EDITORIAL OBSERVATIONS. 
157 
beneficial influence over society if not contemptuously com¬ 
pelled to herd with thieves and scoundrels in a witness box. 
Perhaps this expression is too strong, but it has a side of 
truth; and I have seen barristers speaking to a scientific 
witness in a box in such a way as to show that a witness was 
to them always an inferior personage. This too happens, 
even in cases where the word of the scientific man must of 
necessity decide the whole case, and where the duty of the 
barrister is a mere simple formality. 
“I think a scientific man may well claim for himself such 
an exemption from insult. You may say that his own cha¬ 
racter and bearing ought to command respect, but there are 
few men, if any, in this world, whose treatment by others is 
entirely unaffected by position. ; 
“We have now gone through the main points to be dis¬ 
cussed according to this view of the case, and concluded 
that: 
“ 1st. The scientific man shall not take the place of judge; 
the study of physical science does not fit a man for that 
office. 
“2d. He shall not take the place of a jury, because the 
jury represents the instincts and impulses of intelligent 
freemen acting out the common sense of the community, an 
element essentially distinct from any physical science. 
“ 3d. He shall not act as a plenipotentiary commission, 
absorbing judge and jury, for the above reasons. 
“4th. He shall not act as a recommending commission, as 
such is apt to become too powerful, and really does become 
so in practice. Nos. 3 and 4 are plans of despotic states. 
“ 5th. He shall not act as advocate, because he represents 
fixed law, not the interests of individuals. 
“6th. If he acts as witness he must be allowed to express 
his opinion independently of the advocate, or the plaintiff 
and defendant. Put upon his own honour, he will be able 
21 
XXXIII. 
