Chapter I.: "In the first place we have granted to God, and by this

our present charter confirmed for us and our heirs for ever, that the English Church shall be free, and shall have her rights entire, and her liberties inviolate; and we will that it be thus observed; which is apparent from this that the freedom of elections, which is reckoned most important and very essential to the English Church, we of our pure and unconstrained will, did grant, and by our charter confirm and did obtain the ratification of the same from our lord, Pope Innocent III. before the quarrel arose between us and our barons, and this we will observe, and our will is that it be observed in good faith by our heirs for ever. We have also granted to all freemen of our kingdom, for us and for our heirs for ever, all the underwritten liberties, to be had and held by them and their heirs, of us and our heirs for ever."

Perhaps the most interesting feature of Magna Charta is to {353} be found in the fact, that it did actually in most cases come to be applied ever so much wider than had apparently been the original intention. It was in this sense a vital document as it were, since it had within itself the power of developing so as to suit the varying circumstances for which recourse was had to it. There is no doubt at all of the good faith of the men who appealed to it, nor of their firm persuasion that the document actually intended what they claimed to find in it. Modern criticism has succeeded in stripping from the original expressions many of the added meanings that posterity attached to them, but in so doing has really not lessened the estimation in which Magna Charta must be held.

The position is indeed noteworthily analagous to that of the original deposit of faith and the development of doctrine which has taken place. Higher criticism has done much to show how little of certain modern ideas was apparently contained explicitly in the original formulas of Christian faith, and yet by so doing has not lessened our beliefs, but has rather tended to make us realize the vitality of the original Christian tenets. As everything living in God's creation, they have developed by a principle implanted within them to suit the evolutionary conditions of man's intelligence and the developing problems that they were supposed to offer solutions for. The comparison, of course, like all comparisons, must walk a little lame, since after all Magna Charta is a human document, and yet the very fact that it should have presented itself under so many varying conditions, ever with new significance to succeeding generations of thinking men, is the best evidence of how nearly man's work at its best may approach that of the Creator. It is an exemplification, in a word, of the creative genius of the century, a worthy compeer of the other accomplishments which have proved so enduring and so capable of making their influence felt even upon distant generations.

It is of the very essence of the practicality of Magna Charta that among the early chapters of the important document--Chapter VII.--is one that concerns widows and their property rights immediately after the death of their husbands. Previous chapters had discussed questions of guardianship and inheritance, since it was especially minors who in this rude period {354} were likely to suffer from the injustice of the crown, of their over-lords in the nobility, and even from their guardians. While Magna Charta, then, begins with the principles for the regulation of matters of property as regards children, it proceeds at once to the next class most liable to injustice because of their inability to properly defend themselves by force of arms--the widows.