tian revelation, as well as all the parts thereof. To this Moses and all the prophets bear witness, and our blessed Lord and all His apostles. Thus Moses, in the name of his Lord, "I call heaven and earth to record against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that thou and thy seed may live." Thus Ezekiel (to cite one prophet for all), "The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear (eternally) the iniquity of the father. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him." Thus our blessed Lord, "If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink." Thus His great apostle, St. Paul, "God commandeth all men, everywhere, to repent." All men, everywhere; every person, in every place, without any exception either of place or person. Thus St. James, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him." Thus St. Peter, "The Lord is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." And thus St. John, If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, and He is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world." 66 Oh, hear ye this, ye that forget God! Ye cannot charge your death upon Him. "Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord God. Repent and turn from your transgressions, so iniquity shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions whereby you have transgressed; for why will ye die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God. Wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye." "As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked. Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?" VOL. I.-13 WILLIAM MURRAY, LORD MANSFIELD 1705-1793 William Murray, whose genius elevated him to the peerage under the title of Lord Mansfield, and who was the greatest jurist of the eighteenth century, if not the greatest who ever sat upon the English bench, was a Scotchman, born at Scone in 1705. As he died in 1793, his life just covered the eighteenth century, whose greatest legal luminary he became. His talents were apparent from the first; he was not a flower that bloomed late, but he was a born scholar, and seemed to suck in learning with his mother's milk. His progress in the line of public preferment was rapid and steady, and there were no reverses in his career; he made no mistakes, and his services were so invaluable that there was no danger of his being superseded by any rival. He had become familiar with Greek and Latin long before most boys are out of the dame-school; and we are told that he was wont to amuse himself, in his boyish days, by setting over the Greek and Roman orators into English and back again; he had classic poetry by heart, and conversed in the tongue of Cicero as readily as in his own. He must have foreseen his career from the first; for he early began a systematic study of eloquence, and never pretermitted it, so that when he was called to the bar he was already a past master of all those arts and refinements which other men learn laboriously by practice in the courts, and before juries and assemblies. There was no man of his time who had such a thorough and available familiarity with history as he; he knew whatever man had done or thought in the past, and was therefore the more easily master of what was most expedient to be done in the present. Such breadth and command of knowledge bred a calmness and judicial temper in him which peculiarly fitted him for the great functions he was destined to perform; and would naturally be discouraging to an opponent who must take his information from Mansfield in regard to whatever subject might come up for argument. He was appointed solicitor-general in 1742, and his duties in this office brought him in contact with William Pitt, who was his only worthy antagonist. In debate he was almost invincible, as might be expected from his ready and accurate erudition; but all his accomplishments did not betray him into any neglect in the matter of specially preparing himself for whatever matter might be under discussion; he worked with just as much assiduity as if he had been a novice. The fruits of this application were magnificent; while in the court of the King's Bench he was called upon to decide many thousands of cases; and of them all there were but two in which his associate justices failed to support his opinions. The best panegyric upon him was pronounced by an American, Joseph Story; and inasmuch as Mansfield, by his official position, was necessarily opposed to the American colonies in their struggles for independence, the praise of this great American gains added weight. England and America," declares Story," and the civilized world lie under the deepest obligations to him. Wherever commerce shall extend its social influences; wherever contracts shall be expounded upon the eternal principles of right and wrong; wherever moral delicacy and judicial refinement shall be |