The following remarks are intended to show that there exists no irreconcilable conflict between C. Just. 3.32.22 and C. Theod. 4.18.1. This is a strictly limited purpose, and the author does not propose to attempt any further conclusions as to the complicated history of the restoration of fruits in the rei vindicatio. It may be well to quote the two texts that form the subject of this article.

In his ground-breaking book The Paths to Privity V.V. Palmer has identified the period between 1500 and 1680 as the “formative period”of the doctrine of privity of contract. Within that period there were, he suggests, “basically four individual paths to privity for the beneficiary”: the interest theory, the benefit theory, the agency cases, and the consideration theory. This article is concerned with the first of these theories, and in particular with the role played within that theory by the concepts of use and trust.

Edward Christian has been treated unfairly by history. As the first Downing Professor of the Laws of England and the first lecturer on common law in Cambridge, Christian suffered the chronological misfortune of launching his academic career in the wake of Blackstone's extraordinary achievement. Until recent years Blackstone's brilliance has obscured the intellectual originality and historical significance of all his successors.1 Moreover, Christian's misfortune in following Blackstone was aggravated by a lack of professional success at the Bar and by a seemingly abrasive personality that won him a number of eloquent enemies whose ridicule and comical anecdotes have long outlived their target.

Of all Bacon's claims to greatness, his claims as a lawyer are the least of all known. It is strange that this should be so. The law was his profession. Through the law he gained position and honour—Solicitor and Attorney-General and Lord Chancellor. Moreover, I think that those who study his philosophy should remember that Bacon was trained as a student and practitioner in a system of case law, which taught him to construct the rules and principles of law from concrete cases. It is at least arguable that this had some influence on his inductive system of experimental philosophy. Yet there is no doubt that it is as lawyer that Bacon is least known. I think that for this three reasons can be assigned. In the first place, some of his appearances as a lawyer were the least creditable parts of his career. I do not propose to defend his conduct as Lord Chancellor—he himself threw up the defence. But I think that there is more to be said in extenuation of his offence than some of his more severe critics allow—that at any rate was the opinion of Mr. Spedding, to whose great work on Bacon the Master of Trinity has alluded. In the second place, to appreciate Bacon's greatness as a lawyer we must have a considerable knowledge of sixteenth century law, of sixteenth century legal literature, and of sixteenth century lawyers. That is not very common; but it is getting more common; and as a result of this I think it is clear that among sixteenth century lawyers Bacon is pre-eminent. His only rival is Coke. As a lawyer I think that he was Coke's equal, and as a juridical thinker infinitely his superior. Thirdly, the most decisive reason why Bacon's eminence as a lawyer has been so inadequately recognised is the fact that he took the losing side in the politics of the seventeenth century, and the fact that the influence of seventeenth century politics has been immense and long lived.

Throughout the Rhodesian crisis it has been repeatedly asserted that the Unilateral Declaration of Independence constituted treason. In the House of Commons on 12 November 1965, the Attorney-General himself said:

It is right that I should point out in general terms that there is abundant authority for the conclusion that the conduct of the kind that has taken place is treasonable.