Having one day explained the nature of these Acts to a working man, he appeared incredulous of their existence, and exclaimed, “This is impossible! for every one in England can claim jury trial.” I believe these words to be expressive of a misapprehension under which a vast number of people labour. This man’s impression was true regarding the great principles of English legislation. But a supporter of these Acts might have answered him by telling him that there are in England a number of cases which are decided by a single justice of the peace without the intervention of a jury. Although perhaps at first silenced by this objection, and deprived, therefore, apparently of an obvious argument for claiming jury trial for the women accused under the Acts, our friend, after more mature consideration, could not fail to come to the conclusion that, after all, there was surely some injustice here. In this conclusion he would be correct. In a free country like England, where people are brought up under just institutions, and where the principles of constitutional freedom are so universally diffused in men’s talk, actions, and thoughts that they form the underlying spirit of all political and social intercourse, the instincts of a person whose information is no more definite than that which he gets from the whole tone of society are in the main trustworthy and just. These instincts are more to be relied upon than legal subtleties, and are themselves the surest argument for the justice of our constitution. It is the inextinguishable instinct of freedom, strengthened and nourished by the existence of free institutions, which constitutes the guarantee of the continuance of a nation’s liberty; and for this reason it is that I would give much weight to those widely diffused and instinctive ideas, which we find even more amongst the unlettered than amongst those classes whose sense of freedom has been blunted by the enjoyment of exclusive and unquestioned privileges.