fhould understand his bufinefs; and have not only the will, but the power alfo, (under which must be included the knowledge,) of adminiftering legal and effectual juftice. Else, when he has mistaken his authority, through paffion, through ignorance, or abfurdity, he will be the object of contempt [9] from his inferiors, and of cenfure from thofe to whom he is accountable for his conduct.

YET farther; moft gentlemen of confiderable property, at fome period or other in their lives, are ambitious of representing their country in parliament: and thofe, who are ambitious of receiving so high a trust, would alfo do well to remember it's nature and importance. They are not thus honourably distinguished from the rest of their fellow-fubjects, merely that they may privilege their perfons, their eftates, or their domeftics; that they may lift under party banners; may grant or withhold fupplies; may vote with or vote against a popular or unpopular administration; but upon confiderations far more interefting and important. They are the guardians of the English conftitution; the makers, repealers, and interpreters of the English laws; delegated to watch, to check, and to avert every dangerous innovation, to propose, to adopt, and to cherish any folid and well-weighed improvement; bound by every tie of nature, of honour, and of religion, to tranfmit that constitution and thofe laws to their pofterity, amended if poffib'e, at leaft without any derogation. And how unbecoming must it appear in a member of the legislature to vote for a new law, who is utterly ignorant of the old what kind of interpretation can he be enabled to give, who is a stranger to the text upon which he comments!

INDEED it is perfectly amazing that there fhould be no cther state of life, no other occupation, art, or fcience, in which fome method of inftruction is not looked upon as requifite, except only the fcience of legiflation, the nobleft and most difficult of any. Apprenticeships are held necessary to almost every art, commercial or mechanical: a long courfe

of

of reading and study must form the divine, the physician, and the practical profeffor of the laws: but every man of fuperior fortune thinks himself born a legislator. Yet Tully [10] was of a different opinion; "it is neceffary, fays he, for a "fenator to be thoroughly acquainted with the constitution; " and this, he declares, is a knowledge of the most extenfive "nature; a matter of science, of diligence, of reflection; "without which no fenator can poffibly be fit for his "office."

THE mischiefs that have arisen to the public from inconfiderate alterations in our laws, are too obvious to be called in question; and how far they have been owing to the defective education of our fenators, is a point well worthy the public attention. The common law of England has fared like other venerable edifices of antiquity, which rafh and unexperienced workmen have ventured to new-drefs and refine, with all the rage of modern improvement. Hence frequently its fymmetry has been destroyed, its proportions distorted, and its majestic fimplicity exchanged for fpecious embellishments and fantastic novelties. For, to fay the truth, almost all the perplexed queftions, almoft all the niceties, intricacies, and delays, (which have sometimes difgraced the English, as well as other courts of juftice,) owe their original not to the common law itself, but to innovations that have been made in it by acts of parliament; "overladen (as fir Ed"ward Coke expreffes it') with provifoes and additions, and "many times on a fudden penned or corrected by men of "none or very little judgment in law." This great and well-experienced judge declares, that in all his time he never knew two queftions made upon rights merely depending upon the common law; and warmly laments the confufion introduced by ill-judging and unlearned legiflators. "But if,” he subjoins, “acts of parliament were after the old fa"fhion penned, by fuch only as perfectly knew what the

De Legg. 3. 18. Eft fenatori neceffarium noffe rempublicam ; idque late pa. tet:-genus hoc omne fcientiae, diligentiae

memoriae eft ; fine quo paratus esse senater nullo pa&o poteßt.

f 2. Rep. pref.

❝ common

"common law was before the making of any act of parlia"ment concerning that matter, as also how far forth former "ftatutes had provided remedy for former mischiefs, and "defects difcovered by experience; then should very few "queftions in law arife, and the learned fhould not fo often "and fo much perplex their heads to make atonement and "peace, by construction of law, between infenfible and dif"agreeing words, fentences, and provifoes, as they now do." And if this inconvenience was fo heavily felt in the reign of queen Elizabeth, you may judge how the evil is increased in later times, when the ftatute book is fwelled to ten times a larger bulk unless it fhould be found, that the penners of our modern ftatutes have proportionably better informed themselves in the knowledge of the common law.

