HOPE is the desire of some good, attended with a belief of the possibility at least of obtaining it, and enlivened with joy, greater or less, according to the greater or less probability of our possessing the object of our hope.

Hope, Sir Thomas, Bart, lord advocate to King Charles I. Ţhe earliest progenitor of this celebrated person noticed by our genealogists is John de Hoip, who, they say, came from France in the retinue of Margaret, queen of King James V. Elis son Edward Hoip was a person of reputation in Edinburgh in the time of Mary; and being a great promoter of the Reformation, was chosen a commissioner to represent the city in the memorable parliament of 1560. He was father of Henry Hoip or Hope, a considerable merchant, who had by his wife Jaqueline de Tott, a Dutch woman, said by a contemporary to have some time kept a worsted shop in Edinburgh, two sons, Henry and Thomas. The former became ancestor of the great and opulent branch of the Hopes, long settled at Amsterdam. Thomas, the individual before us, after passing through his grammatical education, which he did with some applause, obtained the place of servitor or clerk to the eminent Mr (afterwards Sir) John Nicoson of Laswade, advocate, under whom were, in all probability, formed the elements of his after fortunes. The situation of clerk to a practising advocate of the Scottish bar is at this day of some consequence; it was then of more. Prior to the institution of the College of Justice in 1532, division of labour in the profession of the law was scarcely known; and in the advocate, or procurator, as he was indifferently called, were united at once the chamber counsel, the barrister, and the attorney. The legal skill and knowledge, however, which the institution of the College of Justice induced, gradually detached the business of an attorney; and by act of sederunt dated 13th July 1596, advocates’ first clerks were empowered to act below the bar, exclusive of all third persons. The place was valuable on a higher ground; it was almost the only path to professional knowledge, and indeed the domestic nursery of the bar. Our ancient common law having, on the erection of the Court of Session, been superseded by the principles of the Roman jurisprudence, the Scottish bar was, till the union, or rather till our own day, generally prepared for at some one of the foreign colleges, of which those of France and Italy were the most frequented, until the lustre of the Cujacian school in the Low Countries, aiding the connection which arose between us and them at the Reformation, drew the student thither. A knowledge of practice, however, still remained to be acquired; but Edinburgh had not yet its chairs of law, nor had the bar sent forth its Craig, its Stair, or its Mackenzie; and, according to the principles of the papal tribunals, of whose spirit the Court of Session partook so largely at its institution, the deliberations of the court were in secret with shut doors; none were then admitted within except the judges and officers of court, and these were all sworn to secrecy. The chamber of a practising advocate was therefore sought by all who meant to make the law the object of their pursuit. In the situation of servitor to Mr Nicoson we find Hope in the year 1600, in which also he married Elizabeth, daughter of John Binning, Esq. of the old and wealthy house of Binning of Wallyford, county of Haddington.

About the same time he was appointed solicitor for life; in all actions and causes touching the collection and receipt of new augmentations, with a salary of L.200 Scots per annum. This appointment was made “with advice and consent” of Mr John Preston of Barns, a lord of session, and afterwards president of that court, collectorgeneral of the augmentations; who also, on the 10th of March 1599, resigned his seat as one of the commissaries of Edinburgh, in Hope’s favour. The general assembly also nominated him solicitor to the phurch.

On the 7th of February 1605 he was admitted advocate; and on the 9th of April following, we find him “advocatesubstitute” (that is, as we understand, substitute to the king’s advocate, then Hamilton of Binning) in the prosecution before the justiciary, at the instance of James Libberton, servant to James, Lord Balmerino, president of the Court of Session, against certain individuals for an assault.

His next appearance was on the other side of the bar, in the famous case of the ministers, which, as it exemplifies much not only of Hope’s character, but also of the sentiments of the time in regard both to religious and civil liberty, merits some attention.

