connexion with any form of government. Its principles are partly those of abstract right, the primitive moral intuitions, and partly the rules of action which experience has demonstrated to be most beneficial to society. It is a science which can be elaborated only by the experience of ages, and can be perfected only by the minutest statistical information. Has there ever been a form of government discovered, which secures the selection of wise, honest and competent legislators? Supposing we establish a pure democracy, and surrender legislation into the hands of the whole people in their primary assemblies, should we be sure of good laws and judicious policy? Let the history of Athens bear witness. Let the banishment of Aristides, and the death of Socrates bear witness. What is worse than the tyranny of a mob? What is worse than the domination of demagogues in the name of the people? Suppose then we adopt a Republic, in which the legislators are chosen by the people, is there then any security that those who are selected will have the requisite knowledge of the science of legislation? Let our own statute books bear witness. The best lawyer

will tell you that such is the ignorance and want of system in our state legislatures that a few years fill the courts with utter confusion, and make civil duty, which ought to be the plainest of all subjects, the most perplexed. In a Republic, if the legislators be capable, is there any security that they will be honest? Certainly not, when the hall of legislation is changed into an arena of combat for the offices of the country, where session after session is consumed in plots and counterplots to retain power, or to oust the possessors. There you may see question after question decided by a strictly party vote, and of course law after law enacted with no reference to abstract right, or the good of the country, but solely to the upholding or putting down of the party in power. The very rotation in office, which is the boast of a Republic, though it may be the best on the whole, is decidedly a disadvantage to legislation. To be an accomplished legislator, requires the study of a life. It is certainly a more important office to make laws than to expound them. Would it be safe to adopt the principle of rotation in the office of the judge, and as soon as one set

has become qualified for the duties of their station, to dismiss them, and supply their places from the ranks of the people? Steadiness in legislation is quite as important as abstract right. A bad system steadily pursued is better than perpetual change.

But am I a monarchist because I thus speak? By no means. The subjection of the fortunes of millions of human beings to the caprice of one man, or to the chances of his character and disposition is a most appalling thought. It is a risk which no wise man would ever wish to run. That one man should have the power to prostrate the prosperity of a great nation, is a state of things which every philanthropist would choose to avoid. Legislation is safer in the hands of many than of one, and safest in the hands of those whom a community choose as their wisest and their best. All I mean to say is, that even then it is liable to mistake and abuse.

What is it but bad legislation that has brought on our country its present distress? The states have borrowed millions from abroad. But this would be no evil if they had been properly expended. If they had

been judiciously invested, and only so fast as they would become immediately productive, no evil would have come of it. They would have been a vast benefit to the country. As it is, the different legislatures have acted without sufficient scientific and statistical knowledge, without a knowledge either of the cost or the productiveness of public improvements; they have sunk millions on millions of capital, and involved the country in debts which the present generation will not see discharged. I may be asked, if I think that the office of legislator would be any better discharged if it were conferred for life, or made hereditary? I answer; Not at all. The experiment has been tried sufficiently often. Nay, it is tried every year in the British Parliament. Nature's nobles sit there year after year beside the aristocracy of human creation, and while the wisdom and eloquence of the House of Commons fill the world with its fame, it is but rarely that a voice of power issues from the House of Lords, and then it usually comes from those who have fought their way there from the ranks of the people.

I am not disheartened by any dim eclipse that may seem to have come over the pros

pects of Republican institutions. I believe they are the best that the wisdom of man has ever devised, and they will give human nature a fair trial, whether it be or be not able to arrive at and maintain a high degree of virtue and happiness.

Mankind can grow wise only by experience. Every act of legislation is an experiment. It is tested by the suffering or the prosperity of the people. Faithful history, the records of courts and custom houses, furnish the result, and bring home the consequence to its cause. Every new experiment contributes to perfect the science of legislation, just as every successful voyage and every shipwreck alike contribute to make more complete the chart of the ocean, and render all future navigation more safe.

The importance of statistics, which is nothing more or less than the record of the good or ill effects of every law that goes into operation, is beginning to be appreciated. It is nothing but an accurate knowledge of things as they are, the physical, moral and religious condition of a people, the population, wealth, employments, productions, the habits, vices and crimes; the number who receive an intel