jurisprudence was reformed by the annual
edicts of the supreme judge, the praetor of the city. As soon as he
ascended his tribunal, he announced by the voice of the crier, and
afterwards inscribed on a white wall, the rules which he proposed to
follow in the decision of doubtful cases, and the relief which his
equity would afford from the precise rigor of ancient statutes. A
principle of discretion more congenial to monarchy was introduced into
the republic: the art of respecting the name, and eluding the efficacy,
of the laws, was improved by successive praetors; subtleties and fictions
were invented to defeat the plainest meaning of the Decemvirs, and where
the end was salutary, the means were frequently absurd. The secret or
probable wish of the dead was suffered to prevail over the order of
succession and the forms of testaments; and the claimant, who was
excluded from the character of heir, accepted with equal pleasure from
an indulgent praetor the possession of the goods of his late kinsman or
benefactor. In the redress of private wrongs, compensations and fines
were substituted to the obsolete rigor of the Twelve Tables; time and
space were annihilated by fanciful suppositions; and the plea of
youth, or fraud, or violence, annulled the obligation, or excused the
performance, of an inconvenient contract. A jurisdiction thus vague and
arbitrary was exposed to the most dangerous abuse: the substance, as
well as the form, of justice were often sacrificed to the prejudices of
virtue, the bias of laudable affection, and the grosser seductions of
interest or resentment. But the errors or vices of each praetor expired
with his annual office; such maxims alone as had been approved by reason
and practice were copied by succeeding judges; the rule of proceeding
was defined by the solution of new cases; and the temptations of
injustice were removed by the Cornelian law, which compelled the
praetor of the year to adhere to the spirit and letter of his first
proclamation. It was reserved for the curiosity and learning of Adrian,
to accomplish the design which had been conceived by the genius of
Caesar; and the praetorship of Salvius Julian, an eminent lawyer,
was immortalized by the composition of the Perpetual Edict. This
well-digested code was ratified by the emperor and the senate; the long
divorce of law and equity was at length reconciled; and, instead of the
Twelve Tables, the perpetual edict was fixed as the invariable st