from every remnant of the weakness of benevo lence and fympathy. The fole principle of all this fair outfide, is the confideration how to make the most of every one that enters his shop.

Yet this being, this fupple, fawning, cringing creature, this fyftematic, cold-hearted liar, this being, every moment of whofe existence is centred in the fordid confideration of petty gains, has the audacity to call himfelf a man. half of all the human beings we meet, belong, in a higher or lower degree, to the clafs here delineated. In how perverted a state of fociety have we been deftined to exift?

One

Nothing is more ftriking than the eagerness with which tradefmen endeavour to fupplant each other. The hatred of courtiers, the jealoufy of artifts, the rivalfhip of lovers attached to a common miftrefs, fcarcely go beyond the fierceness of their paffions. The bitterness of their hatred, the impatience with which they think and speak of each other, the innumerable arts by which they undermine a brother, conftitute a memorable spectacle. There is nothing in which they fo much rejoice, as in the ruin of an antagonist. They will fell their goods at a lofs, and fometimes ruin themselves, in the attempt to accomplish this wifhed-for event.

And

1

cuniary income. Let us analyfe the principles of trade.

The earth is the fufficient means, either by the fruit it produces, or the animals it breeds, of the subsistence of man. A fmall quantity of human labour, when mixed and incorporated with the bounties of nature, is found perfectly adequate to the purposes of fubfiftence. This fmall quantity it is, in the ftrictness of moral obligation, every man's duty to contribute; unless perhaps, in rare inftances, it can be shown that the labour of fome, directed to a higher species of usefulness, would be injurioufly interrupted by the intervention of this trivial portion of mechanical and fubordinate labour.

This is the fimple and undebauched view of man in, what we may call, his ftate of innocence, In the experiment of human fociety it is found that the divifion of labour tends confiderably to diminish the burthen to which it would otherwife amount, and to forward the improvement of human kill and ingenuity. This variation does not neceffarily produce any defalcation from the purity of human motives and actions. Were the members of any community fufficiently upright and difinterested, I might supply my neighbour with the corn he wanted, and he supply me

fuit temporary and perfonal objects. It teaches every man what he has to depend upon, not fuffering him to be condemned at the caprice. of his judges, but by maxims previously promulgated and made known to all. It gives fairi warning to one party, of the punishment, which a certain conduct will incur. It affords to the other party, a remedy against the ufurpation of his neighbour, known, definite, and univerfally acceffible.

If law be, to this eminent extent, the benefactor and preferver of mankind, must it not reflect fome of its own luftre upon its profeffors? What character can be more venerable than an expounder of law, whether we apply this appellation to the judge who authoritatively declares its meaning from the bench, to the pleader who takes care to do juftice to the cafe of a man who is unable to do justice to it himself, or to the less brilliant, but not lefs ufeful, functions of him," who from his chamber communicates the refult of the researches of years, to the client, who; would otherwife be unable to find his way, amidft the complexities of ftatutes, gloffes and precedents?

We will not here enquire into the foundness of the panegyric which has fo often been pronounced upon the infiitution of law. All that

our

our prefent fubject requires of us, is, to afcertain what fort of character the ftudy of law is likely to entail upon its profeffors.

The bufinefs of a man is to enquire into the dictates of reafon and the principles of justice. The bufinefs of a lawyer is of a very different fort. He has nothing to do with general and impartial reafon; his concern is with edicts and acts of parliament. He is to confider these as the standards of right and wrong to mankind. He muft either wholly expel from his mind all notions of independent inveftigation; or he muft fubmit to the neceffity of maintaining that to be right, because it is conformable to law, which he knows to be wrong, because it is irreconcilable to juftice. What may be the general merits of law as an inftitution would be a proper topic of feparate investigation *. But thus much is too plain to need any profound elucidation: that laws, in their great outline, are ufually the prejudices of a barbarous age artificially kept alive and entailed upon a civilifed one; that fuch of them as are of long ftanding, derive their character from principles: and fyftems that have fince been wholly exploded and brought into difufe; that fuch of

* See this question confidered, in Political Juftice, Book VII, Chap. VIII, octavo edition.

them

from every remnant of the weakness of benevo lence and sympathy. The fole principle of all this fair outfide, is the confideration how to make the most of every one that enters his fhop.

Yet this being, this fupple, fawning, cringing creature, this fyftematic, cold-hearted liar, this being, every moment of whofe exiftence is centred in the fordid confideration of petty gains, has the audacity to call himself a man. One half of all the human beings we meet, belong, in a higher or lower degree, to the clafs here delineated. In how perverted a state of fociety have we been destined to exift?

Nothing is more striking than the eagerness with which tradefmen endeavour to fupplant each other. The hatred of courtiers, the jealoufy of artifts, the rivalfhip of lovers attached to a common mistress, scarcely go beyond the fierceness of their paffions. The bitterness of their hatred, the impatience with which they think and speak of each other, the innumerable arts by which they undermine a brother, conftitute a memorable fpectacle. There is nothing in which they fo much rejoice, as in the ruin of an antagonist. They will fell their goods at a lofs, and fometimes ruin themselves, in the attempt to accomplish this wifhed-for event.

And