as we can; and if one construction leads to manifest absurdity, and a different construction leads to a sensible result, we are at liberty to reject the construction which leads to the absurdity; but then, it must be a "construction," not a substitution of something else, either by omitting what is there, or introducing something that is not there; nor can we reject a will, however unjust we may think it; the absurdity must be something opposed to right reason, and not merely to our notions of policy and justice. But I do not think we are at liberty to use the same freedom with the statutes of the realm. If the meaning of the language used by the Legislature be plain and clear, we have nothing to do but to obey it; and I think to take a different course is to abandon the office of judge, and to assume the province of legislation. But is it at all doubtful what the Legislature intended to enact when these statutes passed? I quite agree with my brother Martin, that the statute of 6th George III. must be considered in connection with the statute of 1st George I.; but I go further I think it ought to be considered in connection with all the statutes in pari materiâ; and, making that comparison, let us see whether any doubt can exist as to what was the real intention of the Legislature in making the enactment under consideration, and whether it was not intended to require the oath to be taken in the very form of words set down, whatever might be the consequence of those words forming part of the oath.

The Chief Baron then cited the 5th Elizabeth, chap. 1, which requires certain persons, and, amongst

them, knights, citizens, and burgesses of Parliament, to take a recited oath verbatim. By the statute 3rd James I. chap. 4, sect. 15, the Legislature requires an oath "the tenor of which hereafter followeth." That oath combines the oath of supremacy and allegiance, concluding with these words "All these things I do plainly and sincerely acknowledge and swear, according to the express words by me spoken, without equivocation or mental evasion or secret reservation whatsoever, upon the true faith of a Christian." Here, I believe, for the first time (as far as I am aware) is found the expression * upon the true faith of a Christian "unto which oath so taken, the person so taking it shall subscribe his or her name or mark. Apparently the effect of this statute was to exclude Jews from any benefit that might arise from taking the oath, for they certainly could not take the oath according to the tenor (which is the same thing as verbatim), nor subscribe it as so taken; and I think no one can doubt that if it had been pointed out to the Legislature of that time that the effect was to exclude all but Christians from taking the oath, they would have replied that such was their intention. By 7th James I. chap. 6, various persons are to take the oath; among others, knights, citizens, and burgesses, who are Members of Parliament. Now, I apprehend that the effect of these statutes was to exclude from all the offices mentioned in the first statute, and from all the occupations mentioned in the second statute, every person who could not take the oath verbatim; and as, by the 16th section of the second Act, all Members of Parliament were

to take the oath at this period, no Jew could have been a Member of the Legislature. These statutes remained in force till 1st William and Mary, sess. 1, chap. 8, sect. 2, which repealed them and substituted other oaths in their place. The 12th section enacts the oaths in these express words. From 1st William III. to 13th William III. no oath was required that would exclude Jews; but the 13th William III. chap. 6, imposed an oath on all persons holding any office, which oath concludes thus, "on the true faith of a Christian." All persons were required to take that oath" in the form thereinafter prescribed;" and further, the Act required that unto this oath so taken the person should subscribe his name. The 10th section refers to Members of Parliament, and the 11th gives the penalty. The 1st Anne, stat. 1, chap. 22, required the oath to be administered" in such manner and form as is hereinafter set down and prescribed," and that all taking it should also subscribe it. "according to the form herein set down." The Act of Union, 5th Anne, chap. 8, adapted the oath to the new state of things, and the 6th Anne, chap. 7, "for securing the succession," enacted the oath to be taken after the demise of Queen Anne without issue, and that was to be taken on the true faith of a Christian." The mode of taking remained the same. The 6th Anne, chap. 14, relates to Scotland, and the 8th Anne, chap. 15, makes provision as to taking the oaths there mentioned, "in the words following." Having taken this Having taken this review of the Acts which are in pari materia prior to the 1st George I., I would ask whether it can reasonably be doubted that

