Page:The Annual Register 1758.djvu/466

 452 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1758.

I was not much afraid ; for once or

twice I was about to fpeak, and tell him

plainly, The felf-fame inn that fliines vipon his

palace, Hides not his heavenly vifage from my

cottage, 3ut looks on both alike.

His free and unconquered fpirit would look down with contempt on views of intercft, when they came in competition with views of duty.

Nay, were he called to fo fevere a trial, he would even dare to make ihe greatert and the rareft of all ho- neflYacrifices, that of friendlhip it- felf, to truth and virtue.

Should the fenfe of his duty to his country determine him to a far- ther profecution of his labours, he would fay,

•If fuch his fate, do thoy, fair Truth,

defcend. And watchful guard him in an hcneft

end ; Kindly levere, inftiiift his equal line, To coint no friend, nor own a foe, but

thine. Biit if his giddy eye fhould vainly quit Thy facred paths, to nm the maze of

wit i Jf his apoftatc heart fhould e'er incline To offer incenfe at corruption's rtirine, Urge, uige thy power ; the black at- tempt confound ; Oh, dafti the fmoaking cenfer to the

ground ; Thus aw'd to fear, inftrufted man may

fee That guilt is doom'd to fink in infamy.

^ dijcourfe on the Study of the Laiv, read in the public fchools at Oxford ^ Oa, 24, 1758.' OQavo.

WE cannot help congratu- lating the public on the fair

profpe£l we now have, that one learned foundation at leaft will fully anfvver the intention of the founder. The difcourfe before us is a folid, judicious, and elegant oration, con- taining at once, an hiflory of our law, a jull panegyric on it, argu- ments for putting the ftudy of it under proper regulations, and a fpirited perfuafive to make that fludy fo regulated, a confiderable part of academical education, efpe- cially for perfons of rank. After llrongly urging this to gentlemen in general, he particularly applies to the nobility.

" What is faid of our gentlemen in general, and the propriety of their application to the ftudy of the laws of their country, will hold equally ftrong or llill Wronger with regard to the nobility of this realm, except only in the article of ferving upon juries. But inflead of this, theyhavefeveral peculiar provlncef, of far greater confequence and concern; being not only by birth hereditary counfellors of the crown, and judges upon their honour of the lives of their brother peers, but alfo arbiters of the property of all their fellow-fubjeds, and that in the laft refort. In this their ju- dicial capacity they are bound to decide the niceft and moft critical points of law ; to examine and cor- left fuch errors as have efcaped the molt experienced fages of the pro- fellion, the lord-keeper, and the judges of the courts at Weliminfter. Their fentence is final, decifive, irrevocable: no appeal, no correc- tion, not even a review can be had : and to their determination, what- ever it be, the inferior courts cf juftice murt conform ; otherwife the rule of property would no longer be uniform and Heady.

Should