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Jan 1805
Evidence
Securities
Procedure Technical
'.1. Established Practice
Introduction
Ch. General View Established Practice
Such being the possible securities for trustworthiness in evidence - the securities afforded by the nature of the case to the legislator whose intelligence may /in probity/ may make and prompt him to employ them, it remains to give a general view of the extent to which they have actually been employed by legislators in the existing state of things.
On this part as in every other of the field of evidence, I confine my view to the two most [...?] systems of [...?], the Roman and the English.
Look at which we will, the characters of imperfection /incompetence/ and inconsistency will be but too permanent and incontestable: In the Roman, the leading feature will be its radical and compleat incompetence: in the English, its infinitely diversified /variegated/ and still mere blamable /scandalized/ inconsistency. In the Roman, an invincible stupidity /blindness/, the fruit of long-rooted prejudices /practice/: in the English, what is most excellent what is but universally recognized as such in language: what is best and what is worst /the best and the worst/ what is most excellent and more absurd promiscuously employed in practice.
But the original adoption /growth/ of good and bad together, all the claim of wisdom is but too effectually disproved on the part of past generations of men of law: - by the persevering and promiscuous continuance of good and bad together the praise of probity - of the pure and genuine love of justice /all pure and genuine affection for both/ is but too [...?] disproved on the part of their successors.
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Title: [12 April 1805 Evidence Securities]Description: 12 April 1805 Evidence Securities Ch. Procedure Technical ''. Conclusion What then? To counteract throughout the interests - to frustrate the universal wishes of mankind - could such a work thus arduous[?] to the result in any degree of accident was not design deep design /the deepest/ - was not any thing less than the most consummate and constant /preserving/ artifice any thing less than necessary altogether necessary? necessary, on the part of all persons - in all causes and at all times? what was necessary was power: and this was all. Not it indeed. Power indeed was necessary, power alone has every where been sufficient. Genius, discernment, probity - every useful every commendable /laudable/ endowment - would have been not superfluous only but obstructive. Stupidity, the grossest stupidity, has not only been fully adequate, but in a superior not to any exclusive degree, serviceable conducive. In addition to such intelligence as was necessary to the [.../] and not less [...?] of the sinister objects, and in default /and or in/ of artifice two things and but two things are necessary - ignorance and negligence. Nonsense[?] in proportion as it is gross, thickness obscurity: obscurity in proportion as it is thick, protects fraud against detection and imposes upon the mind of the suitor - that is of men in all his other forms - the sense of his helplessness and dependence. The more compleat /reacts from sense/ /unintelligible/ the nonsense, the more injurious, the more vulnerable, and when backed with irresistible power the more awful as well as [...?], the science. To cleanse the stable of Progress[?] required heroic, almost superhuman powers: to fill it was matter of no such difficulty, no beast too dull not to be capable of contributing his share. The foundations of the technical system were laid everywhere in the gloom of general ignorance: when printing was unknown, and when writing the art which embraces all other arts was practiced scarce by any /by few indeed/ but those who in this way or in some other way, abused it. Stupidity, under the guidance /direction/ of interest was sufficient to rear the /for the rearing of/ the fabrik: prejudice the offspring of sinister interest, prejudice with or without its parent, has been, and would for ever be, sufficient for the preservation /upholding/ of it.
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Title: [1805 Evidence Introd. Jurisprud]Description: 1805 Evidence Introd. Jurisprud Ch. III. Lawyer's Art ''. Forged [...?] Among /At the head/ the causes which prevent jurisprudential law from being any thing better than a wretched succeedance[?] to /miserable makeshift for/ statutory law we have already had occasion to observe the circumstance of its origin - the incompetence of the authenticity /source/ from whence it issues. Under every constitution this incompetence is evidenced by the consideration that the individuals whose will real or imagined is thus invested with law /endowed with the effective force of law/ are so circumstanced, as not to be qualified either by power or by practice for considering the field of legislation in any of these points of view in which it is necessary and customary for the legitimate legislator to be continually /constantly/ contemplating it. Under the popular constitution of the British Island /Britain/ as already observed this incompetence is further enhanced, and that in a prodigious degree by the consideration /circumstance/ that, whereas in the framing of statutory law /determination of the general purport/ and character of statutory law, the body of the people have a very considerable and effective share, in the determination of the general purport and character of jurisprudential law, the body of the people have no share whatever, not more than in the most /purest/ absolute monarchy that is to be found. What on this occasion has been the recourse of the man of law? I speak of Britain here /The present topic is confined to Britain,/ as the only country on which on the strict ground of the virtues[?] upon constitutional principles it is competent to a lawyer to place this /carry a/ circumstance of this sort to the account of advantage. What [...?] in speaking of British law has been his recource? To deny the existence of the sun at noon day while his eyes are smarting under its lustre: in the praise lavished upon his god /goddess/ /idol/, to speak of the popularity of his /its/ origin, as a /property/ /qualification/ not only belonging to him /it/ but possessed by /appertaining to/ law enjoyed in a supereminent degree. One thing, and but one thing, was wanting to the audacity of the imposture: and that was to deny that the body of the people have any sort of share or influence in the production /fabricating/ of statutory law. In /Can/ the part they /parties they excuse[?]/ take in the composition of statutory law be in any other respect more notorious, than the fact of them having no part whatsoever in the framing of jurisprudential law?
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Title: [30 Jan y 1805 Evidence Securities]Description: 30 Jan y 1805 Evidence Securities Ch. Engl. Proleg ''.1 If the use made in England of the English System of procedure in respect to evidence had had English wisdom for its origin, that same wisdom would have bestowed on it an universally extending application without any other exceptions than what were suggested by so many specific and appropriate reasons: in a word this superior wisdom, the existence of which is thus assured[?] their [...?] if in the way of supposition would have operated with the same[?] regularity and comprehension /regular and comprehensive efficacy/ as the really existing inferior wisdom from which the Roman System took its birth. But the multiplied, the diversified, and in every instance groundless deviations /aberrations/ made from this ever conspicuous and ever acknowledged model /pattern/ of perfection, demonstrate but too plainly that if to any thing that can be seen be called wisdom /in any sense the national wisdom, it is not in any sense /degree// it is not to professional wisdom that it owes its birth, and that whatever reflection and industry has been bestowed upon it by men of law, has been occupied /employed/, almost without exception not in the preservation and improving /preserving and improving/ it, but in defaming it in injuring it, and rendering it in every instance less conducive /adapted/ to its professed and only proper end.
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