salutary ends of the general union. Hence, too, the duty and indispensableness of legislation. Codes of jurisprudence are a natural consequence. And heads there must be to plan, and hands to execute; rulers to enact, and a people disposed for submission. In a populous community-one highly advanced and civilized-such arrangements are matters of great delicacy and moment. They require from rulers-besides a careful garnering of the lessons of experience, an enlightened observation, the faculty of prospective adaptation, keen, patient and profound research; and withal an honesty of purpose, and fearless, single-eyed probity. Laws thus framed are an inestimable dowry to a land. They cannot be too highly prized, nor too sacredly guarded. And the memory of their contrivers should be enshrined in the grateful hearts of the people whom they benefit.

Such are the accessory distinctions of our fortune. For, besides the heritage of Liberty, we have the heritage of Law. Our civil jurisprudence is the digest of the wisdom of ages. Our constitutions of government transcend the vaunted models of other and elder times. Our statute-books are the fruits of a legislation illustrated by the lights of the past, but shaped and improved according to the wants, circumstances and perceptions of the present. Laws, in fine, we have providing for the social order, the harmony and well-being of those collectively on whom they operate; laws which shield the meanest

and awe the mightiest, and spread the shelter of a common defence over the poor man's cabin and the rich man's mansion.

Defects in theory, or faults of detail, may be detected in these institutions; but a novice may spy flaws in the noblest monuments of human skill and genius; and fools may blame what wise men cannot always remedy. It is the part of legislation to endeavor to rectify what is palpably amiss; to answer every reasonable demand on its rightful interposition; and to keep pace with the progress of society by correspondent improvements in its statutory provisions. The best political machinery is liable to injury and disorders. It may be weakened by using, or acquire a rust from age. Its weights may run down, some spring may give way, a wheel may be broken, or thrown from the grapple of the masterregulator. Our civil fathers are the artificers to whom we must look for the requisite repairs. Theirs is the task, and at times a difficult and no enviable one, to replace the unsound, to strengthen what is weak, and haply to wind up and re-adjust the curious mechanism. More or less of this duty is annually necessary. But there is danger of over-much doing. Innovations may not be improvements; nor are substitutes always amendments.

There was much of good sense in the language of the Barons of England, when rebuking the arbitrary and capricious edicts of a tyrant, they said, "We are opposed to changing the laws of the Realm."

And much also of shrewdness in the reply of the mercantile deputation of Bordeaux to Louis XIV. when asked what should be done to advance their interests? "Sire," was their answer, "Let us alone." Every one knows that there is such a thing as encumbering with help. Where this may be suspected in questions of legislation, the wisest course obviously is, to refrain from so thankless an office. Better assuredly it is, to do nothing, than work mischief; better to bear the incidental ill, than endanger the abounding good; better to acquiesce in a mixed benefit, than pass from a partial bad to a possible worse, As our history knows of no fabulous age, so our ordinances of government date back to no mean nor obscure origin. Beginning with the memorable compact on board the May Flower, when the emigrant colonists deliberately combined into "a civil body politic," and solemnly bound themselves to yield "all due subjection to such just and equal laws, acts, offices and constitutions" as should from time to time be enacted, and be "thought most meet and convenient" for the general good,-commencing with that noble instrument as the cornerstone of our civil edifice,-the fabric has risen and expanded, growing with the wants, and modified by the circumstances of succeeding times, till attaining its present fair and majestic proportions. If, aside from occasional repairs, any alterations be thought needful in so venerable a pile, prudence would suggest that they be made in accordance with the rule

of established symmetry. If an enlargement of the dimensions be called for, let it be done by the simple method of annexations, instead of the bolder process of entire re-construction on another groundplan and model.

I cannot leave this topic without adverting to a feature of unfairness charged upon our systems of legislation. Our laws are said to operate unequally. A class of political seers has risen up in our times, who pretend to have spied out this blemish; though they leave unexplained how it chanced to escape the penetration of antecedent examiners. Their notable discovery purports to be this: That our laws are chiefly contrivances for the benefit of the rich, to the aggravated grievance and damage of the poor; that they are the offspring of a cruel conspiracy to exalt the one, and depress the other; that they are the ministers of a stern and jealous monopoly, perversely acting upon the maxim, "that whosoever hath to him shall be given, and whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that which he hath."

But who are the rich? Men sprung from the mixed multitude-thrown up from the indiscriminate classes of society. Every walk of life leads naturally on, or it opens into innumerable by-paths, which conduct to ease, or competence, or affluence. Industry, intelligence, frugality and uprightness are ever sure of a fair recompense. Legislation influences wealth-not wealth, legislation. It is the

up,

object of the former to aid the general acquisition o property,―not, of course, by narrowing and shutting but digging open and multiplying its springs for the accommodation of all. Such policy is dictated by sound interest, conformably to the homely but common-sense adage, that every man, to be a good citizen, must have a stake in the hedge. A needy and starving population, on the other hand, having nothing to lose, would never fear the consequences of public turmoils and insurrections.

But legislation, be it observed, whilst seeking to increase the means of general wealth, has taken care to provide that the fortunate possessors, in proportion to the amount of their acquisitions, shall bear their part in the public burdens of taxation for the common welfare and defence. Laws, you may say, protect the rich. We grant it; but the security is just that which they extend to the private possessions of all. So far, in fact, from their operating exclusively to roll up and concentrate capital in the hands of a few, they have done all they can. to ensure its frequent change and dispersion. The prohibition, for example, of entails and rights of primogeniture, is alone enough to preclude the possibility of long continued accumulations of fortune in any family lines. All is in a state of ceaseless fluctuation. And hence, as we often find, the rich man or the flourishing household of to-day, may be sunk into impoverishment and obscurity on the morrow; and the meanest 'poor, or their children in