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THE JUDGE AS A LEGISLATOR

the bulk and pressure of the rules that hedge him on every side. Innovate, however, to some extent, he must, for with new conditions there must be new rules. All that the method of sociology demands is that within this narrow range of choice, he shall search for social justice. There were stages in the history of the law when a method less psychological was needed. The old quantitative tests of truth did not fail in their day to serve the social needs.[1] Their day has long passed. Modern juristic thought, turning in upon itself, subjecting the judicial process to introspective scrutiny, may have given us a new terminology and a new emphasis. But in truth its method is not new. It is the method of the great chancellors, who without sacrificing uniformity and certainty, built up the system of equity with constant appeal to the teachings of right reason and conscience. It is the method by which the common law has renewed its life at

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  1. Flavius, "Der Kampf um die Rechtswissenschaft, pp. 48, 49; Ehrlich, "Die juristische Logik," pp. 291.