ADVERTISEMENT TO THIS EDITION. THE discharge of a duty fimilar to that, to which the world is indebted for the Commentaries on the Laws of England, led the Editor to prefume, that in the course of his researches he might be able to collect fome observations not unufeful to the Public, and at the fame time it fuggefted the propriety of his endeavouring to contribute to the further improvement of that valuable production. Impreffed with thefe ideas, he had formed the refolution to fubjoin a variety of notes to the text, and a fupplement to each chapter, where the fubject seemed important and unexhaufted, and in this manher to extend the whole to five volumes. But as it would have required a great length of time to have completed fo extenfive a defign, he was induced to fupply the prefent Proprietors of the work, who were preparing a new edition, with the notes, and to reserve the confideration of fuch subjects as have not an immediate reference to any paffage in the Commentaries, for a feparate fupplemen tal volume. In this edition the author's text is in no inftance altered, but the principal changes, which either the legiflature or the decifions of the courts have introduced into the law fince the laft corrections of the author, are specified and explained bythe Editor in the notes *. The Commentaries on the Laws of England now form an effential part of every gentleman's library; the beautiful and lucid arrangement, the purity of the language, the claffic elegance of the quotations and allufions, the clear and intelligible explanation of each fubject, muft always yield as much pleasure as improvement: and wherever any conftitutional or legal queftion is agitated, they are the first, and in general the best, authority referred to. In order to add to their utility in this refpect, the Editor has annexed fuch exceptions and particular inftances, as he thought would render the information ftill fuller and more complete. Where he has prefumed to queftion any of the learned Commentator's doctrines, he has affigned his reafons for his doubt or diffent; but where he has difcovered an inaccuracy arifing merely from inadvertence, he has ftated it without fcruple or ceremony. We fhould expect more than human excellence, if we imagined that a work comprizing the whole fyftem of English jurifprudence could be entirely free from mistakes. But it is a matter of great concern to the Profeffion, and to the Public at large, that in an The Editor's notes are feparated from the Judge's notes and text by a line, and are referred to by figures thus (1), and the pages of the former editions are preferved in the margin. 7 Author |