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297
Dear Jerry —
I have waited these two Months past in hopes of executing your Commission with
respect to the two or three Books you mentioned. I have at length found the opportunity of sending them.
The common Bookseller conveyance as a business of three or four Months & as I feared so long a delay
might exhaust your patience, I waited for some such expeditious conveyance as the present. Sir David Carnegie
& Mr Mackenzie set out from hence on their way to England this morning & have obligingly taken charge of
them, by which means I hope you will receive them safe in London within two or three weeks. You will perhaps
be surprized to find inclosed in the parcel three little duodecimo Volumes of the Law of Savoy which you had not
desired — but as the packet was not very large & as I imagined you might probably be curious to see them if they
had not yet fallen in your way, they are sent at a venture.— As to the Berne Society I can learn no very
material circumstances, nor as yet can I tell you any good way of sending what you intend. In the first Volume
of their Memoirs for 1762 you will find their original Laws — the People themselves who compose it at present
are said to be the principal people of the Country & as they are all a thinking Nation, probably men of knowledge - the
decision of a prize upon a question of Jurisprudence seems to have been placed in the Hands of an Oeconomical Society whose chief
objects are the improvement of Agriculture Arts & Manufacturers merely as they bear the character of a Body
divested of all prejudices & partiality — In Conversation with some Law people here I have heard great
Encomiums passed upon a Work of Procedure Criminelle by a M. Jouge Conseiller au Presidial d'Orleans -
The Codex Fabriamus by Favre President of the Senate of Chambery is a Work of credit here — The Style Criminel
of Dumont Conseiller au Parlement seems only a collection of Legal Formulae for all case of criminal proceedings -
The Droit Criminel of Soultages Avocat au Parliament in 3 vol. duod. is esteemed also. The Constitution
Caroline of Charles the 5th is the foundation of all the Modern Criminal Law of Germany — for Switzerland
in particular there is a Work of Signux de Corevon at Lausanne which is in general received as authority.
Of these Books I speak at random as never having opened any of them myself but what is more to your
purpose as having heard them well spoken of by Men of some Knowledge here - As their contents seem
to be analogous to your present Business in hand I put their names down here though they are perhaps
none of them new to you.
Your little sketch of Modern History is just the sort of thing I wished for & I shall endeavour to make sure
of your hints on that matter. The parallel of Characters which you allude to between Sully & Clarendon has often struck me, both
Ministers of abilities & integrity, both the Servants of Masters who struggled with misfortune, both disgraced
in their old years by the intrigues of young debauched Courts — I wish for the sake of British Honor that Clarendon
rose up nearer in the comparison to his great Rival. We have a Young Man here at present a prodigy of Historical
Knowledge, who gives us a hard outline of the Political History of Europe from ancient times down to modern
days; & his Lectures seem to be extremely useful as far as they serve to assist in forming the general ideas
in pointing out the sources of more particular information on the Syste minuter parts; though as a Study
our young professor lives here in the family of a M. Tronekin once the intimate friend of the great Montesquieu
whom I sometimes see; I wish I was of age & knowledge enough to benefit as much as I might do by his conversation.
As to Law, I have got into that detestable Chaos as you will call it of Jus. Civile Romanum, but by the
aid of Heineccius who seems to have more sense than all the other two thousand Commentators put together & the
guidance of Pilati who has furnished one with a sort of Clue to the Labyrinth, I push through it as well as I can. To
get down to Justinian, there seems however to be a good deal of sense & acuteness scattered up & down
& upon the whole I am not sorry that I have engaged in the work, as the Roman Law appears to be frequently adopted
in our own Books & Courts, & since every body talks about it sometimes one should be sorry to be totally ignorant
of what all the Scotch German & French Lawyers make so much a noise. Hallifax has been a
satisfaction to me in his Analyses, but I miss very much that of Blackstone, which as I amuse myself with
comparing the similar matters of the two Laws would have saved me a great deal of trouble. — I should like
much to know what has been done in the Russian & Prussian Codes, & whether, as they Princes who frame them took a
new fabric, they have taken the occasion to give a clear rational System of Laws unembarrassed with the
remains of antiquated customs & delivered from the subtlety of minute divisions & distinctions. It seems
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Identifier: | JB/538/297/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 538.
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1779-02-12 |
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538 |
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297 |
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001 |
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Correspondence |
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Charles Abbot |
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