. This was denominated the great council, being the lords
spiritual and temporal, with the king's ordinary council annexed to
them, as a council within a council. And even in much earlier times the
lords, as hereditary counsellors, were, either whenever they thought fit
to attend, or on special summonses by the king (it is hard to say
which), assistant members of this council, both for advice and for
jurisdiction. This double capacity of the peerage, as members of the
parliament or legislative assembly and of the deliberative and judicial
council, throws a very great obscurity over the subject. However, we
find that private petitions for redress were, even under Edward I.,
presented to the lords in parliament as much as to the ordinary council.
The parliament was considered a high court of justice, where relief was
to be given in cases where the course of law was obstructed, as well as
where it was defective. Hence the intermission of parliaments was looked
upon as a delay of justice, and their annual meeting is demanded upon
that ground. "The king," says Fleta, "has his court in his council, in
his parliaments, in the presence of bishops, earls, barons, lords, and
other wise men, where the doubtful cases of judgments are resolved, and
new remedies are provided against new injuries, and justice is rendered
to every man according to his desert."[357] In the third year of Edward
II. receivers of petitions began to be appointed at the opening of every
parliament, who usually transmitted them to the ordinary, but in some
instances to the great council. These receivers were commonly three for
England, and three for Ireland, Wales, Gascony, and other foreign
dominions. There were likewise two corresponding classes of auditors or
triers of petitions. These consisted partly of bishops or peers, partly
of judges and other members of the council; and they seem to have been
instituted in order to disburthen the council by giving answers to some
petitions. But about the middle of Edward III.'s time they ceased to act
juridically in this respect, and confined themselves to transmitting
petitions to the lords of the council.

The great council, according to the definition we have given, consisting
of the lords spiritual and temporal, in conjunction with the ordinary
council, or, in other words, of all who were severally summoned to
parliament, exercised a considerable jurisdiction, as well civil as
criminal. In this jurisdiction it is