[058-126]

May 1805

Evidence

Ends

Ch. Conflict

This opposition between the two classes of ends is a matter of no light moment: speculation? but that sort of speculation that is not mere speculation : it has had no small influence in practice. Upon no firmer a foundation has that immense fabric of abuse been erected which in the course of this work there will be but too much occasion to delineate.

Without vexation, expense and delay, misdecision - misdecision to the prejudice of the defendant's side - can not be guarded against: therefore vexation, expense and delay are conducive to the ends of justice: pursue the one class of ends and you must pro tanto abandon the other: the more zealously you pursue the one, the wider? your deviation from the other. Vexation, expense and delay constitute the price you pay for justice: avoidance of misdecision being the end that which on the present occasion stands as the representative and substitute of all the ends of justice. The higher the price, the better the commodity: the better the commodity the higher must be the price: and a converse the higher the price, the better will the commodity be.

If this be good reasoning as applied to justice , try it upon bread . A penny is the price I paid for the loaf I have before me. The loaf I am about to breakfast upon: instead of a penny, had I paid twopence for it, the quantity of nourishment contained in it would have been double. Are men convinced by such arguments, or do they only pretend to be so? Are they the offspring of imbecility or of improbity? In whatever mint they originated, such is the reasoning that pass current under the names of Montesquieu and Blackstone.