Farther: as every court of juſtice hath laws and cuſtoms for it’s direction, ſome the civil and canon, ſome the common law, others their own peculiar laws and cuſtoms, ſo the high court of parliament hath alſo it’s own peculiar law, called the lex et conſuetudo parliamenti; a law which ſir Edward Coke[1] obſerves, is “ab omnibus quaerenda, a multis ignorata, a paucis cognita.” It will not therefore be expected that we ſhould enter into the examination of this law, with any degree of minuteneſs; ſince, as the ſame learned author aſſures us[2], it is much better to be learned out of the rolls of parliament, and other records, and by precedents, and continual experience, than can be expreſſed by any one man. It will be ſufficient to obſerve, that the whole of the law and cuſtom of parliament has it’s original from this one maxim; “that whatever matter ariſes concerning either houſe of parliament, ought to be examined, diſcuſſed, and adjudged in that houſe to which it relates, and not elſewhere.” Hence, for inſtance, the lords will not ſuffer the commons to interfere in ſettling the election of a peer of Scotland; the commons will not allow the lords to judge of the election of a burgeſs; nor will either houſe permit the courts of law to examine the merits of either caſe. But the maxims upon which they proceed, together with their method of proceeding, reſt entirely in the breaſt of the parliament itſelf; and are not defined and aſcertained by any particular ſtated laws.
The privileges of parliament are likewiſe very large and indefinite; which has occaſioned an obſervation, that the principal privilege of parliament conſiſted in this, that it’s privileges were not certainly known to any but the parliament itſelf. And therefore when in 31 Hen. VI the houſe of lords propounded a queſtion to the judges touching the privilege of parliament, the chief juſtice, in the name of his brethren, declared, “that they ought not to make anſwer to that queſtion; for it hath not been uſed aforetime that the juſtices ſhould in any wiſe determine the
