman princes, every edict of the king,
issued with the consent of his privy council, had the full force of
law. But the barons surely were not so passive as to intrust a power,
entirely arbitrary and despotic, into the hands of the sovereign. It
only appears, that the constitution had not fixed any precise boundaries
to the royal power; that the right of issuing proclamations on any
emergence, and of exacting obedience to them,--a right which was always
supposed inherent in the crown,--is very difficult to be distinguished
from a legislative authority; that the extreme imperfection of the
ancient laws, and the sudden exigencies which often occurred in such
turbulent governments, obliged the prince to exert frequently the
latent powers of his prerogative; that he naturally proceeded, from the
acquiescence of the people, to assume, in many particulars of moment,
an authority from which he had excluded himself by express statutes,
charters, or conce