Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 13.djvu/824

TC 90 J U S J U S yearly value of 100. TliD vast and multifarious duties of the justices cover some portion of every important head of the criminal law, and extend to a considerable number of matters relating to the civil law, A complete guide thereto is Burn s Justice of the Peace, in 5 large volumes, the thir tieth edition of which was published in 1869. In tho United States these officers are sometimes ap pointed by the executive, sometimes elected. "In some, perhaps all, of the United States, justices of the peace have jurisdiction in civil cases given to them by local regulations " (Bouvier s Law Dictionary]. JUSTICIARY, HIGH COURT OF, in Scotland, is the supreme criminal court, and consists of five of the lords of session together with the lord justice-general and the lord justice-clerk as president and vice-president respectively. The constitution of the court is settled by the Act 1672 c. 16. The lords of justiciary hold circuits regularly twice a year according to the ancient practice, which, however, had been allowed to fall into disuse until revived in 1748. The circuits are the south, at the towns of Jedburgh, Dumfries, and Ayr ; west (three times a year), at Glasgow, Inveraray, and Stirling; and north, Perth, Aberdeen, Dundee, ami Inverness. By a recent order in council the number of circuit courts in future is to be doubled. Two judges generally go on circuit, and in Glasgow they are by special statute authorized to sit in separate courts. The High Court, sitting in Edinburgh, has, in addition to its general jurisdiction, an exclusive jurisdiction for districts not within the jurisdiction of the circuits the three Lothians, and Orkney and Shetland. The High Court also takes up points of difficulty arising before the special courts, like the court for crown cases reserved in England. The court of justiciary has authority to try all crimes, unless when its jurisdiction has been excluded by special enactment of the legislature. It is also stated to have an inherent jurisdic tion to punish all criminal acts, even if they have never before been treated as crimes. Its judgments are believed to be not subject to any appeal or review, but it may be doubted whether an appeal on a point of law would not lie to tho House of Lords. The following crimes must be prosecuted in the court of justiciary : treason, murder, robbery, rape, fire-raising, deforcement of messengers, breach of duty by magistrates, and all offences for which a statutory punishment higher than imprisonment is imposed. JUSTIN", Martyr and Apologist as he is usually called, was an able and eloquent advocate of Christianity in the 2d century. Almost all we know about him is told us in his own writings. He was born in Palestine, at Flavia Ne.ipolis (ApoL, i. 1), the ancient Shechem, now Xabulus. The names of his father Priscus and grandfather Bacchius suggest that he was of Latin descent, and some passages in his writings seem to say that his parents were heathens. He relates his own conversion in two passages. In the one hs says that he was drawn to Christianity, because he saw tho Christians dauntless in death (4po/f., ii. 12) ; in the other he tells how chance intercourse with an aged stranger brought him to know the truth (Dial. c. Try ph., c. 2), but this passage may be allegorical. In the intro duction to the dialogue with Trypho, Justin describes various systems of pagan philosophy and his relation to them. At first he associated with the Stoics ; from them he went to a Peripatetic, then to a Pythagorean ; and at length _ he embraced the doctrines of Platonism. His Platonism clung to him through life, and curiously coloured many of his Christian speculations. We know little about Justin s life after his conversion. It is very probable that ho retained his philosopher s cloak, the distinctive badge of the wandering and professional teacher of philo sophy, and went about from place to place discussing the truths of Christianity in the hope of bringing educated pagans, as he himself had been brought, through philosophy to Christ. At Ephesus he held the famous disputation with Trypho the Jew, and in Rome he argued with Crescens the Cynic. If the Cohortatio be genuine, he also visited Alexandria and Cuma?. His martyrdom is well authenticated. In his second Apology Justin declares that he expected martyrdom, and that he believed that his opponent Crescens, silenced in public by his arguments, would do his best to get him thrown into prison and condemned to death; and this declaration is probably Iho reason why Eusebius, who often manufactures facts out of suppositions, asserts that Justin was slain through the plots of Crescens. An old martyrium, of unknown authorship, records the trial and death of a Justin, who is probably Justin Martyr, though there is no corroborative historical evidence. If the account can be accepted, Justin was brought before Rusticus, a Roman magistrate who was a Stoic ; during his trial he was brave, quiet, and dignified ; he professed his faith in the God of heaven and earth, and in His Son "the Master of Truth," arid confidently expressed the conviction that after death he would share a blessed immortality. He was condemned and put to death on the same day. We cannot fix with any certainty the dates of Justin s birth and death. He was probably born near the beginning of the 2d century, and was martyred somewhere between 148 and 165. Justin was one of the earliest and ablest of the Christian Apologists, and it is as an apologist rather than as a theo logian that he must be criticized, for his Apologies did not lead him directly to exhibit and defend the truths of Christianity. He was defending Christians not Christi anity. Trajan had formally authorized the persecution of the Christians. Hadrian and Antoninus Pius had done nothing to put this decree in operation, but it hung over the Christian church, and might have been put in force at any moment. The Christians were legally proscribed. This was the state of matters which gave rise to Justin s Apologies. He wrote like a man full of Christianity ; it was his philosophy, his religion, his rule of daily life. And lie wrote boldly, having nothing to fear and nothing to conceal. The argument of his first Apology, addressed to the emperor Antoninus Pius, may be thus condensed. " In the name of these unjustly hated and much abused men, I, Justin, one of themselves, present to you this discourse and petition. You are everywhere called the Pious, the guardian of justice, the friend of truth ; your acts shall show whether you merit these titles. My design is neither to flatter you by this letter nor to win your favour. Judge us by a scrupulous and enlightened equity, not by mere presumption, nor in the name of superstition, nor by the persuasion of calumny ; .... we fear no harm if we are not guilty of any crime. You can kill, you cannot injure us. All that we ask for is investigation ; if the charges made against us are true, let us be punished. . . . Our duty is to make our deeds and doctrines fully known ; yours is to investigate our cause and to act as good judges." Justin then proceeds to set forth the iniquity of the summary modes of trial in use against the Christians, and goes on to state and deal with the charges brought against his brethren. These were three : the Christians were denounced as atheists, as rebels, and as evil-doers faithless to God, the emperor, and society. Justin answers, " We are atheists, if it be atheism not to acknowledge your gods ; but we hold this glorious atheism in common with Socrate?, who was martyred for it as we are ; we are no atheists, for we worship the God of truth, the Father of righteousness, of wisdom, and of all virtues. We are no rebels : the kingdom founded by Jesus is purely spiritual, and need be no cause of alarm to the emperors ; we worship God only, but with this exception we joyfully obey you and acknow-