date

27 July 1806 Evidence Scotch Reform
27 July 1806

Evidence Scotch Reform

Lett Lawyers Adverse

The first point for noble Lords in their own minds, [...?] which of the two opposite interests - the interest of the suitor and the interest of the man of law - shall receive the preference. I say opposite far more decidedly and irreconciliably opposite /[...?] opposite/ as matters have stood hitherto, no two sets of interests can be. It is the interest of the suitor that whatsoever is administered under the name of justice be administered with as little delay, expence and vexation in other shapes as possible. It is the interest of the man of law that the quantity of delay expence and vexation may at all /on every/ occasion be as great as possible: that is as great as the people in their character of suitors are by habit, and prejudice, and ignorance /darkness/ and misconception /misrepresentation/ be lulled into the endurance of [...?] because of the money extracted out of the pocket of the man of law: and of the part which goes into other pocket the [...?] is so unseparably connected with the lawyer's share, that when /a[?]/ the one part receives encrease in diminution the encrease or diminution of the other follows of course. Of delay: because something either in the character of cause or effect the connection between the incidents that bred /have [...?] made/ delay and the incidents that have been made to breed lawyer's profit /fees/ is inseparable. Of vexation: because though no fees /lawyers profit/ spring directly out of the vexation of the suitor, abstractedly[?] considered, any more than any enjoyment passes on immediately and in a direct line into the bosom of the butcher from the dying agonies of the lamb, inasmuch that it is not in human nature that the lawyer should be particularly sollicitous or active in the inflicting /active or sollicitous about the infliction of/ vexation on the [...?] for /chance[?]/ vexation's sake, yet as it is impossible that fees /profit/ could ever be received by the lawyer but vexation, and that rising and falling in proportion to the profit must be suffered by the suitor, the best that can happen to the suitor, is that his vexation should, in the eyes of the lawyer, by whom his fate is disposed[?] of, as an object of indifference.
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    '. People or Lawyer

    Lawyer. I see no great use in it. I have told you already: it is because the portion of delay, vexation and expence is so little.

    Non-Lawyer. On the contrary it is because that portion is so great. it is because you are so much overpaid. Nay: do not look so severe /look not this severe/: there is nothing of paradox but in the word /term of expression/: do not much [?] as if you did not see to the bottom of it. It is because so many of the prizes[?] in the lottery are so high, that the number of adventurers and thence of losing adventurers, and thence again the sum total of the loss of the losing adventurers, is so great. Increase therefore the extra quantity of delay vexation and expence, with its concomitant proportion of profit, the more you thus [...?] the mass of temptation, the more and more disadvantageous your lottery would be, the more and more, taking you all together you could want of being adequately paid, the further from the being under-paid, if there be any such great harm in it.