What was the purpose of a general warrant in the context of a search and seizure?

But the intention plainly was to protect the people from unreasonable searches and seizures such as had been practiced in England under general warrants, and, to some extent, in this country in colonial times under so-called writs of assistance. Such searches and seizures the courts held illegal at common law. And the constitutional provision was designed to operate on legislative bodies so as to render ineffectual any attempt by such bodies to legalize by statute what the common law regarded as unlawful because unreasonable. It was also intended to operate upon executives and courts, and to make it the duty of the courts to hold invalid every unreasonable search and seizure whether made under the guise of legislative sanction or without the color of any such sanction. Williams v. State, 100 Ga. 511, 520, 28 S.E. 624, 39 L.R.A. 269.