NOTK DDD. 



in that case. I mentioned it again and again to the court, but I could not 

 obtain judgment. At last the Lord Chancellor stated that he had been delibe 

 rating upon the case for many hours during the night, and that there was one 

 point which had escaped rne in my argument, to which he wished to direct my 

 attention, and he was pleased to direct my attention to it, and to desire it to be 

 re-argued ; and upon re-arguing it, I was satisfied that he was right, and I was 

 wrong ; and whatever may have been the cause of the delay, the consequence 

 has been, that he has prevented the injustice which I should have persuaded 

 him to have committed. I beg also to mention another case, (Ex parte Leigh), 

 which will be found in Glyn and Jameson, 264, the case of a habeas corpus ; 

 where, to my knowledge, the prisoner was detained illegally, upon an affidavit 

 upon detainers for debt by a Mr. Claughton, (I think for 10,000/). The court 

 of King s Bench refused to discharge him. I presented a petition to the Chan 

 cellor on behalf of the bankrupt, being convinced that the decision of the court 

 of King s Bench was erroneous ; and, it being in the case of the liberty of a 

 prisoner, the Chancellor heard it immediately, and took the trouble of applying 

 to the Chief Justice of the court of King s Bench; and, after deliberation, 

 thought it his duty to reverse the judgment, and to order him to be discharged ; 

 and, but for this care and deliberation, I am satisfied he would have been in 

 prison at this moment, as I know the hostility between these parties is con 

 tinuing to this very day. There is a petition in the paper between them coming 

 on at these sittings. 1 am so convinced of the Lord Chancellor s caution and 

 sense of justice, that, notwithstanding some resistance, I have always insisted 

 upon the light given to prisoners by the habeas corpus act to select their own 

 judge, which I trust will never be diminished, and have selected the Lord 

 Chancellor in preference to all the judges. With the pressure of business 

 upon the Lord Chancellor, and his anxiety, it is (I conceive) very difficult for 

 him to decide expeditiously ; and if any part of the blame is to attach to the 

 Lord Chancellor, it is (1 conceive) only this anxiety (ultra anxiety if I may 

 so say) to decide justly. I have no disposition to praise the Chancellor, or any 

 man living, more than I ought. I am much mistaken if there are any two 

 men in the country who differ more in their views of society than the Lord 

 Chancellor and myself. T almost always thought and acted, and I am rejoiced 

 at the recollection of it, with Sir Samuel Romilly : but, speaking of the Lord 

 Chancellor as a judge, I should be most ungrateful if I did not feel his kindness 

 to me for near twenty years, and (as T think) to the whole of his profession, 

 during his long judicial life. I should think most ill of myself, if I did not 

 look up witli the greatest respect to his extensive knowledge and extraordinary 

 powers ; dilating his sight so as to view the whole of every subject, and con 

 tracting it so as not to suffer the most minute object to escape him. I should 

 be most unjust, if I did not acknowledge his patience to hear, his charity to hope, 

 and his anxiety to do justice to every suitor of the court. I trust, therefore, that 

 I shall be protected from the supposition that I wish to ascribe the faults of 

 the court to the judge.&quot; Do not these permanent effects upon powerful minds 

 say that the business of the court was beyond the reach of any one mind? 



&quot; Mark,&quot; says Lord Bacon, &quot; whether the doubts that arise are only in cases 

 not of ordinary experience, or which happen every day. If in the first, impute 

 it to the frailty of man s foresight, that cannot reach by law all the cases ; but, 

 if in the latter, be assured that there is a fault in the law itself.&quot; 



Secondly. The Remedies. 



Assuming that the pressure upon the court had thus increased, the question 

 is, how ought it to be met 1 The modes are two. 



First, by increasing the number of the judges in the same or in different 

 courts. 



Secondly, by increased diligence on the part of the individual judge. 



The tendency of society would be to adopt the latter mode. Lord Bacon, in 

 his instances of power in the Novum Organum, says, &quot; It is one of the great 

 obstacles to improvement that the mind has a tendency to suppose that nothing 

 can be accomplished, unless the same means be employed with, perhaps, a 



