31 March 1805

Evidence

Securities

Ch. Engl. Law Summary

''6. Concluding Observat n

When in the hearing /presence/ of an English lawyer /a man of law/, any complaint is made of the expensiveness, vexatiousness and dilatoriness of the existing /established/ regular /technical/ mode, the only defense or possible apology he can employ /known to trust to/ consists in the assertion /notion/ or what is more impressive as well as easier, the tacit assumption, that the regular mode is good with reference to the direct the main end of justice in a proportion exceeding in a greater or less degree its imperfection with reference to those collateral ones. Summary justice is rendered better than none at all: but it is of an inferior quality, inferior in proportion to the low /inferior/ price put upon it. Those that can not afford to go to the price of the best sort must take up with the inferior sort: but regular justice is the sort of justice that would be sold on all occasions, sold to poor as well as rich if it could be afforded to them at that price /the price of summary/.

This only plea, will, in point of fact /I trust/, appear /be found/ already to be /have been/ pretty satisfactorily refuted: - that the technical mode /system/ is as decidedly repugnant to the direct, as it is to those collateral ends of justice: that the cheapest /cheap/ sort of justice is the only good one: and that it is the nature of the dear sort to grow worse in every respect in proportion to the dearness of the price.