The fact is-and we are anxious to impress it-the new parliament will be precisely of the same impress as the old, for the essential purposes of constitutional regeneration. Retrenchment, to a certain extent, we shall have, and perhaps some delusive and inefficient project of parliamentary reform-perhaps a committee to inquire into the state of the representation. God preserve us, we say, from any parliamentary committees of inquiry! What, indeed, is there to inquire about? Shall we inquire if the sun shines, or the moon gives light? The abuse is notorious, the mode of reforming it is notorious; then let us have it without delay. Are not the motions of Mr. Maddox and the practices of Quintin Dick on indelible record? No one doubts that certain peers send two, three, five, and seven members to parliament, and that they have no right to send one. Abolish the injustice without hesitation. The people would be mad-madder a great deal than the DUKE, when he became premier-were they to suffer procrastination on a subject like this; were they to suffer parliamentary reform to be inquired about and debated on for half a century, like the abolition of negro slavery and catholic emancipation. This is not the spirit of the age; the question is ripe for decision, and the people will never suffer it to be nursed, like a suit in chancery, for the benefit of lawyers and place-hunters. Our oppressors have an obvious interest in delay; for them government can never be better constituted than it is, and their best policy is to concede as little, and as slowly as possible-always excepting the risk they run, by such a course, of having the whole of their ill-gotten acquisitions wrested from them; whereas, by timely sacrifice of a part, they might enjoy the remainder in peace and security.

The new House of Commons, we repeat, will be like its predecessors. It has been elected under the influence of the same partial interests and the same prejudices; and, the seed being the same, so will the fruit. The church, the army, the bar, the nobility, and government offices are chiefly represented, and what can be expected from a body so constituted? Even knowledge has scarcely penetrated this dense corporation. Why, indeed, should men seek information who want for nothing, who enjoy every advantage: with the people it has been different; they suffered long and grievously-they inquired-found out the cause-and are resolved, we fervently trust, to apply that sovereign power they possess to effect a sovereign remedy.

But the King and the Duke, it is rumoured, purpose to administer to a nation's disease! The King, unquestionably, is as true and upright an Englishman as ever sat on the throne; and the Duke is a mighty man of war; but we cannot say, in the threescore years of his preceding life he has ever shown any great sympathy, either in public liberty or public happiness. But, supposing the Duke willing, and we give him credit for good intentions, great shrewdness, and enterprise-what can he do against the Church and Aristocracy? He cannot twist the Bishops and Lords about as he did his tenpenny-a-day heroes at the battle of Waterloo. They have a great interest at stake;

they have cherished it long, and, doubtless, have derived much benefit from it; and we shall be somewhat surprised if they do not cling to the advantages they possess with the same tenacious fatuity, as the Stuarts and Bourbons to their prerogatives. Unless, however, his Grace will vitally touch these classes; unless he will, at one fell sweep, strike the rotten boroughs out of the representation, he will not advance a step either in reconciling the absurdities of the existing system, or in satisfying public expectation. As to tinkering the Scotch representation, or adding a dozen members to six hundred and fifty-eight, from the manufacturing towns, he might as well think of sweetening the briny ocean with a spoonful of sugar.

Meanwhile we shall wait in patience. Perhaps, before our labours can be delivered to the public the mountain, itself will have brought forth, and resolved all doubts. Whatever may be the result, we trust our readers will be attentive to the main point-namely, a democratic power in the state, which shall lighten the intolerable aristocratic load: we want no theories--no republic; we want the old system of king, lords, and commons thoroughly cleansed and renovated. Our grievances are practical, and we seek practical remedies. As we have all an interest in the public weal, we desire the means to protect and promote our social welfare. Our objects are a reform in the administration of justice the church-the corn-laws-game-laws-partial taxationthe laws which regulate the press-the monopolies of the Bank and East-India Company; we wish a vast reduction in the national expenditure, and we wish Ireland to be tranquillized, and her great resources elicited. These reforms, we are fully aware, we can never have without a reform in parliament, and, therefore, first and foremost, we pray for that.

A List of the New House of Commons, their Connexions, &c. will be subsequently given.

THE independence of the judges has so long formed a current theme of admiration, that it appears almost presumptuous to call it in question. Yet the difference between them and other functionaries is not so apparent as is generally assumed. It is true, the judges hold their situations for life, unless guilty of some flagrant impropriety; but the same may be said of other appointments under the Crown, the possessors of which are seldom disturbed, so long as they correctly discharge their duties; or if they are, they invariably receive a superannuation-allowance, or compensation, equivalent to the loss they have sustained. As respects, then, the tenure of office, the sages of the law cannot arrogate a great pre-eminence over other placemen: as respects those causes which ordinarily influence individual conduct-the lure of ambitionthe temptation of lucre-and the seduction of indolence-they have still less to pride themselves. A judge, like a bishop, may be translated from a lower to a higher dignity-from a judgeship to a chiefjusticeship, from that to a peerage or a seat in the cabinet; he may be removed from an office of £5,500 per annum to one of £10,000, and boundless patronage: he may be taken from a court where he is overwhelmed with the claims of duty, to one where the most important duty he has to discharge is to receive his salary. How then can it be alleged the judges are independent and exempt from ministerial influence, when the ministers have similar alluring temptations to hold out to the bench as other functionaries, and similar means of rewarding subserviency?

