Fourthly, for that which may concern the sovereign and estate. Judges ought above all to remember the conclusion of the Roman Twelve Tables; Salus populi suprema lex;[1] and to know that laws, except they be in order to that end, are but things captious,[2] and oracles not well inspired. Therefore it is an happy thing in a state when kings and states do often consult with judges; and again when judges do often consult with the king and state: the one, when there is matter of law intervenient[3] in business of state; the other, when there is some consideration of state intervenient in matter of law. For many times the things deduced to judgment may be meum and tuum,[4] when the reason and consequence thereof may trench to point of estate:[5] I call matter of estate, not only the parts of sovereignty, but whatsoever introduceth any great alteration or dangerous precedent; or concerneth manifestly any great portion of people. And let no man weakly conceive that just laws and true policy have any antipathy; for they are like the spirits and sinews, that one moves with the other. Let judges also remember, that Salomon's throne was supported by lions on both sides:[6] let them be lions, but yet
- ↑ The safety of the people is the supreme law. The quotation is not from the Laws of the XII Tables, but from Cicero, De Legibus Liber III. Caput 3. Section 8, where Cicero proposes it as a law for the government of his imaginary Republic.
- ↑ Captious. Perplexing.
- ↑ Intervenient. Intervening.
- ↑ 'Mine' and 'thine.'
- ↑ Estate. State.
- ↑ "The throne had six steps, and the top of the throne was round behind: and there were stays on either side on the place of the seat, and two lions stood beside the stays.
"And twelve lions stood there on the one side and on the other upon the six steps: there was not the like made in any kingdom." I. Kings x. 19 and 20.
