that notwithstanding his long connection with the movement
party, and the countenance he has from time to time given to measures of
a decidedly liberal cast, he never was, and is still as far from being, a
Democrat. Throughout his career he has been a consistent Liberal: always
advocating such measures of reform as were calculated to remove abuses,
while they in no way affected the stability and integrity of the
institutions of the country. While, on the one hand, he has declared his
most unequivocal opposition to the ballot and universal suffrage, on the
other he has advocated popular education, as the ultimate panacea for all
the evils to be feared from the extension of popular influence.

The legal knowledge of Lord Brougham has been questioned by the members
of the profession whose abuses he desired to reform. It was even said,
that while his elevation to the Chancellorship was the unjustifiable act
of a party to serve party purposes, it was at the same time desirable to
Mr. Brougham in a pecuniary point of view, from a falling off in his
professional practice, caused by his hostility to those abuses. Now,
although this is a question really of more interest to lawyers, than to
the public in general, and one which might, therefore, be left to their
decision, yet there was an _animus_ at the time among this class of men,
that rendered them not disinterested judges. Their opinion therefore must
be taken with a qualification, as well on the score of particular
immediate drawbacks, as on the score of their general professional
prejudices. Lord Brougham respected too much the principles of justice,
and he too little regarded the technicalities of law, to be agreeable to
that body. He had a faculty too, for giving speedy judgments, and a
determination to prevent unnecessary expenses, that were particularly
disagreeable to men imbued with a conscientious desire that justice
should not be prejudiced by an unprecedented and informal haste in its
dispensation, or by a reduction of the number of its advocates. The new
Lord Chancellor, too, thought that when one or two intelligent barristers
had been engaged at a large expense, and had well stated the case of
their client, it was quite unnecessary that the same ground should be
again gone over by juniors, whose arguments marred more than they helped
the interests of their employers. When, therefore, he either put them
down, or was droned into a short nap, while the industrious ad