[The remark that English and American lawyers found their opinions and their decisions upon those of their forefathers, is calculated to excite surprise in an American reader, who supposes that law, as a prescribed rule of action, can only be ascertained in cases where the statutes are silent, by reference to the decisions of courts. On the continent, and particularly in France, as the writer of this note learned from the conversation of M. De Tocqueville, the judicial tribunals do not deem themselves bound by any precedents, or by any decisions of their predecessors or of the appellate tribunals. They respect such decisions as the opinions of distinguished men, and they pay no higher regard to their own previous adjudications of any case. It is not easy to perceive how the law can acquire any stability under such a system, or how any individual can ascertain his rights, without a lawsuit. This note should not be concluded without a single remark upon what the author calls an implicit deference to the opinions of our forefathers, and abnegation of our own opinions. The common law consists of principles founded on the common sense of mankind, and adapted to the circumstances of man in civilized society. When these principles are once settled by competent authority, or rather _declared_ by such authority, they are supposed to express the common sense and the common justice of the community; and it requires but a moderate share of modesty for any one entertaining a different view of them, to consider that the disinterested and intelligent judges who have declared them, are more likely to be right than he is. Perfection, even in the law, he does not consider attainable by human beings, and the greatest approximation to it is all he expects or desires. Besides, there are very few cases of positive and abstract rule, where it is of any consequence which, of any two or more modifications of it, should be adopted. The great point is, that there should be _a rule_ by which conduct may be regulated. Thus, whether in mercantile transactions notice of a default by a principal shall be given to an endorser, or a guarantor, and when and how such notice shall be given, are not so important in themselves, as it is that there should be some rule to which merchants may adapt themselves and their transactions. Statutes cannot or at least do not, prescribe the rules in a large majority of cases. If then they are not drawn from the decision of courts, they will not exist, and men will be wholly at a loss for a guide in the most important transactions of business. Hence the deference paid to legal decisions. But this is not implicit, as the author supposes. The course of reasoning by which the courts have come to their conclusions, is often assailed by the advocate and shown to be fallacious, and the instances are not unfrequent of courts disregarding prior decisions and overruling them when not fairly deducible from sound reason.