Regimental and garrison courts-martial are next described, as well as the preliminaries to trial before courts-martial. In the latter chapter, the section on principals and accessories is peculiarly correct, pointing out those cases where the accessories are punished like the principals, particularly in the instances of mutiny and desertion-the most dangerous crimes of which a soldier can be guilty.

The procedure and form of trial before a general court-martial offers nothing that can induce us to enlarge. But perhaps it should be known that a person not subject to military law may prosecute a person who is so, before a court-martial, provided the offence be of a military nature. Thus a coroner has prosecuted a military surgeon for neglect.-Trials by courtsmartial are peculiarly fair and candid. The prisoner may challenge any of his judges; but our author contends, that he cannot challenge without assigning his reasons, of which the court must judge.

The law of evidence is extensive; and perhaps the author enters more deeply into this part of the subject than was necessary. Prosecutors in courts-martial may give their own evidence. What he remarks on the resemblance of hand-writing has lately occasioned much discussion; and we apprehend the point is far from clear. We do not, as we have said, perceive the connexion of some of these observations with evidence on courts-martial.

The seventh chapter is on the judgement and sentence of a court-martial; and the eighth, on appeals from a regimental to a general court-martial.-The next subject is courts of inquiry, somewhat analogous to the grand inquest; and that which follows relates to the office and duties of a judge-advocate. This office is not well understood; and we shall therefore transcribe some parts of the duty previous to the trial.

The rubrick or marginal notice of the 6th article of the 16th section of the articles of war bears, "that the judge-advocate is to inform and prosecute;" but in the body of the article itself, there is nothing said with respect to the first of these duties; the only matter expressly enacted being, that he shall prosecute in the name of the sovereign, and administer to the members of the court the oath as therein prescribed. Hence it might perhaps be argued, that the word inform, used in the margin, did not imply a separate duty from that of prosecuting; but was used here as synonymous with the words accuse or indict, and, as so taken, was included in the duty of prosecuting. Established usage must here, however, be called in, to clear up an ambiguity of expression; and, on that au thority, we are warranted to say, that the sense annexed here to the word inform, implies a distinct duty of the judge-advocate, viz. that of instructing or counselling the court, not only in matters of essential and necessary form, with which he must be presumed to be

from practice most thoroughly acquainted; but in explaining to them such points of law as may occur in the course of their proceedings, and with respect to which the articles of war or mutinyact may be silent. For it is to be observed, that in all matters touching the trial of crimes by court-martial, wherever the military law is silent, the rules of the common law of the land, to the benefit of which all British subjects are entitled for the protection of life and liberty, must of necessity be resorted to; and every material deviation from these rules, unless warranted by some express enactment of the military code, is, in fact, a punishable offence in the members of the court-martial, who may be indicted for the same in the king's ordinary courts. Hence arises the absolute necessity for some member of the court being versant in the general doctrines of the law, in as far as they relate to the trial of crimes and the weighing of evidence: and the person to whom the court is naturally to look for information of this kind, is the judge-advocate, who is either by profession a lawyer, or whose duty, if he is not professionally such, is to instruct himself in the common law and practice of the ordinary courts in the trial of crimes.

In the performance of this duty, the judge-advocate will always be guided by a just sense of his official character and situation. Ás he has no judicial power, nor any determinative voice, either in the sentences or interlocutory opinions of the court, so he is not entitled to regulate or dictate those sentences or opinions, or in any shape to interfere in the proceedings of the court, further than by the giv ing of counsel or advice; and his own discretion must be his sole director in suggesting when that may be seasonable, proper, or necessary. On every occasion when the court demands his opinion, he is bound to give it with freedom and amplitude; and even when not requested to deliver his sentiments, his duty requires that he should put the court upon their guard against every deviation, either from any essential or necessary forms in their proceedings, or a violation of material justice in their final sentence and judgement. A remonstrance of this nature, urged with due temperance and respect, will seldom, it is to be presumed, fail to meet with its proper regard from the court; but should it happen that an illegal measure or an unjust opinion is nevertheless persevered in, the judge-advocate, though not warranted to enter his dissent in the form of a protest upon the record of the proceedings, (for that implies a judicative voice), ought to engross therein the opinion delivered by him upon the controverted point, in order not only that he may stand absolved from all imputation of failure in his duty of giving counsel, but that the error or wrong may be fairly brought under the consideration of that power with whom it lies, in the last resort, either to approve and order into effect, or to remit, the operation of the sentence.' P.357.

In other respects, he assists the prisoner in his defence, arranges matters preparatory to the trial, takes down the evidence at length, collects the opinions and votes of the members, and, lastly, records the final sentence,

Our author's conclusions we shall select.

Ist, That the military law which obtains in these kingdoms. rests on the same basis of legality with the common and statute laws of the land.

2d, That the military law is a wise, equitable, and humane system, attempered to the spirit of our free constitution, authorising only such restraints as are absolutely necessary for the regulation and discipline of the army, on which depends the maintenance of the national security, and, by necessary consequence, the enjoyment of all our civil rights and franchises.

3d, That, under the British constitution, the military law does in no respect either supersede or interfere with the civil law of the realm: that the former is in general subordinate to the latter; but as, in every well regulated government, all the parts should harmonise and mutually assist the operation of each other; so, by our constitution, the military law gives its aid in many cases to the execution of the civil; as the civil, in its turn, supplies the deficiencies of the military, and assists, wherever it is necessary, its operation.' P. 372.

In the appendix we find different forms of warrants, an intelligent account of the ancient assise of arms and commission of array, as well as the offices of high constable and marshal, and of the powers of a court of chivalry. To these are subjoined the statute passed in Ireland, in the year 1798, for the enactment of martial law.

