Different editions. The first edition was published in the Treatise de Augmentis, 1623. This was translated in the translation of the Treatise de Augmentis, by Watts, in 1640. About the year 1646, a translation of this work was published in Paris. The following is a copy of the title page: Les Aphorismes du Droit, traduits du Latin de Messire François Bacon, grand Chancelier d'Angleterre. Par I. Baudoin. A Paris.

Dedicated à Monsigneur Segrier, Chancelier de France. At the end of the privilege to print a translation of Bacon's works, is "Achevé d'imprimer, pour le première fois, le 20 Decembre, 1646."

Contents.

Pages 1---36. Des Lois en general.

Ce discours est une offre de Chancelier Bacon à son Roy, de faire un digest des Loix d'Angleterre.

36--111. Les Aphorismes du Droit.

111--130. De Devoir du Juge.

Ce discours et les suivans sont tiré des ouvres polites de l'autheur, et ie les ay admistez icy, pour ce qu'il m'ont semble propres au sujet.

130---139. Des requestes et des supplians.

139---147. De l'Expedition des Affaires. 147---end.

Du Conseil.

There is a copy of this in the British Museum, which I suppose to have been written about 1646. In the museum is Historia Vitæ et Mortis in French, by J. Baudoin, 4to. Paris, 1647, and in the privilege to print there is the date 1646. There is a new translation of this tract in 1733, by Shaw, in his edition of Bacon's philosophical works, in 3 vols. 4to. In the year 1806 an edition in 12mo. was published. The following is a copy of the title page: Franc. Baconii Exemplum Tractatus de Justitia Universali sive de Fontibus Juris, extractum ex ejusdem Auctoris opere de dignitate et augmentis scientiarum. Curante Lawry, juris consulto, qui suas notas prefationem que adjecit. Au Depot des Lois Romaines a Metz, chez Behmer. l'an 1806.

In the year 1822 a 12mo. edition was published in Paris, consisting of the Aphorisms in Latin with the notes. The following is a copy of the title page: Legum Leges sive Francisci Baconi Angliæ quondam Cancel. tractatus de fontibus Universi Juris per Aphorismos extractum ex ejusdem auctoris opere de dignitate et augmentis Scientiarum Annotationes quasdam subjecit. A. M.J.J. Dupin in scholis et curiis Parisiensibus Doctor et Advocatus. Dictabimus igitur quasdam Legum Leges, ex quibus informatio peti possit, quid in singulis legibus bene aut perperam positum aut constitutum sit. (Aph. 6.) Parisiis apud Fratres Baudouin Typog. Libr. Via de Vaugirard, No. 36. 1822.

In the year 1823 a translation into English by James Glassford, Advocate, was published at Edinburgh. The following is the title page: Exemplum Tractatus de Fontibus Juris, and other Latin Pieces of Lord Bacon, translated by James Glassford, Esq. Edinburgh, printed for Waugh and Innes, Chalmers and Collings, Glasgow; and Ogle, Duncan and Co. London. 1823.

Upon this subject Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments concludes thus: Systems of positive law, therefore, though they deserve the greatest authority, as the records of the sentiments of mankind in different ages and nations, yet can never be regarded as accurate systems of the rules of natural justice. It might have been expected that the reasonings of lawyers upon the different imperfections and improvements of the laws of different countries should have given occasion to an inquiry into what were the natural rules of justice, independent of all positive institution. It might have been expected that these reasonings should have led them to aim at establishing a system of what might properly be called natural jurisprudence, or a theory of the general principles that ought to run through, and be the foundation of the laws of all nations. But though the reasonings of lawyers did produce something of this kind, and though no man has treated systematically of the laws of any particular

country, without intermixing in his work many observations of this sort, it was very late in the world before any such general system was thought of, or before the philosophy of law was treated of by itself, and without regard to the particular institutions of any one nation. In none of the ancient moralists do we find any attempt towards a particular enumeration of the rules of justice. Cicero in his Offices, and Aristotle in his Ethics, treat of justice in the same general manner in which they treat of all the other virtues. In the laws of Cicero and Plato, where we might naturally have expected some attempt towards an enumeration of those rules of natural equity, which ought to be enforced by the positive laws of every country, there is, however, nothing of this kind. Their laws are laws of policy, not of justice. Grotius seems to have been the first who attempted to give the world any thing like a system of those principles which ought to run through, and be the foundation of the laws of all nations; and his treatise of the laws of War and Peace is, perhaps, at this day, the most complete work that has yet been given upon this subject. This valuable tract is in the treatise De Augmentis, vol. ix. page 82, of this edition.

