Page:Legal Bibliography, Numbers 1 to 12, 1881 to 1890.djvu/43

Legal Bibliography PUBLISHED AND DISTKIBUTED GRATUITOUSLY AT IRREGULAR INTERVALS, By CHARLES C. SOULE, Successor to SOULE & BUGBEE. 'No. 5. 26 Pemberton Square, Boston, Mass. December, 1884. CONTENTS. PAGE Advertisements ... 8 Bargains, A Page of 5 Best the Best 2 Blacl<stone, Best and Cheapest 3 Catalogue of Law Books 3 Change of Firm and Location i Cheap Text-Books 5 Contracts, Great Work on 3 Damages against a Dead Man 2 English Books, New 2 English Digests, New 2 English Reports, Scarce 2 English Reports, Sets 5 Executors and Administrators 2 Hale, Chief Justice . . . Historical Material . . . Indispensables Seven . . Leading Cases made Easy Limitation of Actions . . New Law Quarterly . . . Notes and Queries . . . Publications of C. C. Soule Rare Books Reports, Sets of ... . Subrogation Trials Useful Book of Reference . Wanted, for Cash . . . Future numbers of tJiis paper will be mailed, without clmrge, to any judge, lawyer, or laiu student who will send his name and address to Charles C. Soule, '^6 Pemberton Square, Boston. CHANGE OF FIRM AND LOCATION. On October i, the firm of Soule & Bugbee expiring by limitation, Mr. BuGBEE retired, and the business was transferred to CHARLES C. SOULE, who shortly afterward moved from 37 Court Street to 26 Pemberton Square. CHIEF JUSTICE HALE. Sir Matthew Hale, born in 1609, was the son of a lawyer in mod- erate circumstances. When only five years old he lost both parents, and became the ward of a kinsman, who was a noted Puritan. Being put to school under another Puritan, and sent to O.Kford (at the age of sixteen) under the tuition of still another, he grew up in the faith and manners of that sect. Like many country boys, however, when they get to college, he became " so much corrupted by seeing many plays that he almost wholly forsook his studies." Abandoning the intention he had enter- tained of becoming a clergyman, he came very near entering the army. But a lawsuit against his patrimonial estate changed his plans, and in consulting with counsel as to his defence, he conceived the notion of studying law, and in 1629 was admitted to Lincoln's Inn. Cutting all his gay companions, he studied sixteen hours a day for seven years. " He not only read over and over again all the Year Books, and Reports, and Treatises in print " (there were not so many then as now), '• but visiting the Tower of London, he went through a course of records from the earliest times, and acquired a familiar acquaintance with the state and practice of English jurisprudence during every reign since the foun- dation of the monarchy." Called to the bar when twenty-eight years old, he at once came into good practice, — chiefly in chambers, for " he had neither a natural flow of eloquence, nor boldness of manner, nor a loud voice." Althouo-h living in the troublous times of the Commonwealth, he managed to avoid pronounced partisanship, and being by education a Puritan, and by con- viction a believer in monarchical government, he retained the respect and confidence of all parties, both before and after the Restoration. In 1653 he was made a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, and so served acceptably until the death of Cromwell, 1658, when he refused to accept a new commission. After the Restoration of Charles II. (having served as one of the special commission to try the Regicides), he was appointed, in 1660, Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer, becoming thereby Sir Matthew Hale. In this office he continued eleven years, and was then made Chief Justice of England. Retiring from the bench in February, 1676, on account of illness, he died in the following December. Hale's Pleas of the Crown and History of the Common Law are still well known and widely read ; but it is as a learned and upright judge that his fame chiefly survives. Cowper speaks of " Immortal Hale, for deep discernment praised And sound integrity." Lord Campbell says : " In the list of our great magistrates there is no name more venerated than Hale. . . . His qualifications as a judge always shone with lustre in proportion as the occasion called forth their display. . . . He was not only above the suspicion of corruption or undue influ- ence, but he was never led astray by ill-temper, impatience, haste, or a desire to excite admiration." Lord Chancellor Nottingham spoke thus of Hale: "A man that was so absolutely a master of the science of the law, and even of the most abstruse and hidden parts of it, that one may truly say of his knowledge in the law, what St. Austin said of St. Hierome's knowledge of divinity, — Quod Hieronimus iiescivit nulhcs mortalinin wiquain scivit." Sir Samuel Shepherd mentions him as the most learned man that ever adorned the bench, the most even man that ever blessed domestic life, the most eminent man that ever adorned the progress of science, and also one of the best and most purely religious men that ever Hved." And Richard Baxter sums up his character in these words : " He was most precisely just, insomuch that I believe he would have lost all he had in the world rather than do an unjust act : patient in bearing the most tedious speech which any one had to make for himself ; the pillar of justice : the refuge of the subject who feared oppression, and one of the greatest honors of his Majesty's government. Every man that had a just cause was almost past fear if he could but bring it to the court or assize where he was judge, for the other judges seldom contradicted him." A minor merit, especially appreciated by a bookseller in these days of keen competition and close prices, is thus mentioned by Campbell : " When he bought any articles, after he became a judge, he not only would not try to beat down the price, but he insisled on giving more than the 7'endors demanded; lest, if they should afterwards have suits before him, they should expect favor because they had dealt handsomely by him." The portrait of Chief Justice Hale which accompanies this paper is a reproduction of an admirable engraving by Vertue, from Michael Wright's painting in the Guildhall of London. It represents liim in the robes of oflice, in the characteristic attitude alluded to by Roger North, — "He put his thumbs in his girdle, as his way was." A copy of this portrait, printed on thick paper with wide margins, and suitable for framing, is offered without charge to any one who orders books from this paper to the amount of $10.00 or more. Please Show this Paper to Other Lawyers,