WHAT is faid of our gentlemen in general, and the propriety of their application to the study of the laws of their country, will hold equally ftrong or ftill stronger with regard to the nobility of this realm, except only in the article of ferving upon juries. But, instead of this, they have several peculiar provinces of far greater confequence and concern; being not only by birth hereditary counsellors of the crown, and judges upon their honour of the lives of their brotherpeers, but also arbiters of the property of all their fellowfubjects, and that in the laft refort. In this their judicial capacity they are bound to decide the nicest and most critical points of the law: to examine and correct fuch errors as have escaped the most experienced fages of the profeffion, the lord keeper and the judges of the courts at Westminster. Their fentence is final, decifive, irrevocable; no appeal, no correction, not even a review can be had: and to their deter mination, whatever it be, the inferior courts of justice must conform; otherwife the rule of property would no longer be uniform and steady.

SHOULD a judge in the moft fubordinate jurifdiction be deficient in the knowledge of the law, it would reflect infinite contempt upon himself, and difgrace upon thofe who employ

[ 11 ]

employ him. And yet the confequence of his ignorance is comparatively very trifling and small: his judgment may be examined, and his errors rectified, by other courts. But how much more ferious and affecting is the cafe of a fupe[12] rior judge, if without any fkill in the laws he will boldly venture to decide a queftion upon which the welfare and fubfiftence of whole families may depend! where the chance of his judging right, or wrong, is barely equal; and where, if he chances to judge wrong, he does an injury of the most alarming nature, an injury without poffibility of redrefs.

YET, vaft as this truft is, it can no where be fo properly repofed, as in the noble hands where our excellent conftitution has placed it: and therefore placed it, becaufe, from the independence of their fortune and the dignity of their station, they are prefumed to employ that leifure which is the confequence of both, in attaining a more extenfive knowledge of the laws than perfons of inferior rank: and because the founders of our polity relied upon that delicacy of fentiment, so peculiar to noble birth; which, as on the one hand it will prevent either intereft or affection from interfering in queftions of right, fo on the other it will bind a peer in honour, an obligation which the law efteems equal to another's oath, to be mafter of those points upon which it is his birth-right to decide.

THE Roman pandeas will furnifh us with a piece of history not unapplicable to our prefent purpofe. Servius Sulpicius, a gentleman of the patrician order, and a celebrated orator, had occafion to take the opinion of Quintus Mutius Scaevola, the then oracle of the Roman law; but, for want of fome knowledge in that science, could not fo much as understand even the technical terms, which his friend was oblig ed to make use of. Upon which Mutius Scaevola could not forbear to upbraid him with this memorable reproofs, "that "it was a fhame for a patrician, a nobleman, and an orator

& Ff. 1. 2. 2. §. 43. Turpe elle patricio, et nobili, et caufas oranti, jus in que verfaretur ignorare. "of

"of caufes, to be ignorant of that law in which he was fo " peculiarly concerned." This reproach made fo deep an impreffion on Sulpicius, that he immediately applied himself to the study of the law; wherein he arrived to that proficien- [ 13 ] cy, that he left behind him about an hundred and four-fcore volumes of his own compiling upon the subject; and became, in the opinion of Cicero, a much more complete lawyer than even Mutius Scaevola himself.

I WOULD not be thought to recommend to our English nobility and gentry, to become as great lawyers as Sulpicius; though he, together with this character, sustained likewife that of an excellent orator, a firm patriot, and a wife indefatigable fenator: but the inference which arifes from the story is this, that ignorance of the laws of the land hath ever been, esteemed dishonourable in those, who are entrusted by their country to maintain, to adminifter, and to amend them.

BUT furely there is little occafion to enforce this argu ment any farther to perfons of rank and diftinction, if we of this place may be allowed to form a general judgment from thofe who are under our inspection: happy that while we lay down the rule, we can alfo produce the example. You will therefore permit your profeffor to indulge both a public and private fatisfaction, by bearing this open teftimony; that, in the infancy of these studies among us, they were favoured with the most diligent attendance, and pursued with the most unwearied application, by thofe of the nobleft birth and most ample patrimony: fome of whom are still the ornaments of this feat of learning; and others at a greater diftance continue doing honour to its inftitutions, by comparing our polity and laws with thofe of other kingdoms abroad, or exerting their fenatorial abilities in the councils of the nation at home.

NOR will fome degree of legal knowledge be found in the leaft fuperfluous to perfons of inferior rank: efpecially those