The Sun.
London, England, 1828-02-09 00:00:00

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infraction of tile Genie Lawa;and other defects of
the unpaid Magistracy, on which our contemporary,
the Chronicle, has been dwelling;at length every .
day for the lest ten years. The validity of his charges
we do not at present mean to discuss, and the ra-
ther are we indueed to :postpone'. any 'observations
-we should be inalined to make' on this'topie, that the
Learned Gentleman having hired the ulcer leaves
thc'salve to be prepared by come other hand. He
points to the evil but does not hint at the remedy.
In his (*en:Miens on property, Mr. Brougham no-
tices the inconveniences arising from• different modes
of holding in. copyhold. In some manors the will
that disposes of them must be renewed every two
or three years ; in others the eldest daughter is heir ;
in others, the copyhold is coparcenary; in others one
half goes as 'dower. • The cases • stated; and the
arguments adduced, and the cures suggested in re-
spect of the law affecting real property, we must,
however, pass over as purely legal, and • only in-
telligible to a legal reader. In the . course of
his farther remarks ;on the practice of the Courts
which‘are rather miscellaneous in their character, Mr.
Brougham takes occasion strongly to recommend
the practice of arbitration, the cheapest mode
of obtaining justice; and, in so doing, he very
justly remarks, that he speaks most disinte-
'restedly. On the 'law of debtor and creditor, he ob-
jects in toto to the arrest of the person of thedebtor,
unless for the purpose, and with a view to the dis-
covery of his goods ; and he would have his goods of
every deseripticin, lands, chattels, monies, all that he
has in his possession, or due to him, at the absolute
dispOsal of his creditor, until the latter is fully paid:
This is very nearly, if not altogether, the law of Scot-
land. On the subject of pleading, very little novelty
was.struck out by Mr. Brougham. The' objections
to the form of declarations, and their ridiculous repo:
titiens, have all•beeraurged. in a more concise, and
therefore more cogent way, by Mr. Bentham and the
'Westminster Review. The same remark may be
applied to that -part of the speech wherein Mr.
Brougham treats of limitations and: of real
,actions. We have given the • foregoing very
brief and imperfect _ , analysis of this wonderful
speech, the longest ever pronounced in Parliament;
in order that the general reader may be in some
measure aware of its contents,- which we could
hardly suppose him to be bold enough to attempt
to gather by actual- perusal. It is 'not our purpose
to inquire at present into the soundness of the nu-
merous charges which Mr. Brougham brings against
the Common Law and its administration, nor the
means by which he intends to effect their removal.
The latter, it must be obvious, it would be unfair to
criticise too sharply, for they can, at the best, be
considered only in the light of hints, whereon the
commission which he solicits, and which we hope
he will obtain, may work. While on this subject,
we cannot help noticing ' the -strange mistake into
which an Evening Paper has' fallen, in attribut-
ing to the Learned' Gentleman .whit• he never
entertained, the wish' to• give up the considera-
tion of -the subject which he has so ably, as well
as laboriously, brought before Parliament, to a
Committee—a debating club, as it is styled. The
Commission, if granted, will consist of the ablest
of the Civilians of the Enipire, men to whom,' con-
sidering the source from which their appointments
must emanate '(his Majesty) and their own grave
and learned character, it is any thing bat seemly
to give k) light a name. Looking to the prin-
ciple of legal reform, there is one sentiment ex-
pressed by Mr. Brougham, in which we concur
the more readily, that we have, on many, occa-
sions, expressed it ourselves, namely, that he who
would set about tefortning our law in ifs 'smallest
and •seemingly most insignificant parts, must have.
learning and comprehension to see the beitrings and
relations of the whole, because it will not unfre-
quently heaped, that what appears an incongruity
when viewed by itself, is, when considered in its re-
lations, essential to the harmony and stability of the
whole—that, therefore, reforms to be useful must
proceed on general views, and that, when thus car-
ried on, they possess much less of the matter of in-
novation than when attempted in partiewlar eases.
In short, we must in many respects, regard_ the corpus
juris in the same light as the body paysicaland when
we find a small imperfection even in its remotest ex-
tremities, we must: not be over hasty in the use of
repellarits, or of the excising-knife, lest the disease
which we aim at curing turn out to be the channel
by which the peccancy of some dangerous humour is'
drained from a more vital part. We agree also with
Mr. Brougham in 'his conclusion, that he who shall
succeed in rendering plain the intricacies of our laws,
and of turning them to. What was theia original ob-
ject, and what ought to be indeed the object of all
law, as well as of those that minister it—to be a
terror to those that do' evil, and 'a protection to
those that do well—who!shall canvert what has too
often been, to use Mr. B.as language, " a two-edged
sword in the hands of powet into a staff for the sup-
port of the people," will acquire a higher, because
a more permanent, fame than any that martial deeds
• bestow. It was, as Mr. Brougham remarked, the
boast of Napoleon, that he would go down to pos-
terity with the " Code" in his hand. We have
now, at the head 'of our Administration, the only
man to whom the Eagles of NapOleon ever stooped.
If he set himself to remove cautiously and prudently
- the incrustations, which time and evil interpretation
• have accumulated round our Code, holding fast to
the living spirit, instead of stickling for the dead
letter, he may then boast that he is, by a much
better title than that derived from the beating down
of his legions, le vainqueur du vainqueur de monde.—
Neil', Times.: