displayed itself merely in a disinclination to part with it when acquired, the fault might have been easily excused. But unhappily his cupidity led him to regard the increase of his fortune as a primary object of ambition; and though to accomplish it he never descended to employ means inconsistent with the strictest integrity, there cannot be a doubt that he sacrificed to it a species of fame which it was in his power to earn, and which it was incumbent on him to de

serve.

Had he not been deterred by avarice from effecting the reform of the court of chancery, he might have left behind him a smaller inheritance to his children, but he would have transmitted to them the glory of being descended from a disinterested benefactor of his country. Lord Waldegrave has said of him, that "he might have been thought a great man, had he been less avaricious, less proud, less unlike a gentleman, and not so great a politician." Sufficient has already been said to account for the first and the last of these charges. The two others may be looked upon as one. The pride of wealth and of station, even the pride of intellectual endowments, which is perhaps somewhat less offensive than either, can scarcely be made very manifest without subjecting him who exhibits them to the imputation of being unlike a gentleman.

Although lord Hardwicke devoted a part of the leisure which his numerous duties left him, to the cultivation of general literature, it is not to be supposed that he could have much time to spare for composition. Accordingly, there remain few specimens of his style in writing, though were we to judge of it only from his mode of speaking, we might safely pronounce it to have been easy and elegant. Some memoranda and familiar letters have been preserved by Dr. Birch, among which is a Latin one addressed to Dr. Clerk, (Samueli Clerico,) dated September 15, 1724; and some political papers are still in the possession of his family. It is supposed also, that he had some share in the composition

of the work entitled, "A Discourse of the judicial authority of the Master of the Rolls," usually attributed to his wife's uncle, sir Joseph Jekyll, who filled that post; but the supposition has never been authenticated. The only tract of any importance that can be confidently attributed to him, is a letter to the Scottish judge, lord Kames, which has been inserted in the first volume of the memoirs of the latter, written by lord Woodhouselee. Previous to the publication of his "Principles of Equity," in 1760, lord Kames had communicated the introduction of the work to lord Hardwicke, and the letter in question is a dissertation on some of the topics proposed for discussion. Lord Hardwicke does not profess to go at length into the arguments that may be adduced in support of his opinions. "The field," he says, employing a sporting metaphor, "is wide, and to range the whole is beyond my strength; but I will beat a piece of ground here and there, to try if I can start any thing that may be worth your lordship's pursuing." After some preliminary comments on the separation of common law from equity, he proceeds: "Whether the jurisdiction of common law and equity ought to be committed to the same or to different courts, is a question of another nature, and is very properly said by you to be no less intricate than important. It is a question of policy and legislation, depending upon general reasons of civil prudence and government. You have treated it with great modesty; and for my own part I am fearful of being influenced by some prejudice or bias contracted from long habit and the usages of my own country." Notwithstanding this candid avowal, however, he examines the question with great impartiality, deciding at length in favor of the separation of the courts. He afterwards passes to the consideration of the restrictions that ought to be placed on the discretionary power of an equity judge. He acknowledges the necessity of some restraints; but represents at the same time the disadvantage of increas

ing them in such a degree as to confine that power within as narrow limits as in a court of common law. The reasoning, though not fully developed, is quite worthy of lord Hardwicke; the whole letter is elegantly written, and it affords at the same time, a specimen of his peculiar manner of treating legal subjects, and evidence of his freedom from prejudice in consenting to enter into a deliberate discussion upon doubts, the very mention of which some chancellors would have held to be nothing short of an insult.

All the powers of his vigorous and commanding intellect were preserved unimpaired to the latest period of his life, so that he retained the ability as well as the inclination to enjoy the pleasures of literary occupation. The hand of time. had also been laid so gently on his frame, that he knew little or nothing of the usual infirmities of age. By a constant adherence to the strictest temperance, he had repaired the defects of a constitution originally by no means robust; and his health was uniformly good until near the close of his seventy-third year, when he began to suffer from the attacks of the disease, which not long afterwards put a period to his existence. His decease took place, at his house in Grosvenor-square, on the 6th of March, 1764. His remains are interred at Wimpole.

The evening of lord Hardwicke's life was as serene and unclouded as the former part of it had been brilliant. It would be difficult to point out an instance of a longer or more uniform career of prosperity than that which he enjoyed. Entering the world without the advantages of birth or fortune, unfriended and unknown, he had overleaped with unexampled rapidity and ease the obstacles, which, in the profession he had chosen, usually impede at the first outset the exertions even of men of wealth, rank, and powerful connections. No more singular instance can be quoted of his good fortune, than that the party in which he enrolled himself should remain in power for a length of time almost

unparalleled in the history of English ministries. With equal, or even superior abilities, had he from the first attached himself to the opposition instead of to sir Robert Walpole and his allies the Pelhams, it is clear he never would have enjoyed an opportunity of signalizing his knowledge and his talent in any official situation. That abilities, however transcendent, would never have obtained him such easy promotion as he gained through the influence of favoritism and patronage, is a fact that will surely be disputed by no one who is acquainted with the usual course of legal preferment; but at the same time it is equally certain that he never would have been able to improve his first advantage as he did improve it, without the aid of talents and acquirements of no ordinary kind. Though he owed much, therefore, to his good fortune, that circumstance detracts nothing from his real merit.

Besides the dignified offices which were permanently conferred on him, he was, at four several times, appointed one of the lords justices for the administration of the government during the king's excursions to Hanover. He also on three different occasions received the commission of lord high steward of England. In 1749, on the duke of Newcastle resigning the office of high steward of the university of Cambridge to accept that of chancellor of the same body, lord Hardwicke was elected to the place his friend and patron had vacated; and the same dignity has since been successively conferred on his son and his grandson. Of his five sons, the second, Charles Yorke, followed the profession in which his father had so eminently distinguished himself, and followed it with such success, that he also became chancellor; though, unfortunately, a premature death prevented him from acquiring in that situation the reputation which his learning and his talents could otherwise scarcely have failed to procure him.

The last century produced examples in public life, of the

descent of talent as well as honors from father to son. Thus the illustrious lord Chatham gave birth to William Pitt; with different degrees of merit, lord Holland was the father of Charles Fox; and sir Robert Walpole, of Horace, lord Orford. Such instances appear to have been generally less rare in the profession of the law than in any other. When Bacon presided in the court of chancery, he had it to say that there were three of the king's servants in great places: Mr. Attorney, son of a judge, Mr. Solicitor, likewise son of a judge, and himself a chancellor's son. Heneage Finch, the son of lord chancellor Nottingham, elevated himself by his legal acquirements to the rank of earl of Aylesford; and nearer our own time, the son of chief justice Pratt has presided first in the common pleas, and afterwards in the court of chancery, where his name as lord Camden will long be held in veneration. To this catalogue of lawyers by descent, which may no doubt be greatly enlarged, must be added the name of Charles Yorke. His career, though short, was eminently successful; and the talents of which he had given proof afforded such promise of future celebrity, that he was universally looked up to as likely to become one of the most brilliant ornaments of that profession, to which his father had been indebted for all his wealth, his dignities, and his fame.

ART. II.-ON THE INFLUENCE OF THE STOIC PHILOSOPHY ON THE ROMAN LAW.

[The following article is a translation of three chapters of one of the most remarkable works on Roman law, which have recently appeared in France :— remarkable, because it has received the warm and hearty commendations of the learned German critics of the historical school, who very rarely find any thing to commend in the modern French works on the Roman law. The