powers fhall concur in promoting the publick good, without danger of collifion or diminution of each other's dignity; without impediment, on the one fide, to the operations of government, or, on the other, to the due adminiftration of juftice.

The inftitution, gentlemen, of this court appears to have been misapprehended: it was not, I firmly believe, intended as a cenfure on any individuals, who exist, or have exifted. Legiflative provifions have not the individual for their object, but the species; and are not made for the convenience of the day, but for the regulation of ages. Whatever were the reasons for its first establishment, of which I may not be fo perfectly apprized, I will venture to affure you, that it has been continued for one obvious reafon; that an extensive dominion, without a complete and independent judicature, would be a pheno menon, of which the hiftory of the world affords no example. Juftice must be administered with effect, or fociety cannot long fubfift. It is a truth coeval with human nature, and not peculiar to any age or country, that power in the hands of men will sometimes be abused, and ought always, if poffible, to be reftrained; but the reftrictions of general laws imply no particular blame. How many precautions have from time to time been used to render judges and jurors impartial,

and to place them above dependence! Yet none of us conceive ourselves difgraced by fuch pre

cautions.

The object then of the court, thus continued with ample powers, though wifely circumfcribed in its jurifdiction, is plainly this: that, in every age, the British fubjects resident in India be protected, yet governed, by British laws; and that the natives of these important provinces be indulged in their own prejudices, civil and religious, and fuffered to enjoy their own cuftoms unmolefted; and why those great ends may not now be attained, confiftently with the regular collection of the revenues and the fupremacy of the executive government, I confefs myself unable to discover.

Another thing has been, if not greatly mifconceived, at least very imperfectly understood; and no wonder, fince it requires fome profeffional habits to comprehend it fully: I mean the true character and office of judges appointed to adminifter thofe laws. The use of law, as a science, is to prevent mere difcretionary power under the colour of equity; and it is the duty of a judge to pronounce his decifions, not fimply according to his own opinion of justice and right, but according to prescribed rules. It must be hoped, that his own reafon generally approves thofe rules; but it is the judgement of the law, not his own, which he delivers. Were judges

to decide by their bare opinions of right and wrong, opinions always unknown, often capricious, fometimes improperly biaffed, to what an arbitrary tribunal would men be subject! In how dreadful a ftate of flavery would they live! Let us be fatisfied, gentlemen, with law, which all, who please, may understand, and not call for equity in its popular fenfe, which differs in different men, and must at best be dark and uncertain.

The end of criminal law, a most important branch of the great juridical fyftem, is to prevent crimes by punishment, so that the pain of it, as a fine writer expreffes himself, may be inflicted on a few, but the dread of it extended to all. In the adminiftration of penal juftice, a fevere burden is removed from our minds by the affiftance of juries; and it is my ardent wish, that the court had the fame relief in civil, especially commercial, caufes; for the decifion of which there cannot be a nobler tribunal than a jury of experienced men affifted by the learning of a judge. Thefe are my fentiments ; and I exprefs them, not because they may be popular, but because I fincerely entertain them; for I afpire to no popularity, and feek no praise, but that which may be given to a strict and confcientious discharge of duty, without predilection

or prejudice of any kind, and with a fixed refolution to pronounce on all occafions what I conceive to be the law, than which no individual muft fuppofe himself wiser.

The mention of my duty, gentlemen, leads me naturally to the particular fubject of my charge, from which I have not, I hope, unreafonably deviated: but you are too well ap→ prized of your duty to need very particular inftructions; and happily no higher offences (except one larceny) appear in the calendar than fome criminal frauds and a few affaults: one of them, indeed, is stated as very atrocious, and, if you confider that the frequency of fmall crimes becomes a ferious evil in fociety, you will not think the more trivial complaints unworthy of attention. your Redress of wrongs must be given, or it will be taken; and the law wifely forbids the flightest attack upon the person of a subject, left far worse mischief should enfue from the fudden ebullition of rage, or the flower, but more dangerous, operation of revenge.

Your powers, however, are not limited to this calendar, or even to the bills which may be preferred; for, whatever else shall come to your knowledge, it will be your part to prefent, and ours to hear attentively: thus, by a cordial

concurrence in preferving the publick peace, and bringing fuch as violate it to punishment, we fhall contribute, in our respective stations, to the fecurity of this great fettlement, and to the profperity of these provinces, in which the dearest interests of our common parent and country, Great Britain, are now effentially involved.