6. Usury. He prepared the draught of an Act against Usury, which was published in the third edition of the Resuscitatio in 1671, which is in vol. xiii. of this edition, page 385, and in his Essays, there is an Essay upon Usury, vol. i. of this edition, page 137.

7. Ordinances in Chancery. These ordinances were published in the court the first day of Candlemas term, 1618, and have, from that period, been adopted and acted upon in the court. I do not find them noticed either by Rawley or Tennison. The following is a publication of this tract: Ordinances made by the Right Honourable Sir Francis Bacon, Knight, Lord Verulam, and Viscount of St. Albans, being then Lord Chancellor. For the better and more regular Administration of Iustice in the Chancery, to be daily observed saving the Prerogative of this Court. London: Printed for Mathew Walbanke and Lawrence Chapman 1642.

Vol. 2. 170. Ordinances by the Lord Chancellor for the better and more regular administration of justice in the Chancery, to be duly observed, saving the Prerogative of the Court published in the Court the first day of Candlemas Term, 1618. Harleian MSS. They will be found in vol. vii. of this edition, page 273.

Of Dispatch. The first Essay containing any observations appertaining to legal improvement, which will be found in vol. i. of this edition, page 83, is in his Essay of Dispatch: "Affected dispatch is one of the most dangerous things to business that can be: it is like that which the physicians call predigestion, or

hasty digestion; which is sure to fill the body full of crudities, and secret seeds of diseases therefore measure not dispatch by the times of sitting, but by the advancement of the business and as, in races, it is not the large stride, or high lift, that makes the speed; so, in business, the keeping close to the matter, and not taking of it too much at once, procureth dispatch. It is the care of some only to come off speedily for the time, or to contrive some false periods of business, because they may seem men of dispatch: but it is one thing to abbreviate by contracting, another by cutting off; and business so handled at several sittings, or meetings, goeth commonly backward and forward in an unsteady manner. I knew a wise man, that had it for a by-word, when he saw men hasten to a conclusion, Stay a little, that we may make an end the sooner.'

On the other side, true dispatch is a rich thing; for time is the measure of business, as money is of wares; and business is bought at a dear hand where there is small dispatch."

So, too, upon taking his seat as Chancellor, he said, in his address to the bar : "For the third general head of his Majesty's precepts concerning speedy justice, it rests much upon myself, and much upon others: yet so, as my procuration may give some remedy and order to it. For myself, I am resolved that my decree shall come speedily, if not instantly, after the hearing, and my signed decree speedily upon my decree pronounced. For it hath been a manner much used of late in my last lord's time, of whom I learn much to imitate, and somewhat to avoid; that upon the solemn and full hearing of a cause nothing is pronounced in court, but breviates are required to be made; which I do not dislike in itself in causes perplexed. For I confess I have somewhat of the cunctative; and I am of opinion, that whosoever is not wiser upon advice than upon the sudden, the same man was no wiser at fifty than he was at thirty. And it was my father's ordinary word, You must give me time.' But yet I find when such breviates were taken, the cause was sometimes forgotten a term or two, and then set down for a new hearing, three or four terms after. And in the mean time the subject's pulse beats swift, though the chancery pace be slow. Of which kind of intermission I see no use, and therefore I will promise regularly to pronounce my decree within few days after my hearing; and to sign my decree at the least in the vacation after the pronouncing. For fresh justice is the sweetest. And to the end that there be no delay of justice, nor any other means-making or labouring, but the labouring of the counsel at the bar.

Again, because justice is a sacred thing, and the end for which I am called to this place, and therefore is my way to heaven; and if it be shorter, it is never a whit the worse, I shall, by the grace of God, as far as God will give me strength, add the afternoon to the forenoon, and some fourth night of the vacation to the term, for the expediting and clearing of the causes of the court; only the depth of the three long vacations I would reserve in some measure free from business of estate, and for studies, arts and sciences, to which in my own nature I am most inclined.