Other causes operate unfavourably on judicial appointments. Instead of the individuals elevated to the bench being a selection from the entire bar, of men the most distinguished for ability, probity, and independence, the choice of the ministry is limited to men of their own party. A Tory minister never chooses a Whig judge; nor the contrary. This tends to lower the character of the judges in public estimation, by clearly

evincing, that politics, as well as legal fitness, have a share in ministerial appointments. It also instils into the mind of both expectant judges, and of men already on the bench, a party feeling fatal to strict justice on political questions. So well established is this fact, that it is notorious, whenever a question comes before the tribunals, whether it be upon a prosecution for libel, or upon any other matter connected with government, the council, at their meetings, take for granted that they can tell pretty accurately the leaning of the court, and predict exactly which way the consultations of the judges will terminate. It is very unfortunate the judges should be always on the ministerial side of politics; but there is no help for this, while they continue to be selected on the exclusive principle. They have their opinions on public questions as well as other men; they know they fill a certain situation, and they cannot forget by whom they were placed there, or for what reason.

With these remarks we shall leave the venerable occupiers of the bench, on whom we had no intention of offering any observation; but in some way their situation obtruded itself on our notice, on first entering on the consideration of the important subject of this chapter. We shall now proceed briefly to notice the more prominent abuses in the laws and their administration.

The whole body of English Law is divided into two kinds-the Common and the Statute Law. The Common Law is founded entirely on custom, or precedent, and the decisions in the courts of justice. It is not founded on any Act of Parliament, nor on any legislative enactment; it is recorded in no public document; the only memorials of its existence, are to be found in traditional maxims, records of pleas, books of reports, or the treatises of men eminent in the profession. It is evident, that laws originating and preserved in this manner, must be vague, obscure, often absurd, and even contradictory. The Common Law is, in fact, a monument of the opinions, errors, knowledge, and ignorance, of every period of society; it has flowed down the stream of time, accumulating like some mighty river, and carrying along vestiges of the learning and ignorance, folly and wisdom, of every age through which it has passed.

How unworthy such an incongruous mass must be of the present age; how inapplicable to the usages of society; and how difficult it is for any individual to obtain a knowledge of such an onus camelorum, it is unnecessary to describe. Unsuitable as such a system of law is, to fulfil the ends for which all laws were originally intended, it forms a very considerable part of the laws of this country. It is in virtue of the common law, that the eldest son inherits from his father; that property may be purchased and transferred by writing; that a deed is void if not sealed and delivered; that money lent upon bond is recoverable by action of debt; and that a breach of the peace is punishable with fine and imprisonment. These are doctrines not established by any written statute or any legislative enactment, but depend solely upon immemorial usage.

So much for the Common or Unwritten Law; next for the Statute

Law, which exhibits a still more frightful chaos. Statute-Law consists of all those acts, edicts, and statutes, made by the king, with the consent of the lords and commons in parliament assembled. The oldest of these now extant, and printed in the statute-books, is Magna Charta, as confirmed in parliament by 9 Hen. III. There were doubtless many acts before that time, the records of which are now lost; and which most probably were the foundation of some of the maxims in the old Common Law.

No man in England professes to be acquainted with the Statute-Law -not even the Lord Chancellor nor the Lord Chief Justice. It is such a prodigious compilation, that a knowledge of it is wholly unattainable. No one knows exactly what is law in England; though every individual is presumed to be acquainted with it, and ignorance is admitted as no excuse for its violation. Any one may become a legislator for the whole country; he has nothing to do but to turn to the statute-book; he will there find laws in abundance, of which no one has any knowledge; he may adduce them as the law of the land; he cannot be contradicted, unless some subsequent statute can be found by which it is repealed, and which it would probably require a-year's labour to discover. In some respects the statute-book may be compared to the scriptures. It contains many good maxims and excellent precepts; but, as a whole, it is contradictory, obscure, and inapplicable to the age. What one part affirms, another part denies. Laws may be adduced from it, like texts from the Bible, proving any thing and every thing, adapted to all times, principles, and occasions: one affords profitable employment for one hundred thousand wrangling lawyers; the other profitable employment for as many polemical divines: one is termed the perfection of human wisdom; the other a bright emanation from the Deity!

How ignorant the most eminent in the profession are on the subject, we may gather from a speech of the late Lord Stanhope, on the revision of the Statute-Book. Some of the most striking facts mentioned by his lordship, we will here insert. Conformably with a motion of his lordship, the judges were directed to prepare a bill, reducing into one act all the acts imposing the punishment of pillory. At the end of the bill the judges inserted some observations, stating that pillory was the punishment for some offences not merely by statute but at common law; and also they could not say whether their might not be statutes on the subject which had escaped their attention. Their surmise was just; for Lord Stanhope afterwards discovered two more statutes, passed in the reign of Geo. II. which had wholly escaped their investigation. Here then was an instance of the twelve judges not being able to discover all the acts inflicting a single punishment.

The same noble lord, wishing to ascertain how far the judges were agreed as to what was the law on several particulars, put to them various questions. For instance, he asked whether a person digging the brick earth from his own field, there manufactured into bricks, and sold, thereby made himself a trader liable to the bankrupt-laws? The judges of the Common Pleas were clearly of opinion one way, the judges