willing enough to take the law upon trust. They rely upon your authority, because they are too indolent to search for information: or, conceiving that there is some mystery in the laws of their country, which lawyers are only qualified to explain, they distrust their judgment, and voluntarily renounce the right of thinking for themselves. With all the evidence of history before them, from Tresilian to Jefferies, from Jefferies to Mansfield, they will not believe it possible that a learned judge can act in direct contradiction to those laws, which he is supposed to make the study of his life, and which he has sworn to administer faithfully. Superstition is certainly not the characteristic of this age; yet some men are bigotted in politics who are infidels in religion.—I do not despair of making them ashamed of their credulity.
The charge I brought against you is expressed in terms guarded and well considered. They do not deny the strict power of the judges of the court of king's bench to bail in cases not bailable by a justice of peace, nor replevisable by the common writ, or ex officio, by the Sheriff. I well know the practice of the court, and by what legal rules it ought
