Lord Justice

“ And if he may do acts of grace by prerogative above law, then may he also do acts of justice (so pretended) by the same prerogative; and so may murder innocents, as well as pardon murderers; he may condemn the just, as well as justify the wicked; both which are alike abomination to the Lord, Prov. xvii. 15. This power cannot be owned in any man. 11. To own absolute power, were to recognosce the king as the proper and sole interpreter of the law. ”

“ Your lordship was pleased to give him a further day to consider, and to put in his Answer; which day being Yesterday, I did humbly move, that he might be required to give a direct and positive Answer, either by denying or confession of it; But, my lord, he was then pleased for to demur to the Jurisdiction of the Court; which the court did then over-rule, and commanded him to give a direct and positive Answer. My lord, besides this great delay of justice, I shall now humbly move your lordship for speedy Judgment against him. ”

“ He was a patriot, taking the side of his country's highest interests; a statesman, seeking to conserve the wisdom of his ancestors; an orator, exposing vices and defending the innocent; a philosopher, unfolding the wisdom of the Greeks; a moralist, laying down the principles of immutable justice; a sage, pondering the mysteries of life; ever active, studious, dignified; the charm and fascination of cultivated circles; as courteous and polished as the ornaments of modern society; revered by friends, feared by enemies, adored by all good people ”

“ They who go to war must abide the issue of war; they who take the sword must be prepared to perish by the sword. Thus far, in the history of the world, very few rights have been gained by civil war which could not have been gained in the end without it. The great rights which the people have secured in England for two hundred years are the result of an appeal to reason and justice. The second revolution was bloodless. The Parliament which first arrayed itself against the government of Charles was no mean foe, even if it had not resorted to arms. ”

“ They are smoke and ashes, and a tale." "If thou findest in human life anything better than justice, temperance, fortitude, turn to it with all thy soul; but if thou findest anything else smaller (and of no value) than this, give place to nothing else." "Men seek retreats for themselves,--houses in the country, seashores, and mountains; but it is always in thy power to retire within thyself, for nowhere does a man retire with more quiet or freedom than into his own soul." ”

“ Some were great intellectual giants, yet all repelled scepticism as life repels death; all dwelt on the sufferings of the cross as a door through which the penitent and believing could surely enter heaven, yet based the justice of the infinite Father of Love on what, when it appeals to consciousness, seems to be the direst injustice. ”

“ The attributes of God like jury sit,
And all consign the sinner to the pit;
And Justice, as the counsel for Heaven’s Crown,
Demands that they should cut the rebel down.
Does not the law condemn thee to thy face,
And is not thine an aggravated case?
“Thou hast destroyed thyself,” the Judge deelares;
This is one charge which thy indictment bears.
Hast thou not dozed thy precious soul with sin,
And poisoned every noble power within?
Bad words and deeds, those poisons given by thee,
Have they not wrought both death and misery?
Hast thou not sinned in thought, and word, and deed? ”

“ At last Rome declared war, B.C. 149—the wickedest war in which she ever engaged—and Cato had the satisfaction of seeing, at the age of eighty-five, his policy indorsed against every principle of justice and honor. A Roman army landed in Africa unopposed, and the Carthaginians were weak enough to surrender, not only three hundred hostages from the noblest families, but the arms already enumerated. Nothing but infatuation can account for this miserable concession of weakness to strength, all from a blind confidence in the tender mercies of an unpitying and unscrupulous foe. ”

“ They are kings and priests, and shall reign for ever and ever. God having given his Son as our surety, and published “the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus,” and taken his seat upon the throne of grace in the character of a merciful judge, he proclaims the believer free from condemnation, and “accepted in the Beloved.”
In a human court, a man may be either justified or forgiven. Sometimes the jury find the prisoner innocent, and he is acquitted; sometimes they find him guilty, and he is forgiven. The former is an act of justice; the latter, an act of mercy. ”

“ But, Sir, we must prefer the discharge of our duty unto God, and unto the kingdom, before any other respect whatsoever. And although at this time many of us, if not all of us, are severely threatened by some of your party, what they intend to do, Sir, we do here declare, That we shall not decline or forbear the doing of our duty in the administration of Justice, even to you, according to the merit of your Offence although God should permit those men to effect all that bloody design in hand against us. ”

“ Very proud and conceited of themselves, and their own judgment and justice, as if their delivering a man up, under the general character of a malefactor, were sufficient for the civil magistrate to ground a judicial sentence upon, than which what could be more haughty? ”

“ He could find no language sufficiently strong to express his abhorrence of those who led the people for their own individual advancement. He was equally severe on corrupt governors and venal judges. He upheld morality and justice as the only guides in public affairs. He loved popularity, but he loved his country better. ”

“ It was at this time, B.C. 387, that Plato visited Sicily on a voyage of inquiry and curiosity, chiefly to see Mount Ætna, and was introduced to Dion, then a young man in Syracuse, and brother-in-law to Dionysius. Dion was so impressed with the conversation of Plato, that he invited the tyrant to talk with him also. Plato discoursed on virtue and justice, showing that happiness belonged only to the virtuous, and that despots could not lay claim even to the merit of true courage—most unpalatable doctrine to the tyrant, who became bitterly hostile to the philosopher. ”

