e, there stand, eternally firm
and unchangeable, the great principles of our Constitution which are the
basis of our Jurisprudence, and of every Law which is inherently just. I
use these words deliberately--"eternally firm and unchangeable." A long
and deep study of these principles, and some experience of the grief and
disaster caused by any grave departure from them, have convinced me that
these principles are founded on the highest ethics,--the ethics of
Christ.

The great Charter of our Liberties was born, as all the most precious
things are, through "great tribulation," at a time when our whole nation
was groaning under injustice and oppression, and when sorrow had
purified the eyes of the noble "Seers" of the time, and their appeal was
to the God of Justice Himself, and to no lower tribunal. These Seers
were then endowed with the power to bend the will of a stubborn and
selfish monarch, and to put on record the stern principles of our
"Immortal Charter."

I have often longed that every school-boy and girl should be taught and
well-grounded in these great principles. It would not be a difficult nor
a dry study, for like all great things, these principles are simple,
straight, and clear as the day. It is when, we come to intricacies and
technicalities of laws, even though based on these great fundamental
lines, that the study becomes dry, useful to the professional lawyer,
but not to the pupil in school or the public generally.

The principles of our Constitution have been many times in the course of
our national history disregarded, and sometimes openly violated. But
such disregard and such violation have happily not been allowed to be of
long duration. Sometimes the respect of these principles has been
restored by the efforts of a group of enlightened Statesmen, but more
frequently by the awakened "Common Sense"[29] of the people, who have
become aware that they, or even some very humble section of them, have
been made to suffer by such violation. Again and again the gallant "Ship
of our Constitution," carrying the precious cargo of our inalienable
rights and liberties, has righted herself in the midst of storms and
heavy seas of trouble. Having been called for thirty years of my life to
advocate the rights of a portion of our people,--the meanest and most
despised of our fellow citizens,--when those rights had been destroyed
by an Act of Parliament which was a distinct violation of the
Constitution, and having