In 1592 presbyterianism was established in Scotland by law, but much against the wish of the sovereign, who accordingly lent all his efforts to suppress it again, and to substitute in its stead the show and subordination of episcopacy. His first attack was directed against the general assembly (the convocation of the Scottish church), which, although its meeting “every yeir at the least, and oftener pro re nata, as occasion and necessity sail require,” was expressly secured by statute of the above year, he prorogued twice successively, first on account of the accession, and then on pretence of adjusting the union. A third prorogation was issued, and, as if to declare that the power of calling the assembly was in the king, no time was fixed for its meeting. The royal designs being thus manifest, it became incumbent on the church, if it meant to maintain its liberties, now to make a stand. Accordingly nine presbyteries sent their representatives to Aberdeen on the 2d of July 1605, the day and place named in the former prorogation. When they had assembled, Straiton of Laurieston, the king’s commissioner, presented them a letter from the privy council, which being addressed “to the brethren of the ministry, convened at their assembly in Aberdeen,” they resolved should not be read till they were constituted. They proceeded accordingly to elect a moderator and clerk. They then took up the letter, when a messenger-at-arms, also from the privy council, entered, and charged them to dismiss under pain of rebellion. The church having, in constituting their meeting, asserted their right to a general assembly, were prepared to comply with the wish of the council, and only requested the king’s commissioner to name a day and place for next assembly. On his refusal, the moderator appointed the assembly to meet again on the last Tuesday of September ensuing, and then dissolved the meeting with prayer. The conduct of the church on this occasion was worthy of a people who had their religious liberty secured to them by law, and was marked at once by zeal for the rights of the church and respect for the authority of the sovereign, by intrepidity and moderation; but no sooner was the king apprised of it, than he directed the parties to be proceeded against with all rigour. John Forbes, minister at Airfurd, the moderator, John Welsh, minister at Ayr, and four others, were therefore cited to appear before the privy council to answer for their conduct. They appeared accordingly, but respectfully declined the jurisdiction of the tribunal as incompetent. A new crime thus sprung into being; and Hamilton, the king’s advocate, and his ready instrument on all [7:11:560] occasions, 'thereupon brought a prosecution against the six ministers, under an act passed during the infamous administration of Arran in 1584, which declared that none should decline the judgment of the king or privy council, under the pain of treason. On the 10th of January 1606 the trial came on at Linlithgow, and the counsel chosen by the prisoners were, “Mr Thomas Gray and Mr Thomas Hoip, advocates,” Craig and Oliphant having refused to plead in the cause, though it seems they had previously engaged to do so. Gray was a man of sincere affection to the cause, and of good skill in the law; but he had no great readiness of utterance. Hope had never before pleaded in that court. A formal plea was first put in and overruled. Hope then argued the case to the court; but all his arguments, able and conclusive though they were, and his courage, learning, and ingenuity in maintaining them, proved unavailing; the indictment was sustained, and the truth of the facts sent to the jury as their only province; for, according to the practice of that time, all the facts of the case were circumstantially stated in the indictment, with a view to limit the jury to the single point whether the facts were proved or not, their effect, if proved, being already settled by the authority of the court, which the juries of that period scarcely ever ventured to dispute. The jury by a majority, and after much tampering and undue influence, found all the defendants guilty of treason, and in September following they were banished the kingdom for life.

The next notice we have of Hope is in a letter from the council to the king, dated 24th June 1608, where Oliphant, Russel, King, and he, are mentioned as “the most learned and best experienced of their professioun and we find that he gradually entered on the largest professional practice of his time. His knowledge of tithes and church-law was particularly remarked, so that King Charles I., whose anxiety to recover the church property is well known, impressed with a sense of his value, immediately on his accession appointed him king’s advocate, in conjunction with the aged Sir William Oliphant of Newton. The king also then knighted him; and the Court of Session, by act of sederunt dated 12th July 1626, passed at the king’s request, allowed him to plead covered. The nature of this last act has been strangely misapprehended by some of our writers. The usual explanation is, that having two (Play-fdir, Sharp, and some other peerage writers, assert he had three) sons on the bench, the court indulged him with the privilege of pleading with his cap on like the judges; it being deemed indecorous, they say, that a father should stand uncovered before his sons. The truth is, however, that Hope had no son on the bench at this time, nor for six years afterwards; and the act of sederunt had an origin altogether different. From the institution of the College of Justice till this time, the king’s advocate was a member, not only of the bar, but also of the bench. But in February 1626, Oliphant was removed from the bench, and a royal ordinance issued, that no officer of state should have an ordinary seat there. It was this ordinance which was the occasion of the act in question; and the intent and meaning of the act no doubt was to assert and establish the equality of the king’s advocate with the bench. It was not long before Hope took occasion to vindicate his dignity in a more substantial way; for it appears that, on account of some expressions used by him at the bar, the judges thought fit to visit him with a public censure. This, however, was not to be endured by Hope; so on his application to the fountain of honour, a royal letter, of date 4th December 1626, was despatched to the judges, in which the king sharply reproved them for their want of respect^ and deshed that in future none in his high office should be rashly censured, without first acquainting the king therewith. a t,

