Sec. 17. THE TERM LAW DEFINED.-Law, as the term is used by the legal profession, and will be used in the Cyclopedia of Law, is defined to be, "a rule of civil conduct prescribed by the supreme power in a state, commanding what is right and prohibiting what is wrong.

The above is Blackstone's celebrated definition of municipal law, the word "municipal" being used by him with reference to the laws of a state or nation, and to distinguish this meaning of the word law from that broader and indiscriminate use of the term in which it signifies a rule of action, whether animate or inanimate, and whether set by a human or superhuman authority. I. Bl. Com. 44.

A more concise definition of law, as the term is used by the courts and in the science of jurisprudence, is that given by Prof. Holland, who defines law to be "a general rule of external human action, enforced by a sovereign political authority." Holland's Jurisprudence, Chapter III. Sec. 18. ANALYSIS OF BLACKSTONE'S DEFINITION OF LAW.-The definition of municipal law is thus analyzed and justified by its author:

1. Law is a "rule," as it is something permanent, uniform, and universal, and not a mere transient sudden order from a superior to or concerning a particular person. It is also a "rule" in the sense that it is an injunction and not advice or counsel, it must be followed at all events, willingly or unwillingly. The obligation is the result of a command and not of an agreement.

2. It is a rule "of civil conduct," since it refers only to the duties owing by the citizen to the political society in which he lives, and not to moral duties which are the obligations of natural or revealed law.

3. It is a rule "prescribed," that is, published and promulgated, and not a mere secret resolution of the legislator. It is requisite that every law be notified to the people who are to obey it. But the manner of the notification may be varied. Thus it may be notified by tradition and long practice, which supposes a previous publication, as in the case of the common law; by being read in public assemblages; and by being written or printed, as is now the general method. It is this requirement of notification which makes ex post facto, or laws having a retroactive effect, so decidedly unpopular, as in this case there could be no possibility of previous notice of the law. Hence all laws should be made to take effect only after their passage and publication.

4. It is prescribed "by the supreme power in a state" for the act of legislating, or prescribing the rule, is the greatest act of superiority that can be exercised by one being over another. "Sovereignty and legislature are indeed convertible terms; one cannot subsist without the

other." It is the very essence of a law that it be made

by the supreme power.

5. It is a rule "commanding what is right and prohibiting what is wrong," for by the law are the boundaries of right and wrong established and ascertained. When the law forbids any action it becomes by reason of this inhibition wrong for the subject to do the thing forbidden, and if the law does not forbid the act, it is legally right to do that act, and this regardless of moral sanction.

In commanding the right and prohibiting the wrong every law may be said to consist of several parts, which are (a) The declaratory part, by which the rights to be observed and the wrongs to be avoided are clearly stated; (b) the directory part, which orders the subject to observe the rights and abstain from the commission of the wrongs stated in the declaratory part; (c) the remedial part, in which a method is pointed out to enforce rights or redress wrongs; and (d) the sanction or vindicatory branch of the law, which designates the evil or penalty to be incurred by such as commit any public wrong, and neglect their duty. I. Bl. Com. 44-54.

Sec. 19. COMPREHENSIVE MEANING OF THE WORD LAW.-In its most comprehensive sense, the term law has been applied to designate the rules of external nature, and its meaning has been rendered ambiguous, because it is used indifferently to describe the order which pervades the universe, the observed regular phenomena of nature, the intangible moral restraints upon human conduct, as well as those definite

rules of human action prescribed by some political superior. But to the jurisprudent the term has come to have only this latter and limited sense, when used without a qualifying or explanatory word.

The older writers, as Blackstone, were prone to find a higher sanction for laws than that of their being prescribed by the sovereign political authority. They regarded man as a creature, and hence subject to the laws of his Creator. Man's free will being restrained and modified by the "immutable laws of human nature,” and by his reason rendered capable of discovering the purport of those laws. Thus were the laws established by man for his social regulation, sought to be connected with the "eternal and immutable laws of good and evil, to which the Creator himself in all his dispensations conforms." Human reason, rightly exerted, discovers the laws which the Creator has set, as the principles, “that we should live honestly, should hurt nobody, and should render to every one his due," the fundamental precepts of the law laid down by Justinian. Again, according to these writers, the Creator in his infinite goodness has so regulated his creature, man, "that we should want no other prompter to inquire after and pursue the rule of right, but only our own self-love, that universal principle of action," and the rule of obedience is reduced to the one paternal precept, "that man should pursue his own true and substantial happiness." In addition to the laws discovered by reason, are those revealed directly by the Creator, and to be "found only in the Holy Scriptures."

"Upon these two foundations," says Blackstone, "the

law of nature and the law of revelation, depend all human laws; that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these." Thus, according to Blackstone, human laws, except in a number of indifferent points in which the divine and natural law leave man at his own liberty, are "only declaratory of, and act in subordination to, the former." And he concludes, "No human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this natural law, and such of them as are valid derive all their force and all their authority, mediately or immediately, from this original." This conclusion, as will be seen, is not in accord with his definition of municipal law, save on the supposition that all legislation is sanctioned by natural law.

Sec. 20. SAME SUBJECT-A LATER VIEW. -A later school of jurisprudents separate positive or municipal law entirely from the so-called natural or revealed law. Their reasoning is, that while man is a mystery to himself, external nature is a greater one, and he seeks to explain the more, by the less obscure. "As he governs his flocks and his family, so he supposes that unseen beings govern the waters and the winds. The greater the regularity in nature, the fewer such beings does he suppose to be at work in her; till at length he rises to the conception of one great being whose laws are obeyed by the whole universe, or having gotten the idea of the universe he holds that and not a supreme ruler and law-giver." Man believes himself acquainted either by experience or revelation with certain rules intended for his guidance, and hence the terms, laws of Nature, of