22. Sixteen peers are to be choſen to repreſent the peerage of Scotland in parliament, and forty five members to ſit in the houſe of commons.
23. The ſixteen peers of Scotland ſhall have all privileges of parliament: and all peers of Scotland ſhall be peers of Great Britain, and rank next after thoſe of the ſame degree at the time of the union, and ſhall have all privileges of peers, except ſitting in the houſe of lords and voting on the trial of a peer.
These are the principal of the twenty five articles of union, which are ratified and confirmed by ſtatute 5 Ann. c. 8. in which ſtatute there are alſo two acts of parliament recited; the one of Scotland, whereby the church of Scotland, and alſo the four univerſities of that kingdom, are eſtabliſhed for ever, and all ſucceeding ſovereigns are to take an oath inviolably to maintain the ſame; the other of England, 5 Ann. c. 6. whereby the acts of uniformity of 13 Eliz. and 13 Car. II. (except as the ſame had been altered by parliament at that time) and all other acts then in force for the preſervation of the church of England, are declared perpetual; and it is ſtipulated, that every ſubſequent king and queen ſhall take an oath inviolably to maintain the ſame within England, Ireland, Wales, and the town of Berwick upon Tweed. And it is enacted, that theſe two acts “ſhall for ever be obſerved as fundamental and eſſential conditions of the union.”
Upon theſe articles, and act of union, it is to be obſerved, 1. That the two kingdoms are now ſo inſeparably united, that nothing can ever diſunite them again; unleſs perhaps an infringement of thoſe points which, when they were ſeparate and independent nations, it was mutually ſtipulated ſhould be “fundamental and eſſential conditions of the union[1].” 2. That what-
- ↑ It may juſtly be doubted, whether even ſuch an infringement (though a manifeſt breach of good faith, unleſs done upon the moſt preſſing neceſſity) would conſequentially diſſolve the union: for the bare idea of a ſtate, without a power ſomewhere veſt-
