miliarity with modern history as " astounding and even appalling, for it produces a painful consciousness of inferiority, and creates remorse for time misspent." When called to the bar in 1730, "he had made himself acquainted not only with international law, but with the codes of all the most civilized nations, ancient and modern; he was an elegant classical scholar; he was thoroughly imbued with the literature of his own country; he had profoundly studied our mixed constitution; he had a sincere desire to be of service to his country; and he was animated by a noble aspiration after honorable fame." When he first came to London as a boy in Westminster school, he was introduced by his countryman, Lord Marchmont, to Mr. Pope, then at the height of his unrivaled popularity. The poet took a lively interest in the young Scotchman, attracted not only by the quickness of his parts and the fineness of his manners and person, but by "the silvery tones of his voice," for which he continued to be distinguished to the end of life. Mr. Pope entered with the warmest concern into all his employments, and as sisted especially in his rhetorical studies during his preparation for the bar. One day. says his biographer, he was surprised by a friend, who suddenly entered the room, in "the act of practicing before a glass, while Pope sat by to aid him in the character of an instructor!" Their friendship continued throughout life; and in a new edition of the Dunciad Mr. Pope introduced his name, with that of other distinguished men, complaining that law and politics should have drawn them off from the more congenial pursuits of literature. "Whate'er the talents and howe'er designed, We hang one jingling padlock on the mind. Some years elapsed after Mr. Murray's call to the bar before he had any business of importance; and then, after a few successful cases, it poured in upon him to absolute repletion. "From a few hundred pounds a year," said he, "I found myself in the receipt of thousands." Retainers came in from every quarter; and one of a thousand guineas was sent by Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, with that ostentatious munificence which she sometimes affected. Nine hundred and ninety-five guineas were returned by Mr. Murray, with the significant remark that "a retaining fee was never more nor less than five guineas." He found her a very troublesome client. Not unfrequently she made her appearance at his chambers after midnight, crowding the street with her splendid equipage and her attendants with torches; and on one occasion when he was absent, his clerk, giving an account of her visit the next morning, said, “I could not make out, sir, who she was, for she would not tell me her name; but she swore so dreadfully that she must have been a lady of quality!" Soon after the fall of Sir Robert Walpole in 1742, Mr. Murray was appointed Solicitor General, and elected a member of Parliament through the influence of the Duke of Newcastle. His powerful talents were needed for the support of the new administration, which was suffering under the vehement attacks of Mr. Pitt. Here commenced that long series of conflicts which divided for life the two most accomplished orators of the age. It could not be otherwise, for never were two men more completely the antipodes of each other. Pitt was a Whig; Murray was a High Tory. Pitt was ardent, open, and impetuous; Murray was cool, reserved, and circumspect. The intellect of Pitt was bold and commanding; that of Murray was subtle, penetrating, and refined. Pitt sought power; Murray, office and emolument. Two such men could not but differ; and differing as they did for life, it was natural that the one should distrust or despise, and the other fear, perhaps hate. In native talent, it would be difficult to say which had the advantage; but the mind of Murray was more perfectly trained, and his memory enriched with larger stores of knowledge. "In closeness of argument," says an able writer," in happiness of illustration, in copiousness and grace of diction, the oratory of Murray was unsurpassed: and, indeed, in all the qualities which conspire to form an able debater, he is allowed to have been Pitt's superior. When measures were attacked, no one was better capable of defending them; when reasoning was the weapon employed, none handled it with such effect; but against declamatory invective, his very temperament incapacitated him for contending with so much advantage. He was like an accomplished fencer, invulnerable to the thrusts of a small sword, but not equally able to ward off the downright stroke of a bludgeon." In 1754 Mr. Murray was appointed Attorney General, and soon after made leader of the House of Commons under the Duke of Newcastle. "At the beginning of the session," says Horace Walpole, "Murray was awed by Pitt; but, finding himself supported by Fox, he surmounted his fears, and convinced the House, and Pitt too, of his superior abilities. Pitt could only attack, Murray only defend. Fox, the boldest and ablest champion, was still more forward to worry; but the keenness of his saber was blunted by the difficulty with which he drew it from the scabbard—I mean, the hesitation and ungracefulness of his delivery took off from the force of his arguments. Murray, the brightest