any intolerant theory of government, of religion or morals. No educated and thoughtful people ever acted upon any such theory, and no people whatever ever practised it without sooner or later becoming the victims of their own blindness. We learn to tolerate a theoretical defect in a constitution, as we learn to bear with the follies and vices of our race. And these mankind are beginning to perceive, can better be corrected by time and patience than expelled by violent remedies. In legislation experience teaches us that, except in extreme cases, it is better to pause, until the operation of a system can be understood, than, because we may think it theoretically wrong, suddenly to introduce another on which experience has thrown as little light.

Since the adjournment, of the last session the Revised Statutes of New Hampshire have been published and laid before the people. In the month of March last in pursuance of the duty imposed upon me by the resolution adopted at the last session of the Legislature, I made a careful examination of the manner in which the public printers of the State had performed their contract. The result of that investigation was that their duties had been scrupulously fulfilled. The volume is well bound and printed upon paper and with type fully equal to the terms of their agreement. The work is remarkably free from typographical errors. several instances errors and omissions in the copy furnished them by the Legislature, are noticed in the book in such a way as to draw your attention to them and enable you to legislate upon such particulars as may seem to require it.

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The publication of the laws of the State in this revised form is undoubtedly a great improvement upon the former system. The cumbersome and ungrammatical phraseology of many of the statutes has been corrected. The involved and obscure meaning of many sections has been elicited and enunciated in distinct and intelligible propositions: provisions upon the same subject, but separated from each other by wide intervals of years and pages, have been brought to

gether and classified. Repealed statutes have been omitted and a general character of compactness and simplicity has been given to the whole. All persons of reflection and all those whose duty it is either to examine or expound the laws, can readily perceive that the labor and expense devoted to this object, have met with a satisfactory reward. It would be difficult to find two gentlemen who, in the very short period allowed them to complete so laborious a task, would have performed it so well and so thoroughly as Messrs. Bell and Fox, the commissioners appointed by my predecessor to perform that duty. That there are defects and omis

sions in the book as now published, which a longer time for examination would have enabled the Legislature to discover, and which would have been remedied by greater caution, is not improbable. It would be wonderful indeed, if from the haste and carelessness which have disfigured many of our statutes for the last fifty years, we had at once been awakened to the necessity of bestowing upon the enactment of the laws that patient care and studious diligence which are requisite to the perfection of every other intellectual effort. The improvement already made is a great and essential one and will undoubtedly be valuable both in its immediate and practical effects, and as an example. It is singular that, compared with other subjects of human interest, the business of careful legislation should have occupied so little of the attention of the community. It is not, surely, that the subject is one that requires but little intellectual effort. There is in truth no matter of temporal concern that requires so much. A good system of laws founded upon and in harmony with the principles of a free government, adapted to the wants of the people, comprehensive enough to embrace within its range all their essential rights and duties, but not sufficiently minute in its details to become oppressive in its operations, is one of the most difficult, as it is one of the rarest, achievements of human skill. The names of great lawgivers have been handed down to pos

terity as the greatest benefactors of mankind. Properly to perform this duty requires not only great abilities, a well disciplined mind and habits of accurate thought, but indefatigable perseverance; a clear perception of the object to be attained; its consistency with the general plan, and the invaluable power of close and patient attention. It would be unreasonable for us to repine at the absence of great jurists, for they are seldom found among mankind. But if the genius of a great lawgiver does not exist among us, we are still unpardonable, if we regard legislation as an irksome task which we may slight or evade without a violation of our official oaths. The more un presuming virtues of industry, caution and investigation, it is to be hoped, still exist among us. There can be no sufficient excuse for hasty and careless legislation. We require of the advocate who manages our causes, the physician who prescribes for our diseases, of the architect who constructs our buildings, that each of them shall call into exercise his best efforts, and shall apply the principles of his art to the conduct of our business. We expect them to consider the object to be attained, to perceive all the obstacles in the way of success, to view the subject in all its bearings, and to take time enough to assure themselves that the best mode is adopted. No less, surely, ought to be required or expected of the legislator. The man who enunciates a proposition in mathematics, without considering the result to which his principle will lead him, or who promulgates a doctrine in morals, without reflecting on its operation upon the happiness of the community, we look upon as a pretender, and unworthy of our confidence. And certain it is that there can be no duty more responsible or more important, than that which we owe to those who sent us here-no interests more momentous than those confided to our keeping; and yet legislation is too often regarded not as a serious duty, involving the happiness of the community and calling for self denial, labor and forethought. Laws are too frequently passed without sufficient

consideration, to answer a temporary purpose, and upon a partial view of the subject. When such laws go into operation, they are found to be defective, and their defects beget a necessity for the passage of other laws: these in their turn soon require amendment, until the system becomes a crude mass of contradictory provisions, almost defying analysis and discouraging the most faithful and diligent inquirer. Changes are then proposed in the laws to remedy existing defects, and alterations are from time to time made without fully accomplishing the purpose designed. Evils exist, much time and money are squandered in litigation, until the public attention is aroused, and the people become convinced that a farther expenditure of time and money is necessary, to avoid the evils which should have been avoided in the beginning. Such was the conviction growing out of the state and condition of our system of laws, as it existed anterior to the late revision. The interests and the happiness of the people demanded a revision of our public statutes. The work has been done, existing evils have been remedied, a system has been arranged, with a precision, order and method required by the wants of the people.

It should be our end and aim, and the end and aim of those who come after us, not to mar this system by hasty legislation-if defects shall hereafter be discovered, to provide for such defects in that plain, direct and intelligible manner, as will add beauty and strength to the work.

But after all that has been done-after all the evils have been remedied so far as human skill will avail-certain it

is that litigation will arise. It is idle to suppose that, under the Revised Statutes or under any system of laws which the wisdom of man ever devised, litigation will cease or will ever be essentially diminished. We are no better than those who have gone before us-have the same frailties as those of olden time; the same passions and prejudices, the same ambition and selfishness, that characterized the chosen people for whom, thousands of years ago, the Al

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mighty dictated a code of civil government, imposing penalties for their offences and regulating their controversies. The passions which, five hundred years since, placed men in battle array against each other, now find vent in the peaceful arena of a court of justice; and judges and jurors in their respective provinces, pass upon questions and determine rights which were once adjudicated by the sword. Men are made of the same clay and are agitated by the same passions as of old. Christianity, however, and a more accurate view of the objects of human society, have taught us that reason and law are the best safeguards of human happiness. Litigation will exist so long as men are the creatures of impulse, so long as craft and cunning turn us away from the right path, or pride and obstinacy render us callous to our sense of duty. The imperceptible but sure changes that are constantly going on in manners, in notions of government and in the appreciation of our rights, afford food for discussion, which too frequently terminates in litigation. And when we consider that no one case in all its particulars can ever afford an exact precedent for another, and that in the infinite variety of human circumstances no case was ever exactly like another, we cease to wonder that men plunge into controversies. The utmost that legislation can do, is to adopt a system of general rules, within which all probable cases may be included, in order that, if there must be litigation, the parties may reach the actual merits of their disputes, without wasting their strength in vain endeavors to ascertain the meaning of the lawgivers, and to obtain a judicial construction of their acts.

I have thus alluded to the defects in our legislation, because I think they are evils common to and increasing in every part of America. The fatal facility of making laws in the thirty legislative assemblies of the United States, has caused an accumulation of statutes embarrassing to the courts and to the bar, and injurious to the people; and the ease with which public laws are passed in our own State,