2§2 The Old Stannaries [April, 
In conclusion, allow me to say that it seems quite pro- 
bable that human welfare does not require us to sit in 
judgment on the ideas of others. Thoughtful men are 
becoming more and more impressed with the vastness of 
the unknown and the comparative insignificance of human 
achievement, while the demonstrated fallibility of human 
reason leads them to temperance and modesty of thought 
and expression : to appreciation , as well as toleration, of op- 
position and doubt. Certain it is, that if we preserve our 
intellectual integrity we shall be unable to settle many of 
the problems that interest us most. If we decide upon 
some of them, and other persons still reserve their judgment 
or decide differently, we need not lose our tempers ; they 
have not only decided differently from us, but we have also 
decided differently from them. It is impoitant to notice 
that neither of these decisions has affeCted the truth in the 
least. If we feel called upon to defend the truth, we are, 
after all, only defending what we believe to be truth, and 
possibly against men as honest and as able as ourselves. 
But why should we defend the truth ? So long as the heart 
of humanity shall pulsate, will not truth be cherished there ? 
Why would it not be far better for each one to put himself 
in the attitude of a reverent searcher for truth ? remembering 
always that the little decisions that we may reach are pos- 
sibly wrong, that all of the honesty and ability in the world 
is not concentrated within ourselves and the comparatively 
few who think as we do, and that one can do nothing nobler 
than to make himself as intelligent and humane as possible, 
resolutely following out his highest convictions, and living 
at peace with himself and with all men. 
III. THE OLD STANNARIES OF THE WEST 
OF ENGLAND. 
By James Quick. 
C*£. 
f T is a remarkable faCt, though unnoticed by most writers 
of English history, that there existed in England for 
many centuries an assembly which held the regulation 
or supervision of all matters connected with what was for 
a long period the most important branch of English com- 
mercial enterprise. Yet such was the case. The privilege 
of making laws for the direction of tin mining in the West 
of England was enjoyed by two convocations designated 
