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RETROSPECTIVE GLEANINGS.

ANCIENT LAWS.


The following quaint observations possess peculiar interest at the present
moment:

"Among the ancient Druids," says Mr. Owen Feltham, "it was absolutely
forbidden to register their laws in writing. And Caesar, in his Gallique
Wars, gives us two reasons for it. One, that their mysteries might not
come to be profaned and encommoned by the vulgar: another, that not being
written, they might be more careful ever to carry them in their thoughts
and memory. Though doubtless it was as well to preserve their own
authority, to keep the people to a recourse to them, and to a reverence
and esteem of their judgments. Besides, it oft falls out that what is
written, though it were a good law when made, yet by the emergency of
affairs, and the condition of men and times, it happens to be bad and
alterable. And we find it to be evidently true, that, as where there are
many physicians, there are many diseases; so where there are many laws,
there are likewise many enormities. That nation that swarms with law and
lawyers, certainly abounds with vice and corruption. Where you find much
fowl resort, you may be sure there is no want of either water, mud, or
weeds.