Introduction.
ccxiv
The commission,
May
on
after the publication of its first report
appears to have died out.
1867,
13,
pounded various
treatises to be sent in as
Digest contemplated
Mr. Macleod, one
some
but
specimens
of the
ensued with
litigation
and no more has
of the v^riters selected,
been heard of that commission since
pro-
It
report
its first
but
if
ever the experiment could have been successfully accomplished,
would
it
have
when such
been
commissioners was selected to try
A
in taking specific subjects
how human of
it.
and consolidating various statutes
The Sale
in relation to that subject.
Interpretation
of
but very useful, course has been pursued
less ambitious,
Exchange
body
a
Partnership Act,
the
Act,
Goods Act, the
of
the
Bills
of
Act, and the Marine Insurance Act, are examples
useful such a course
ingenuity will ever
may
but no amount of
be,
make
code that will not
a
require exposition.
An clear
make
ancient philosopher thought he could
by a preparatory account
effect;
modern
but
ment and
desire
ideas
to
of
rather
what
was intended
it
point
the law
plain
to
omit preambles altogether.
to
enact-
Bacon
undoubtedly favours the modern view that law should
commence with enactment. logi
He
says:
legum, qui inepti olim habiti sunt,
"Neque et leges
disputantes non jubentes, utique placerent,
si
nobis pro-
introducunt
priscos
mores
legum plerumque (ut nunc sunt tempora) necessario adhibentur, non tam ad explica-
ferre
possemus.
tionem
legis,
in comitiis fieri
It
Sed prologi
quam
isti
instar suasionis ad perferendam
et rursus
ad satisfaciendum populo.
legem
Quantum
potest tamen, prologi evitentur, et lex incipiat a jussione."
may
be that Bacon had in his mind what another judge
expressly said: that the preamble might act as the key" of the statute
to explain its object,
and thereby elucidate
meaning;
otherwise he would
not have added the
its
qualification "
quantum
fieri
potest."
The
difference
was
