Produced by The Bookworm, Linda Cantoni, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Posner Memorial Collection (http://posner.library.cmu.edu/Posner/)) [Transcriber's Note: Sir William Blackstone's _Commentaries on the Laws of England_ was first published in 1765-1769. It contains a number of archaic spellings (including "goaler" for "gaoler" and "it's" for "its") that have been preserved as they appear in the original. All such spellings have been verified using the Oxford English Dictionary. Inconsistencies in spelling, punctuation, hyphenation, capitalization, and italicization have also been preserved. Obvious printer errors have been preserved and marked with a [Transcriber's Note]. Long s in the original has been modernized as modern s. The archaic convention of placing quotation marks at the beginning of each line of a quotation has also been modernized to quotation marks only at the beginning and end of the quotation.] COMMENTARIES ON THE LAWS OF ENGLAND. BOOK THE FIRST. BY WILLIAM BLACKSTONE, ESQ. VINERIAN PROFESSOR OF LAW, AND SOLICITOR GENERAL TO HER MAJESTY. OXFORD, PRINTED AT THE CLARENDON PRESS. M. DCC. LXV. TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY, THE FOLLOWING VIEW OF THE LAWS AND CONSTITUTION OF ENGLAND, THE IMPROVEMENT AND PROTECTION OF WHICH HAVE DISTINGUISHED THE REIGN OF HER MAJESTY'S ROYAL CONSORT, IS, WITH ALL GRATITUDE AND HUMILITY, MOST RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED BY HER DUTIFUL AND MOST OBEDIENT SERVANT, WILLIAM BLACKSTONE. PREFACE. _THE following sheets contain the substance of a course of lectures on the laws of England, which were read by the author in the university of OXFORD. His original plan took it's rise in the year 1753: and, notwithstanding the novelty of such an attempt in this age and country, and the prejudices usually conceived against any innovations in the established mode of education, he had the satisfaction to find (and he acknowleges it with a mixture of pride and gratitude) that his endeavours were encouraged and patronized by those, both in the university and out of it, whose good opinion and esteem he was principally desirous to obtain._ _THE death of Mr VINER in 1756, and his ample benefaction to the university for promoting the study of the law, produced about two years afterwards a regular and public establishment of what the author had privately undertaken. The knowlege of our laws and constitution was adopted as a liberal science by general academical authority; competent endowments were decreed for the support of a lecturer, and the perpetual encouragement of students; and the compiler of the ensuing commentaries had the honour to be elected the first Vinerian professor._