genius of the three, had too much and too little of the lawyer; he refined too much and could wrangle too little for a popular assembly." We have seen already, in the life of Lord Chatham, what difficulties Murray had to encounter that session in sustaining the ministry of Newcastle, and the crushing force with which he was overwhelmed by his opponent. In 1756 he resolved to endure it no longer, and on the death of Sir Dudley Ryder he demanded the office of Chief Jus tice of the King's Bench. Newcastle refused, remonstrated, supplicated. "The writ for creating Murray," he declared, "would be the death-warrant of his own administration." He resisted for several months, offering the most tempting bribes, including a pension of £6000 a year, if he would only remain in the House until the new session was opened, and the address voted in reply to the King's speech. Murray declared, in the most peremptory terms, that he would not remain "a month or a day even to support the address;" that he never again would enter that assembly." Turning with indignation to Newcastle, he exclaimed, "What merit have I, that you should lay on this country, for which so little is done with spirit, the additional burden of £6000 a year;" and concluded with declaring his unalterable determination, if he was not made Chief Justice, to serve no longer as Attorney General. This brought Newcastle to a decision. On the 8th of November, 1756, Murray was sworn in as Chief Justice, and created a peer with the title of Baron Mansfield. At a later period he was raised to the earldom. In entering on his new career, he was called upon to take public leave of his associates of Lincoln's Inn. On that occasion he was addressed in an elegant speech by the Honorable Charles Yorke. The reader will be interested in Mr. Murray's reply, as showing with what admirable dignity and grace he could receive the compliments bestowed upon him, and turn them aside in favor of another. "I am too sensible, sir, of my being undeserving of the praises which you have so elegantly bestowed upon me, to suffer commendations so delicate as yours to insinuate themselves into my mind; but I have pleasure in that kind of partiality which is the occasion of them. To deserve such praises is a worthy object of ambition, and from such a tongue flattery itself is pleasing. "If I have had, in any measure, success in my profession, it is owing to the great man who has presided in our highest courts of judicature the whole time I attended the bar.1 It was im 1 Lord Hardwicke, father of Mr. Yorke. K possible to attend to him, to sit under him every day, without catching some beams from his light. The disciples of Socrates, whom I will take the liberty to call the great lawyer of antiquity, since the first principles of all law are derived from his philosophy, owe their reputation to their having been the reporters of the sayings of their master. If we can arrogate nothing to ourselves, we can boast the school we were brought up in; the scholar may glory in his master, and we may challenge past ages to show us his equal. My Lord Bacon had the same extent of thought, and the same strength of language and expression, but his life had a stain. My Lord Clarendon had the same ability, and the same zeal for the Constitution of his country, but the civil war prevented his laying deep the foundations of law, and the avocations of politics interrupted the business of the chancellor. My Lord Somers came the nearest to his character, but his time was short, and envy and faction sullied the luster of his glory. It is the peculiar felicity of the great man I am speaking of to have presided very near twenty years, and to have shone with a splendor that has risen superior to faction and that has subdued envy. "I did not intend to have said, I should not have said so much on this occasion, but that in this situation, with all that hear me, what I say must carry the weight of testimony rather than appear the voice of panegyric. “For you, sir, you have given great pledges to your country; and large as the expectations of the public are concerning you, I dare say you will answer them. "For the society, I shall always think myself honored by every mark of their esteem, affection, and friendship; and shall desire the continuance of it no longer than while I remain zealous for the Constitution of this country and a friend to the interests of virtue." Lord Mansfield now entered on that high career of usefulness which has made his name known and honored throughout the civilized world. Few men have ever been so well qualified for that exalted station. He had pre-eminently a legal intellect, great clearness of thought, accuracy of discrimination, soundness of judgment, and strength of reasoning, united to a scientific knowledge of jurisprudence, a large experience in all the intricacies of practice, unusual courtesy and ease in the dispatch of business, and extraordinary powers of application. He came to the bench, not like most lawyers, trusting to his previous knowledge and the aid afforded by counsel in forming his decisions, but as one who had just entered on the real employment of his life. "On the day of his inauguration as Chief Justice, instead of thinking that he had won the prize, he considered himself as