Commentaries on the Laws of England by BLACKSTONE, William - 1765-69

Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1765-69. Very good. 4 vols.: 473; 520, xix; 455, xxvii; 436, vii, [40] p. 27 cm. Full leather with blank impressing to edges, gilt trim and 5 raised bands to spines. Red and green spine labels. Corners worn. Hinges repaired internally. Bookplates on front pastedowns for Owen Wynne of Penowern, Merionyddshire. Preface and Contents are inserted between pp. 8 and 9 in vol. I. Vol. I has worm holes to top corners not affecting text, a few minor stains. Vol. II has red stain on lower part of text block edge. Some foxing.

Until William Blackstone (1723-70) published these Commentaries, the ordinary Englishman had viewed the law as a vast, unintelligible and unfriendly machine from which nothing but trouble could be expected. Blackstone's achievement was to popularize the law and the traditions which influenced its formation. While he has been accused of increasing English complacency in its existing institutions, he at least made the English more familiar with their own legal system. Suddenly the law gained popular respect, due at least in part to the enormous success of Blackstone's work. Blackstone divides the law into four divisions: the rights of persons; the rights of things; public wrongs; private wrongs. Hence, a book for each division. Published over a period of five years in four volumes, these books were reprinted again a dozen times in almost as many years. They were translated into French, German, Italian, and Russian, and remained the textbook for legal students for some time. They were indispensible to the Justice of the Peace as well as to his clerk. Obviously these books met a need: they were the first methodical treatise on the common law suitable for a lay readership since at least the Middle Ages. Carter 212.