the Legislature, in using the expressions verbatim (in one Act), according to the "tenor" (in another), in these " express words" (in a third), and "according to the form herein set down and prescribed," which occurs in the statute in question, meant what the words import. All these expressions really mean the same thing, namely, that the very words set down were to be used; and are we at liberty to omit or add anything on account of our notion of what is just or unjust? And are we to alter the oath so as to accommodate it to the conscience of a Jew, when it is notorious that it was the avowed object of the Legislature to exclude even Christians, unless they were of one particular denomination? And if this relaxed construction cannot be put on the statutes of Elizabeth, of James I., of William III. and Anne (as I think it cannot), by what process of reasoning, under what authority, can we put a different construction upon the statutes of George I. and George III.? But let us see what is the view taken by the Legislature itself upon this very subject. By the 9th George I. chap. 24 (an Act which has happily expired), persons not taking the oath were obliged to register their names and real estates. The title of the Act is important. It has been suggested that these provisions were directed against Papists only. That is not so. The title is"An Act to oblige all Persons, being Papists, in that Part of Great Britain called Scotland, and all Persons in Great Britain, refusing or neglecting to take the Oaths appointed for the Security of His Majesty's Person and Government, by several Acts herein mentioned, to register their Names and real

Estates. The attention of the Legislature was drawn to the hardship of the case of the Jews, occasioned by this last Act, and redress was given by the statute 10th George I. chap. 4; but the redress is limited to the grievance; and it was enacted that Jews might, for the purpose of the Act alluded to, take the abjuration oath, omitting the words "on the true faith of a Christian." So taking the oath, Jews were not to be required to register their names and real estates. There is nothing that makes the 17th section applicable to the 1st George I., and if that statute were now in force it would not entitle Jews to take the oath, omitting the words "on the true faith of a Christian," for the purpose of sitting in Parliament; but every other effect of not taking the oath of abjuration is left untouched. Now, according to the view of my brother Martin, at that very time not only was it unnecessary to pass any Act to relieve the Jews in respect of the registration of their names, but for any purpose whatever; it was competent, not only for a Jew, but for a Turk, a Hindoo, a Pagan, or any other, if by accident he were born in the realm, and were capable of taking any oath binding on his conscience, to take the abjuration oath, omitting the words "on the true faith of a Christian," and to be elected and take his seat as a Member of Parliament, and to fill all the offices alluded to, unless he were kept out by some other test. And as the essence of the matter is said to be taking the substance of the oath in a manner binding on the conscience, I think it is not possible to stop short of this, that if a jury found that a Roman Catholic was bound by the oath, without the

words" on the true faith of a Christian," even he might so take it. I cannot for this purpose discover any difference between a Roman Catholic and a Jew. With these Acts before me, and with the legislative commentary on them, which the last statutes and the 13th George II. chap. 7, furnish, I think, we are not as Judges— living though we do in a more enlightened and liberal age-to be liberal above what is written, or by any method of construction, when the statutes distinctly, expressly, and imperatively require one form, to substitute another as equivalent for the object or purpose of the Legislature, when every one acquainted with our history and the course of our legislation must in candour acknowledge that in any part of the reign of George I., George II., or the early part of George III., it was the furthest from the intention of the Legislature to admit into the House of Commons persons of the Jewish religion. The language used appears to me to be so clear, so distinct, so express and stringent, as to exclude a relaxed (and what may be called a liberal) construction by Judges, quite as much as it is intended to guard against a mental reservation by those who think that the effect of an oath can honestly be so evaded. On these grounds I agree with my brothers Parke and Alderson that our judgment ought to be for the plaintiff, and the judgment of the Court is therefore for the plaintiff.

Judgment for the plaintiff accordingly.

The judgment of the Court of Exchequer was appealed against by writ of error, and the question was again argued at length before the Judges in the Court of Ex

chequer Chamber, in the sittings after Hilary Term, 1852. The learned Judges who composed the Court were the Lord Chief Justice (Lord Campbell), and Justices Coleridge, Cresswell, Wightman, Williams, and Crompton.