ART. V. The Theological, Philosophical, and Miscellaneous Works of the Rev. William Jones, M.A. F.R.S. To which is prefixed, a short Account of his Life and Writings. 12 Vols. 8vo. 51. 8s. Boards. Rivingtons. 1801.

THEOLOGY and philosophy were the favourite pursuits of the very respectable author of the works before us-to which he Occasionally united political science; while, in every branch of his researches, he discovered the same ardor of mind, and treated with very little ceremony every opinion which interfered with his own. Orthodox in theology, in philosophy heretical, in politics a vehement tory, he throws his darts in every direction, and sometimes not unsuccessfully pierces through the shield of a Socinus or a Newton, a Locke or a Priestley. We single out these names, because they frequently recur in the volumes before us: no opportunity appears to be lost, indeed, of attacking them; and sometimes the attack is conducted in a manner which reflects no degree of credit on the liberality of the writer, and, instead of assisting his own cause, injures it very essentially. The extreme, however, into which he carried every notion after having once imbibed it, renders many parts of his worsk

so far useful, that the perusal of them will lead the student to a better examination of his own principles; and it is scarcely probable that any one should commence these volumes with a mind as full of prejudices as that of the author, and rise at their termination, without rejoicing or deploring that they are for the most part weakened, shaken, or totally overthrown.

The editor laments that he could find no one able or willing to undertake a digested, interesting, and edifying history' of the author's life and writings; and had he been as great in his generation as the biographer would wish us to believe, we should also sympathise with his sorrow. From a meagre and ill-written account of him we extract the following particulars. The reverend William Jones was a descendent of colonel Jones, who married a sister of Cromwell. His father lived at Lowich in Northamptonshire, but, in what capacity, we are not informed; and he himself was born the 30th of July, 1726. On the nomination of the duke of Dorset, he became a scholar at the Charter-house, which he quitted when about eighteen years of age, with a Charter-house exhibition for University-college, Oxford. Here, in common with several contemporary students, he adopted the Hutchinsonian system; and having taken his degree of bachelor of arts, he was ordained deacon in 1749, and priest in 1751. His first employment in the church was in the curacy of Tinedon in Northamptonshire, where he wrote his answer to bishop Clayton's Essay on Spirit; which gives the biographer an opportunity of digressing on bishop Prettyman's Elements of Theology, and lamenting that his lordship never fell in with the writings of Mr. Hutchinson.' The lamentation of Mr. Jones would have been directed to a different topic; and he would have poured forth a Philippic against his biographer for recommending the Elements of Theology, written by a prelate, in which a part of the liturgy of the church is attacked; and bishop Prettyman would have been made an object of equal censure with bishop Clayton.

In 1754 our author was married to the sister of the reverend Brook Bridges, whom he assisted as curate at Wadenho; and in this situation he drew up a work which had once an extensive circulation-The Catholic Doctrine of the Trinity; and entered, through the very honourable liberality of his friends, into a course of philosophical experiments, which formed the basis of his philosophical works, published in 1762, under the title of An Essay on the first Principles of Natural Philosophy, and which, in 1781, were enlarged, and given to the world under the name of Physiological Disquisitions. The publication of the former volume introduced him to the notice of the late earl of Bute-a man who, whatever may have been his political demerits, is entitled to the highest encomiums for the encouragement he was at all times ready to afford to learning

and science: and it is pleasing to record that this nobleman gave an order to a mathematical instrument-maker to furnish our author with all such instruments as he might find necessary in the course of his experiments.

In 1764 he was presented to the vicarage of Bethersden in Kent, and soon after to the more valuable rectory of Pluchley in the same county, where he increased his income by private tuition, continued his philosophical experiments with great ardor, and published several smaller theological works. The good rector was induced to remove from Pluchley,' after a residence of twelve years, having accepted the perpetual curacy of Nayland in Suffolk-to which place he transferred himself and family, and soon after exchanged his living in Kent for Paston in Northamptonshire. The reasons which induced the good rector' to quit Kent are not given us by his biographer; and, as they are almost forgotten in the county, we shall not revive a story which created a laugh at the expense of the philosopher, who was not led into temptation,' we are told, to quit his new post by any further offers of preferment. In his curacy he continued to be engaged as usual. In 1786 he delivered a course of lectures on the figurative language of the Scriptures, which were published the ensuing year; and he was gratified in his fondness for music by the exquisite happiness of introducing an organ into his church. The pleasure of the ear was not, however, his chief aim: he was a most exemplary parish-priest; he took great pains with his flock, and instructed the younger part with an attention which cannot be too much recommended to ministers of every denomination. In 1790 he published two volumes of sermons; and the embryo disputes in France began at the same time to fill his mind with all the terrors of the alarmist. The preservation of 'our religion, government, and laws,' so fully occupied his thoughts, as to give birth to the British Critic and the Scholar, which were armed against the errors of the times. In 1792 he lost his worthy friend bishop Horne, whose life he soon afterwards wrote and published; and in 1793 entered into a little expostulation with the British Critic for not paying that attention to his Grand Analogy, or the 'I estimony of Nature and Heathen Antiquities to the Truth of a Trinity in Unity, which the father of the review seemed to think an act of duty. In 1798 he was presented to the sinecure rectory of Hollingbourn in Kent; and in the same year published his Letter to the Church of England, pointing out some popular Errors of Consequence.' In 1799 he was visited by a very severe affliction, in the loss of a most worthy and beloved wife-a calamity which was soon succeeded by a paralytic attack; in consequence of which he himself expired in the morning of the Epiphany following, without a groan or a sigh. Of the finished character of this humble disciple of the blessed