:

There is another point of true expedition, which resteth much in myself, and that is in my manner of giving orders. For I have seen an affectation of dispatch turn utterly to delay at length: for the manner of it is to take the tale out of the counsellor at the bar his mouth, and to give a cursory order, nothing tending or conducing to the end of the business. It makes me remember what I heard one say of a judge that sat in chancery; that he would make forty orders in a morning out of the way, and it was out of the way indeed; for it was nothing to the end of the business and this is that which makes sixty, eighty, an hundred orders in a cause, to and fro, begetting one another; and like Penelope's web, doing and undoing. But I mean not to purchase the praise of expeditive in that kind; but as one that have a feeling of my duty, and of the case of others. My endeavour shall be to hear patiently, and to cast my order into such a mould as may soonest bring the subject to the end of his journey. As for delays that may concern others, first the great abuse is, that if the plaintiff have got an injunction to stay suits at the common law, then he will spin out his cause at length. But by the grace of God I will make injunctions but an hard pillow to sleep on; for if I find that he prosecutes not with effect,

he may perhaps, when he is awake, find not only his injunction dissolved, but his cause dismissed."

The caution of an anxious judge, in avoiding hasty decision, may be seen in the following anecdote respecting Chancellor D'Aguesseau: "The only fault imputed to D'Aguesseau was dilatoriness of decision. We should hear his own apology. The general feeling of the public on this head, was once respectfully communicated to him by his son: My child,' said the Chancellor, when you shall have read what I have read, seen what I have seen, and heard what I have heard, you will feel, that if on any subject you know much, there may be also much that you do not know, and that something, even of what you know, may not at the moment be in your recollection. You will then, too, be sensible of the mischievous and often ruinous consequences of even a small error in a decision; and conscience, I trust, will then make you as doubtful, as timid, and consequently as dilatory as I am accused of being."

The nature of dispatch, as it is called, in the administration of justice, may be seen in the following translation by my dear friend, Samuel Tayler Coleridge: The way of ancient ordinance, though it winds, Is yet no devious way. Straight forward goes The lightning's path, and straight the fearful path Of the cannon-ball. Direct it flies and rapid,

Shattering that it may reach, and shattering what it reaches.

My son! the road the human being travels,

That on which blessing comes and goes, doth follow
The river's course, the valley's playful windings
Curves round the corn-field and the hill of vines,
Honouring the holy bounds of property

there exists

An higher than the warrior's excellence.

WALLENSTEIN.

Of Judicature. The next essay, which contains observations upon the administration or improvement of justice, is his Essay on Judicature, which will be found in vol. i. page 179. It contains most valuable observations: 1st. in general. 2nd. In particular.

I must content myself with referring to the essay, and the following Observations in the Edinburgh Review upon Bacon's Essay on Judicature, April, 1830. "The bench of Scotland contains bright-names; men, under whom the duty of carrying judicial reformation into practice has as favourable a prospect as devotion to the cause, and great legal accomplishment, can ever give it. The bar, besides professional learning and talent, is as splendidly adorned by general literature and by public virtue as any bar upon earth. Criticisms have been made on the manner of both. We cannot venture to say how far either the censure or the praise of these criticisms is just. Probably both, at times. They must not be judged of merely by a standard taken from the accidental fashion or custom of any other place, but by their approximation to, or recession from, the things that form the universal excellences of the judicial manner. In a well regulated place of justice, the court room is orderly and noiseless. The bench attends; or appears to do so. When it does not, the failure neither proceeds from indifference nor from impatience. There is much consultation before judgment; little conversation during debate. The judges recollect, that the vices of counsel must always be generated by themselves, because they are only practised from their supposed influence with the bench, and from seeing that the opposite virtues fail. The bar venerates good taste, the only corrective of the defects naturally connected with the exercise of that profession. It therefore grudges the laurels that are sometimes bestowed by the ignorant on certain vulgar qualities, such as pertinacity or vehemence, which, though they may accompany success, can never, in a right court, be the cause of it. On ordinary occasions, when there is no call for a higher flight, it appreciates brevity, calm

ness and sense virtues so essential amidst the buste al distractie wer war that their presence renders even nones' more power. makes learning useless.

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Argosition to Improvement by Politicians. Lord Bacon, when smuEEMEN he objections by politicians to the advancement of learning. Bye, it njected by politicians that learning doth mar and pervert men's disparitiones for matter of government and policy; which the study of arts akce #thup t rurious by variety of reading; or too peremptory by the strict in dimin ar too overweening, by reason of the greatness of examples, of 190 (neompetida with the times, by reason of the dissimilitude of examples, of 18 luget it inth tivert and alienate men's minds from business and setion, instilling ste chov + Love of leisure and privateness." He then enters rainutely at «a senmingii d ut these objections. See vol. ii. page 16.

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