The whole Court were upon this occasion unanimous, and thought the case free from doubt. The two objections taken to the judgment of the Court of Exchequer were-first, that the oath of abjuration no longer subsists; but the Court thought it was an Act for a permanent purpose, that the name of the then Sovereign was introduced merely to denote that in all time to come, until the law should be altered, the oath of abjuration should be taken to the Sovereign on the throne. The second objection was as to the construction of the oath-whether the words " on the true faith of a Christian" were an essential part of the oath, or merely the form of taking it. The Court thought that the true rule was laid down in "Omichund v. Barker"-that where the only question was how an oath was to be taken, it was to be taken in the form most binding on the conscience; but here the Court had to look to the intention the Legislature had expressed in the Act of Parliament, and it seemed to the Court that the true construction of it is, that the words in question are an essential part of that which is to be sworn to, and that no person is to be allowed to take the oath who cannot or will not say he does so on the true faith of a Christian." Whatever the particular object of the Legislature in passing the Act, it really, in construction, applies to Jew as well as Roman Catholic, and the Court could not confine it to the Roman

66

"It is well

COURT OF QUEEN'S BENCH. June 21, 22, 23 & 24.

The QUEEN, on the Prosecution of GIOVANNI GIACINTO ACHILLI V. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN.

The Court of Queen's Bench has been occupied four days in trying a libel case, which excited a more than ordinary degree of public curiosity. In any circumstances a case involving the character of the Roman Catholic priesthood would have attracted much attention; but the excitement caused by the aggression of the Pope (as it was termed) in establishing his hierarchy in these realms, invested the revelations of this action with extraordinary interest and importance. To this is to be added, the singular position of the parties; the plaintiff having formerly been a Roman Catholic priest of rank, a monk of the dreaded order of the Dominicans, a preacher of great eminence,

and now a convert to the Reformed Church. On the other hand, the defendant, Dr. Newman, was a gifted and respected member of the University of Oxford, a clergyman of the Church of Eng. land, a leader of that great and stirring party in the Church popularly designated as the "Puseyites" or "Tractarians;" but who had unhappily ended his theological speculations by conversion to the Church of Rome, of which he had become a most zealous and certainly an irreproachable-member.

During the whole length of the trial the Court was most densely crowded, by noblemen and gentle men of either form of faith, whose zeal for their own Church and convert was not at all diminished by their antipathy to the faith and champion of the other; the general public enjoyed the general scandal.

The libel complained of was contained in a pamphlet written by Dr Newman, entitled, "Letters on the present Position of Catholics in England." The libel, after referring to Dr. Achilli, represents him as one argument against the Roman Catholic Church, and puts this description of himself into his own mouth :

"Mothers of families,' he seems to say, gentle maidens, innocent children, look at me, for I am worth looking at. You do not see such a sight every day. Can any Church live over the imputation of such a production as I am? I have been a Roman priest and a hypocrite; I have been a profligate under a cowl. I am that Father Achilli, who as early as 1826, was deprived of my faculty to lecture, for an offence which my superiors did their best to conceal;

and who in 1827 had already earned the reputation of a scandalous friar. I am that Achilli, who, in the diocese of Viterbo, in February, 1831, robbed of her honour a young woman of 18; who, in September, 1833, was found guilty of a second such crime, in the case of a person of 28; and who perpetrated a third in July, 1834, in the case of another aged 24. I am he, who afterwards was found guilty of sins, similar or worse, in other towns of the neighbourhood. I am that son of St. Dominic who is known to have repeated the offence at Capua, in 1834 and 1835, and at Naples, again in 1840, in the case of a child of 15. I am he who chose the sacristy of the church for one of these crimes, and Good Friday for another. Look on me, ye mothers of England, a confessor against Popery, for ye "ne'er may look upon my like again." I am that veritable priest who, after all this, began to speak against, not only the Catholic faith, but the moral law, and perverted others by my teaching. I am the Cavaliere Achilli, who then went to Corfu, made the wife of a tailor faithless to her husband, and lived publicly and travelled about with the wife of a chorus singer. I am that Professor in the Protestant College at Malta, who with two others was dismissed from my post for offences which the authorities could not get themselves to describe. And now attend to me, such as I am, and you shall see what you shall see about the barbarity and profligacy of the inquisitors of Rome.' You speak truly, O Achilli, and we cannot answer you a word. You are a priest; you have been a friar; you are, it is undeniable, the scandal of Catholicism, and