only starting in the race." How he discharged the duties of his high station, it belongs especially to men of his own profession to determine. One fact, however, may stand in the place of many authorities. Out of the thousands of cases which he decided in the Court of King's Bench, there were only two in which his associates of that court did not unanimously agree with him in opinion. Yet they were, as all the world knows, men of the highest ability and the inost perfect independence of mind. Junius, indeed, assailed him with malignant bitterness, but it is the universal decision of the bar that his charges were false as they were malignant. Against this attack we may set off the opinion of Chief Justice Story. "England and America, and the civilized world, lie under the deepest obligations to him. Wherever commerce shall extend its social influences; wherever justice shall be administered by enlightened and liberal rules; wherever contracts shall be expounded upon the eternal principles of right and wrong; wherever moral delicacy and judicial refinement shall be infused into the municipal code, at once to persuade men to be honest and to keep them so; wherever the intercourse of mankind shall aim at something more elevated than that groveling spirit of barter, in which meanness, and avarice, and fraud strive for the mastery over ignorance, credulity, and folly, the name of Lord Mansfield will be held in reverence by the good and the wise, by the honest merchant, the enlightened lawyer, the just statesman, and the conscientious judge. The proudest monument of his fame is in the volumes of Burrow, and Cowper, and Douglas, which we may fondly hope will endure as long as the language in which they are written shall continue to instruct mankind. His judgments should not be merely referred to and read on the spur of particular occasions, but should be studied as models of juridical reasoning and eloquence." As a speaker in the House of Lords, the success of Lord Mansfield was greater than in the House of Commons. The calmness and dignity of the assembly were better suited to his habits of thought. Here, after a few years, he had again to encounter his great antagonist, who was raised to the same dignity in 1766. As Chatham was the advocate of the people's rights, Mansfield was the champion of the King's prerogative. He defended the Stamp Act, and maintained the right of Parliament to tax the Americans as being virtually represented in the House of Commons. A speech on that subject, corrected by himself, is given below. Lord Campbell, notwithstanding his strong predilections as a Whig, does not hesitate to pronounce it unanswerable. His speech in favor of taking away the protection extended to the servants of peers is the most finished of his productions, and will also be found in this volume. To these will be added his argument in the case of the Chamberlain of London vs. Allan Evans, which has often been spoken of as the most perfect specimen of juridical reasoning in our language. His address from the bench, when surrounded by a mob, during the trial of the outlawry of Wilkes, will also form part of the extracts. After discharging his duties as Chief Justice nearly thirty-two years, he resigned his office on the 4th of June, 1788. His faculties were still unimpaired, though his strength was gone; and he continued in their unclouded exercise nearly five years longer, when he died, after an illness of ten days, on the 20th of March, 1793, in the eighty-ninth year of his age. was un "The countenance of Lord Mansfield," says a friend and contemporary, commonly beautiful, and none could ever behold it, even in advanced years, without reverence. Nature had given him an eye of fire; and his voice, till it was affected by the years which passed over him, was perhaps unrivaled in the sweetness and variety of its tones. There was a similitude between his action and that of Mr. Garrick. In speaking from the bench, there was sometimes a confusion in his periods, and a tendency to involve his sentences in parentheses; yet, such was the charm of his voice and action, and such the general beauty, propriety, and force of his expressions, that, while he spoke, all these defects passed unnoticed." The eloquence of Lord Mansfield, especially in his best speeches in the House of Lords, was that of a judge rather than an advocate or a party leader. He had the air of addressing the House of Lords, according to the theory of that body, as one who spoke upon honor. He sought not to drive, but to lead; not to overwhelm the mind by appeals to the passions, but to aid and direct its inquiries; so that his hearers had the satisfaction of seeming, at least, to form their own conclusions. He was peculiarly happy in his statement of a case. "It was worth more," said Mr. Burke, than any other man's argument." Omitting all that was unnecessary, he seized, with surprising tact, on the strong points of a subject; he held them steadily before the mind; and, as new views opened, he led forward his hearers, step by step, toward the desired result, with almost the certainty of intuitive evidence. "It was extremely difficult," said Lord Ashburton, "to answer him when he was wrong, and impossible when he was in the right." His manner was persuasive, with enough