“ It is not good to have respect of persons in judgment. 24 He that saith unto the wicked, Thou art righteous; him shall the people curse, nations shall abhor him: 25 But to them that rebuke him shall be delight, and a good blessing shall come upon them. 26 Every man shall kiss his lips that giveth a right answer.
Here are lessons for wise men, that is, judges and princes. As subjects must do their duty, and be obedient to magistrates, so magistrates must do their duty in administering justice to their subjects, both in pleas of the crown and causes between party and party. ”

“ If, therefore, there is a ministry of the Spirit in the world, it must be wholly different in kind from that spoken of above. And this is what we learn from Christ's teaching: "He, when He is come, will convict the world in respect of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment." There is a ring of judicial sternness in the words; they call up to our minds the solemnities of a court of justice--the indictment, the conviction, the condemnation. ”

“ He does it by blessing them with good magistrates and good ministers of state (v. 26) : " I will restore thy judges as at the first, to put the laws in execution against evil-doers, and thy counsellors, to transact public affairs, as at the beginning," either the same persons that had been turned out or others of the same character. [3.] He does it by restoring judgment and righteousness among them (v. 27) , by planting in men's minds principles of justice and governing their lives by those principles. ”

“ For example, all the judgments of a judge who has justice for his end and venerates and loves this as Divine, while he detests adjudications for the sake of reward, for friendship, or from favour, as flagitious; for so he consults the good of his country, by causing justice and judgment to reign therein as in heaven, and so he consults the peace of every harmless citizen, and protects him from the violence of evil-doers; all which are good works. ”

“ It is the glory of our courts of justice that they exercise an absolutely even-handed dealing between man and man, and that His Majesty himself is bound by their decisions.’ (Here there was a murmur of applause which was instantly suppressed.) ”

“ Christ does not here prohibit the public judgments of magistrates, by which they condemn the guilty and absolve the innocent, for this is necessary in all commonwealths, but only private judgments, and that when they are rash, envious, detractive, for they are repugnant to charity and justice, yea to God Himself, whose office of judgment is usurped. ”

“ But, my lords, it is to be observed, that they who so warmly recommend the strictest adherence to justice, seem not fully to understand the duty which they urge. To do justice, my lords, is to act with impartiality, to banish from the mind all regard to personal motives, and to consider every question in its whole extent, without suffering the attention to be restrained to particular circumstances, or the judgment to be obstructed by partial affection. ”

“ And even as you accord justice dominated by fairness in the light of the need of those who are brought before you, so shall you have the right to expect justice tempered by mercy when you sometime stand before the Judge of all the earth. ”

“ That I may be destroyed, as with greater pomp and artifice, so with less pity, will be but a necessary policie to make my Death appear as an Act of Justice, done by subjects upon their Soveraign, who know that no Law of God or Man invests them with any power of Judicature without me, much lesse against me: and who, being sworn, and bound by all that is sacred before God and man, to endeavour my preservation, must pretend Justice to cover their perjury. ”

“ Would it not be a libel upon justice, if a judge, presiding over one of our ordinary courts, should award to every criminal brought before him, the same punishment? "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?" Certainly the law of poor, weak, mortal man is not superior to that of the Judge of all. ”

“ Let us now see, fathers, how you value that life of man, which is so jealously safeguarded by human justice. It appears from your novel laws that there is only one judge in a case of affront or injury, and that this judge is to be he who has received the offence. He is to be at the same time judge, plaintiff, and executioner. He demands the death of the offender, sentences him to death, and immediately executes the sentence; and so, without respect either for the body or for the soul of his brother, slays and imperils the salvation of him for whom Christ died. ”

“ We hold in proper respect and reverence these sacred depositories of the people's rights. 'The criminal, and the judge who is to award his punishment, form a solemn sight. They are both men; both the 'children of an Universal Father, and sons of immortality;' the one so sunken in his state as to be disowned by man; the other as far removed by excellence from the majority of mankind.' No function can be more honorable, more sacred, or more beneficial, than that of an upright judge. ”

“ It has always been the praise of this house to pay an equal regard to justice and to mercy, and to follow, without partiality, the direction of reason, and the light of truth; and how consistently with this character, which it ought to be our highest ambition to maintain, we can ratify the present bill, your lordships are this day to consider. It is to be inquired, whether to suppose a man guilty, only because some guilt is suspected, be agreeable to justice; and whether it be rational before there is any proof of a crime, to point out the criminal. ”

“ If they which employ their labour and travail about the public administration of justice, follow it only as a trade, with unquenchable and unconscionable thirst of gain, being not in heart persuaded that justice is God's own work, and themselves his agents in this business,—the sentence, of right, God's own verdict, and themselves his priests to deliver it ”

“ One may, but without passion, bear testimony against the accused. If he is convicted, justice condemns him. But the judge, in describing the crime and pronouncing sentence, never forgets the duty due to the creature of God on whom the punishment is about to fall. Here I see nothing but fury and jealous rage. They are devoured by their thirst for blood, and equity is not the basis of their judgments. ”

“ Nor do we desire more to enjoy what is ours, than that all our subjects may enjoy what by law is theirs, by a full and entire administration of justice throughout the land, and by extending our mercy where it is wanted and deserved. ”

“ He will himself be a spirit of judgment to those that sit in judgment; the privy counsellors shall be guided by wisdom and discretion and the judges shall govern by justice and equity. It is a great mercy to any people when those that are called to places of power and public trust are qualified for their places, when those that sit in judgment have a spirit of judgment, a spirit of government. ”

“ A low Amen went all round the kirk at these words; for the most hopeless called to mind that maxim of law, equity, and justice—that every man under accusation of crime should be held innocent till he is proved to be guilty. ”