quity derived into this Kingdom of England, with several kinds and ceremonious forms thereof, from good authority described.' The result of Selden's investigations into the origin of this mode of trial led him to attribute it to the Normans, a conclusion in which he is supported by the best modern authorities (Pollock and Maitland, History of English Law, ii. 597).
The publication of three such works in one year by a student of an Inn of Court of two years' standing was a remarkable evidence of industry and learning. Selden's next two publications show him associated with the poets of his day. In 1612 he wrote (at the request of Michael Drayton, then poet-laureate) notes on the first eighteen cantos of his 'Polyolbion,' and in 1613 he wrote commendatory verses in Greek, Latin, and English to William Browne's 'Britannia's Pastorals.'
In 1614 Selden published his 'Titles of Honour,' dedicated to his friend and chamber-fellow, Edward Heyward. In the first part he deals with the titles and dignities of emperors, kings, and other rulers, beginning with the inquiry whether there were kings before the flood. In the second part he deals with inferior titles, commencing with those of heirs-apparent to thrones; and finally discusses feminine titles, honorary attributes such as 'clarissimus' and 'illustris,' and the laws of precedence.
In 1616 Selden edited the treatise of Sir John Fortescue (1394?–1476?) [q. v.], 'De Laudibus Legum Angliæ,' and in 1617 he wrote a 'Treatise on the Jews in England' for Purchas; this appeared in Purchas's work in a mutilated form, a circumstance which is said to have led to a quarrel between the two authors.
In the same year (1617) appeared Selden's treatise 'De Diis Syris,' the first of his oriental studies (see pp. 219–20 below). In the same year also was written 'A brief Discourse touching the Office of Lord Chancellor of England,' which was presented by Selden to Sir Francis Bacon on his appointment as lord keeper. A fourth and still more important book appeared in the same year (1617), the 'History of Tythes,' the best known of all Selden's productions, except his 'Table Talk.' It was dedicated to Sir Robert Cotton. Selden begins the history of tithes with the gift of Abraham to Melchizedek, and then discusses them as they existed among the Jews. He next considers what traces there are of them among the Greeks and Romans; then, arriving at the Christian era, he divides the history into periods—from the birth of Christ to A.D. 400, from A.D. 400 to 800, from A.D. 800 to 1200, from A.D. 1200 to his own day—dealing in fullest detail with their origin and development in England.
In more than one passage of this essay Selden handles the question whether tithes are payable jure divino. In the sixth chapter (section 6), he first approaches the subject; he does not deny that they are payable by what he calls 'ecclesiastical or positive law,' but he denies that they are payable by what he calls 'the divine moral law or the divine natural law, which should bind all men and ever;' and he endeavours to show that the practices of the early church were consistent only with this view. In the seventh chapter he again reverts to the subject, and states the chief question in debate among divines in these terms: 'whether by God's immediate moral law the evangelical priesthood have a right to tythes in equal degree as the layman hath to his nine, or if they have them only as by human positive law and so given them for their spiritual labour.' It obviously follows that if tithes are of divine law, both as to their existence and their quota, they cannot be affected by human law; and here Selden's love of the common law comes into play, and he urges the fact that 'the practised common law … hath never given way herein to the canons, but hath allowed customs and made them subject to all civil titles, infeodations, discharges, compositions, and the like.' It is not perhaps difficult to guess in which direction the mind of Selden leaned on this crucial question between the canon and the common law, but it is difficult to find in the treatise any direct expression of his private judgment.
It was not only passages touching 'the divine right' of tithes which gave offence to the clergy. The preface appears to have been written after the work had made some noise, owing doubtless to the circulation of the manuscript among Selden's friends. In this preface he with more than usual spirit turns on his critics; he energetically protests that his book is 'not written to prove that tythes are not due by the law of God; not written to prove that the laity may detain them; not to prove that lay hands may still enjoy appropriations; in sum, not at all against the maintenance of the clergy; neither is it anything else but itself—that is, a mere narrative of the History of Tythes.' With increased heat he pointed to the opposition which the clergy offered in past times to the progress of true knowledge and to the suspicions with which they had viewed 'the noble studies' of Roger Bacon, Reuchlin, Budæus, and Erasmus. When