of force and animation to secure the closest attention. His illustrations were always apposite, and sometimes striking and beautiful. His language, in his best speeches, was select and graceful; and his whole style of speaking approached as near as possible to that dignified conversation which has always been considered appropriate to the House of Lords. SPEECH OF LORD MANSFIELD ON THE RIGHT OF TAXING AMERICA, DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS, FEBRUARY 3, 1766. INTRODUCTION. IN January, 1776, a bill was brought into the House of Commons, under Lord Rockingham's ministry, for the repeal of the American Stamp Act; and in order to mollify the King, who was opposed to that measure, it was accompanied by a Declaratory Act, affirming that "Parliament had full power and right to make laws of sufficient force to bind the colonies." Lord Chatham, then Mr. Pitt, remarked with severity on this Declaratory Act when before the Commons. Lord Camden did the same when it came before the House of Lords, February 3d, 1766. He said, "In my opinion, my Lords, the Legislature have no right to make this law. The sovereign authority, the omnipotence of the Legislature, is a favorite doctrine; but there are some things which you can not do. You can not take away a man's property without making him a compensation. You have no right to condemn any man by bill of attainder without hearing him. But, though Parliament can not take any man's private property, yet every subject must make contribution; and this he consents to do by his representative. Notwithstanding the King, Lords, and Commons could in ancient times tax other persons, they could not tax the clergy." He then went on to consider the case of the counties palatine of Wales and of Berwick, showing that they were never taxed till they sent representatives to the House of Commons, observing that the Irish tax themselves, and that the English Parliament could not tax them. "But," said he, "even supposing the Americans have no exclusive right to tax themselves, it would be good policy to give it to them, instead of offensively exerting a power which you ought never to have exercised. America feels that she can do better without us than we can do without her." Lord Northington, the Chancellor, made some coarse and bitter remarks in reply; and Lord Mansfield then rose to defend his favorite doctrine of the right of Great Britain to tax the colonies. His speech is by far the most plausible and argumentative one ever delivered on that side of the question; and Lord Campbell, in referring to the subject, says, "Lord Mansfield goes on with great calmness, and with arguments to which I have never been able to find an answer, to deny, as far as the power is concerned, the distinction between a law to tax and a law for any other purpose." ""} The speech was corrected for the press by Lord Mansfield, and may therefore be relied on as authentic. one of right, SPEECH, &c. MY LORDS, I shall speak to the question | The question strictly as a matter of right; for it is not expedi- a proposition in its nature so perfectly ency. distinct from the expediency of the tax, that it must necessarily be taken separate, if there is any true logic in the world; but of the expediency or inexpediency I will say nothing. It will be time enough to speak upon that subject when it comes to be a question. I shall also speak to the distinctions which have been taken, without any real difference, as to the nature of the tax; and I shall point out, lastly, the necessity there will be of exerting the force of the superior authority of government, if opposed by the subordinate part of it. I am extremely sorry that the question has ever become necessary to be agitated, and that there should be a decision upon it. No one in this House will live long enough to see an end put to the mischief which will be the result of the doctrine which has been inculcated; but the arrow is shot, and the wound already given. I shall certainly avoid personal reflections. No one has had more cast upon him than myself; 1 Lives of the Chancellors. v., 206. but I never was biased by any consideration of applause from without, in the discharge of my public duty; and, in giving my sentiments according to what I thought law, I have relied upon my own consciousness. It is with great pleasure I have heard the noble Lord who moved the resolution express himself in so manly and sensible a way, when he recommended a dispassionate debate, while, at the same time, he urged the necessity of the House coming to such a resolution, with great dignity and propriety of argument. Refutation of arguments from ancient practices. I shall endeavor to clear away from the question, all that mass of dissertation and learning displayed in arguments which have been fetched from speculative records and men who have written upon the subject of government, or from ancient records, as being little to the purpose. I shall insist that these records are no proofs of our present Constitution. A noble Lord has taken up his argument from the settlement of the Constitution at the Revolution; I shall take up my argument from the Constitution as it now is. The Constitution of this country has been always in a moving state, either gaining or losing something, |