400 ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



afterward. Neither should the judge make a superexten- 

 sion where the law has once begun one. 



XIX. The solemnity of forms and acts admits not of 

 extension to similar cases : for it is losing the nature of so 

 lemnity to go from custom to opinion, and the introduction 

 of new things takes from the majesty of the old. 



XX. The extension of law is easy to after- cases, which 

 had no existence at the time when the law was made: for 

 where a case could not be described because not then in 

 being, a case omitted is deemed a case expressed, if there 

 be the same reason for it. 



Precedents and the use of forms 



XXL 2. We come next to precedents; from which jus 

 tice may be derived where the law is deficient, but reserving 

 custom, which is a kind of law, and the precedents which, 

 through frequent use, are passed into custom, as into a tacit 

 law; we shall at present only speak of such precedents as 

 happen but rarely, and have not acquired the force of a law, 

 with a view to show how and with what caution a rule of 

 justice may be derived from them when the law is defective. 



XXII. Precedents are to be derived from good and mod 

 erate times, and not from such as are tyrannical, factious, or 

 dissolute; for this latter kind are a spurious birth of time, 

 and prove more prejudicial than instructive. 



XXIII. Modern examples are to be held the safest. For 

 why may not what was lately done, without any inconven 

 ience be safely done again ? Yet recent examples have the 

 less authority; and, where things require a restoration, par 

 ticipate more of their own times than of right reason. 



XXIY. Ancient precedents are to be received with cau 

 tion and choice; for the course of time alters many things; 

 so that what seems ancient, in time may, for disturbance 

 and unsuitableness, be new at the present; and therefore 

 the precedents of intermediate times are the best, or those 

 of such times as have most agreement with the present, 

 which ancient times may happen to have more than later. 



XXV. Let the limits of a precedent be observed, and 



