196 PREFACE TO THE SECOND PART. 



158. Paragraph 1. (Part I.) contains my rea 

 sons for numbering the paragraphs, but, be 

 sides the reasons there stated, there is one, 

 which did not then occur to me, and which 

 was left to be suggested by experience, of a 

 description which I did not then anticipate; 

 namely, that, in the case of more than one 

 edition, the paging may, and generally does, 

 differ in such manner as to bring the matter, 

 which, in one edition, is under any given page, 

 under a different page in another edition. This 

 renders the work of reference very laborious at 

 best, and, in many cases, it defeats its object. 

 If the paragraphs of BLACKSTONE'S COMMEN 

 TARIES had been numbered, how much valu 

 able time it would have saved. I am now 

 about to send a second edition of the First 

 Part of this work to the press. I am quite 

 careless about the paging: that is to say, so 

 that the whole be comprized within the 134 

 pages, it is of no consequence whether the mat 

 ter take, with respect to the pages, precisely the 

 same situation that it took before ; and, if the 

 paging were not intended to join on to that of 

 the present volume, it would be no matter 

 what were the number of pages upon the 

 whole. I hope, that these reasons will be suf 

 ficient to convince the reader that I have not, 

 in this case, been actuated by a love of sin- 



