degraded the liberty of the press, and prepared the way for the excesses which Mr. Burke himself was fated afterwards to deplore, and the contempt in which his perspicacity did not then perceive this great safeguard of our liberties was at a still later period in peril of falling. At all events, we who now have had leisure to contemplate the period in which those great statesmen lived, and to weigh the justice of their tributes to this too celebrated writer, have the duty cast upon us of exposing his falsehoods, and of rendering a necessary though a tardy reparation, to those characters which he unscrupulously assailed. Nor is there any duty the discharge of which brings along with it more true satisfaction. It may be humble in its execution, but its aim is lofty; it may be feebly performed, but it is exceedingly grateful. Nor can any one rise from his labours with a more heartfelt satisfaction than he who thinks that he has contributed to rescue merit from obloquy, and to further the most sacred of all human interests, the defeat of injustice-injustice in which they share who fear to resist it. "Sed injustitiæ genera duo sunt; unum eorum qui inferunt; alterum eorum qui ab iis, quibus infertur, si possunt, non propulsant injuriam." (Cic. De Off., 1.) 404 EARL CAMDEN. JOHN WILKES-DEMAGOGUE ARTS. AMONG the names that adorn the legal profession there are few which stand so high as that of Camden. His reputation as a lawyer could not have gained this place for him; even as a judge he would not have commanded such distinction, though on the Bench he greatly increased the fame which he brought from the bar; but in the senate he had no professional superior, and his integrity for the most part spotless in all the relations of public life, with the manly firmness which he uniformly displayed in maintaining the free principles of the constitution, wholly unmixed with any leaning towards extravagant popular opinions, or any disposition to court vulgar favour, justly entitle him to the very highest place among the judges of England. It was a remarkable circumstance that, although he entered the profession with all the advantages of elevated station, he was less successful in its pursuit, and came more slowly into its emoluments than almost all others that can be mentioned, who have raised themselves to its more imminent heights from humble or even obscure beginnings. One can hardly name any other chief judge, except Bacon himself, who was the son of a chief justice. Lord Camden's father presided in the Court of King's Bench. He himself was called to the bar in his twenty-fourth year, and he continued to await the arrival of clients,-their "knocks at his door while the cock crew," -for nine long years; but to wait in vain. In his thirty-eighth year he was, like Lord Eldon, on the point of retiring * Sub galli cantum, consultor ubi ostia pulsat. Hor. from Westminster Hall, and had resolved to shelter himself from the frowns of fortune within the walls of his College, there to live upon his fellowship till a vacant living in the country should fall to his share. This resolution he communicated to his friend Henley, afterwards so well known first as Lord Keeper, and then as Lord Chancellor Northington, who vainly endeavoured to rally him out of a despondency, for which it must be confessed there seemed good ground. He consented, however, at his friend's solicitation, to go once more the western circuit, and through his kind offices received a brief as his junior in an important cause-offices not perhaps in those days so severely reprobated as they now are by the more stern etiquette of the profession. The leader's accidental illness threw upon Mr. Pratt the conduct of the cause; and his great eloquence, and his far more important qualifications of legal knowledge and practical expertness in the management of business, at once opened for him the way to brilliant fortune. His success was now secure. After eight years of very considerable practice, though unequal to that which most other great leaders have attained, he was made at once Attorney-General; and three years after, in 1762, raised to the Bench as Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, "the pillow," according to Lord Coke, "whereon the attorney doth rest his head." In 1749, when in his forty-sixth year, he had been chosen to represent the borough of Downton, but during his short experience of the House of Commons he appears not to have gained any distinction. The rewards of parliamentary ambition were reserved to a later period of his life. Of his forensic talents no records remain, beyond a general impression of the accuracy which he showed as a lawyer, though not of the most profound description; par negotiis neque supra. The fame of his legal arguments in Westminster Hall is not of that species which at once rises to the mind on the mention of Dunning's name, or Wallace's, the admirable variety and fertility of whose juridical resources were such that "their points" are spoken of to this day, and spoken of with admiration. But he greatly excelled them both in powers as a leader at Nisi Prius; and his eloquence was apparently of that chaste and gentle but persuasive kind which distinguished his great rival Murray, and made all the readers of Milton involuntarily apply to him the famous portraiture of Belial— Belial, in act more graceful and humane A fairer person lost not heaven; he seemed Dropt manna, and could make the worse appear But his eminently judicial qualifications shone forth conspicuously when he rose into their proper sphere. His unwearied patience, his unbroken suavity of manner, his unruffled calmness of temper, the more to be admired because it was the victory of determined resolution over a natural infirmity, his lucid clearness of comprehension and of statement, his memory, singularly powerful and retentive, his great anxiety to sift each case to the very bottom, and his scrupulous, perhaps extreme care, to assign the reasons for every portion of his opinions, went far to constitute a perfect judge, inferior in value though these qualities might be to the profound learning that has marked some great magistrates, like Lord Eldon and the older lawyers; and, perhaps, to the union of marvellous quickness, with sure sagacity, for which others, like the Kenyons, and the Holroyds, and the Littledales, have been famous. There was, however, in Lord Camden no deficiency of legal accomplishments, nor any want either of quickness or of perspicacity in the conduct of judicial business. And it must ever be remembered, that as a judge has always, or almost always, the statements and the suggestions of all parties before him, and is thus rather placed in a passive situation, those faculties of rapid perception and of deep penetration, that circumspection which no risk can escape, and that decision, at once prompt and firm, which instantly meets the exigencies of each sudden emergency, are far less essential virtues, far less useful attributes, of the ermine than of the gown. It is but rarely that a judge can be taken off his guard; never in any important civil suit, unless by some accident there is an extreme overmatch of the advocate upon one side compared with his antagonist; and chiefly possible in criminal cases, disposed of by a law which lies within a narrow compass, and connected with facts generally of ordinary occurrence and easy to deal with. It would thus be extremely erroneous to underrate Lord Camden's judicial qualities, merely because there have been many more consummate masters of English jurisprudence upon the bench, and some even of more extraordinary sagacity, quickness, and penetration. In the great qualities of sustained dignity, chaste, and therefore, not exaggerated propriety of demeanour, absolute impartiality, and fearless declaration of his conscientious opinion, how surely soever it might expose him to the frowns of power, or the yet more galling censure of his profession, this eminent magistrate never had a superior, very seldom an equal. That profession is ever singularly jealous on such points, and particularly prone to suspect such conduct as proceeding from a love of popularity, which these learned men, having but rarely been able to taste, are extremely apt to pronounce unsavoury, citing the illustrious chancellor and philosopher, of whom they peradventure have only read the one saying, that "a popular judge is a deformed thing, and plaudites are fitter for players than for magistrates." This propensity of the bar Lord Camden well knew; but he felt, above all dread of its effects, conscious that he was instigated by no childish love of plebeian |