On the 11th of February 1628, Hope was created a baronet; and on Oliphant’s death in April following, he obtained a patent of the office of sole advocate to the king and prince for life, with a pension of L.200 sterling yearly out of the crown rents; an allowance larger than that enjoyed by the judges, or than had previously been annexed to the office. Not being a lord of session, a letter from the king was then also transmitted to the judges to allow him to remain in court during its deliberations, “sua that he may heir and knaw such thingis as sail happin to occur that concernis his majesty,” the deliberations of the court being at this time carried on with shut doors; and as they proved dilatory in the matter, the king despatched a peremptory order, dated 1 Oth October 1628, to allow him to sit within the bar, and to remain in court during its deliberations, both, in fact, ancient privileges of the king’s advocate. This they obeyed on the 19th of November 1628, taking Hope’s oath “to keip the secreits of the house.” In 1630 he received from the crown a gift of L.2000. In 1632 his eldest son was knighted, and made a lord of session; and the next year his second son likewise received the honour of knighthood.

It was in 1632 that Hope produced his Minor Practicks, or Observations on the Law, delivered by him to his son orally, it is said, at his mornings’ toilet. It is distinguished for its legal learning, the breadth and boldness of its views, the acuteness of its remarks, and the subtilty of its distinctions. To this last quality of it, indeed, we are indebted for the sketch of its author by Dirleton, who characterises Hope as “juris nostri peritissimus, sed nimiae et captiosae subtilitatis.” A more minute account of Hope is given by Mackenzie. His forte, says he, consisted in a wonderful power of invention, which supplied him with so great a multitude of topics that he commonly wanted time for their exposition. His course in debate was uniform, yet peculiar; for when he had propounded an argument or exception, he usually adduced the reason upon which it was founded, and if that appeared doubtful, then the reason of the reason, or the ultimate principle itself. The resources of rhetoric were not unknown to him, but it seemed as if they were unnecessary. Of the illustrious triumvirate who in the days of Hope, Nicholson, and Stuart, adorned the Scottish bar, Nicholson improved our eloquence, Hope the law itself.

It was he who, according to some, devised the irritant and resolutive clauses of entails; the one to annul the deed attempted to be granted, the other to dissolve and forfeit the right of the person making the attempt. He also devised the title by adjudication on an heir’s feigned bond.

We are moreover told that he recommended to the lords of erection, or titulars of church lands, a mode of getting all the kirk livings back again, notwithstanding· the act of parliament which annexed them for ever to the crown, by causing a wadset of the same to be taken, and declaring in the writs that his majesty was indebted in large sums of money, though indeed he owed none. To the exercise of Hope’s ingenuity in this last case, however, a different criterion must be applied from any that can be used in the others, he being in the employment of his sovereign to obtain and secure the annexation. Burnet expressly says that “Sir Thomas Hope, a subtle lawyer, who was believed to understand the matter of church property beyond all the men of his profession, though in all respects he was a zealous puritan, was made the king’s advocate, on his undertaking to bring all the church lands back to the crown ; yet, adds the bishop, “he proceeded in the matter so slowly, that it was believed he acted in concert with the party that opposed it.”

Hope’s conduct was equally unprincipled in another respect. During the struggles between the king and the puritans, he was the adviser of both. The tumult at Edin [7:11:561]burgh in 1637, the supplication to the privy council in 1638, the war against the king in 1639, and the convention of estates in 1643, were all known to and approved of by him; yet all this time he was the king’s advocate, and by his flattering carriage, says Bishop Guthry, insinuated himself so far with his majesty, that notwithstanding information enough, his majesty consulted and was ruled by him in most of his affairs. On account of the benefits derived by them from his counsels, the Covenanters continued him in his office of king’s advocate; his second son, Sir Thomas, who had commanded the College of Justice troop in their army against the king, they made a lord of session, and lord justice general of Scotland; and his sixth son, Sir James, they made governor-general of the mint, then an office of importance, to which they annexed an exclusive local jurisdiction, both civil and criminal. The king, on the other hand, appointed Hope to almost the only place then in his gift, namely, that of his commissioner to the general assembly, a place new to a commoner, and in which Hope, now giddy with the height to which he had been raised, carried himself proudly and extravagantly. He died in November 1646. (u. u. u.)

Hope Island, an island situated in the South Pacific Ocean, and discovered in 1772. It is not far from Ceram island. There are also two small islands of this name near the north-east coast of New Holland. Long. 214. 36. W. Lat. 15. 41. S.