The wisdom, however, of government is of more importance than the laws.  I should study the temper of the people, before I ventured on actions of this kind.  I would consider the whole of the prosecution of a libel of such importance as Junius, as one piece, as one consistent plan of operations:  and I would contrive it so, that, if I were defeated, I should not be disgraced,—­that even my victory should not be more ignominious than my defeat; I would so manage, that the lowest in the predicament of guilt should not be the only one in punishment.  I would not inform against the mere vender of a collection of pamphlets.  I would not put him to trial first, if I could possibly avoid it.  I would rather stand the consequences of my first error than carry it to a judgment that must disgrace my prosecution or the court.  We ought to examine these things in a manner which becomes ourselves, and becomes the object of the inquiry,—­not to examine into the most important consideration which can come before us with minds heated with prejudice and filled with passions, with vain popular opinions and humors, and, when we propose to examine into the justice of others, to be unjust ourselves.

An inquiry is wished, as the most effectual way of putting an end to the clamors and libels which are the disorder and disgrace of the times.  For people remain quiet, they sleep secure, when they imagine that the vigilant eye of a censorial magistrate watches over all the proceedings of judicature, and that the sacred fire of an eternal constitutional jealousy, which, is the guardian of liberty, law, and justice, is alive night and day, and burning in this House.  But when the magistrate gives up his office and his duty, the people assume it, and they inquire too much and too irreverently, because they think their representatives do not inquire at all.

We have in a libel, 1st, the writing; 2nd, the communication, called by the lawyers the publication; 3rd, the application to persons and facts; 4th, the intent and tendency; 5th, the matter,—­diminution of fame.  The law presumptions on all these are in the communication.  No intent can make a defamatory publication good, nothing can make it have a good tendency; truth is not pleadable.  Taken juridically, the foundation of these law presumptions is not unjust; taken constitutionally, they are ruinous, and tend to the total suppression of all publication.  If juries are confined to the fact, no writing which censures, however justly or however temperately, the conduct of administration, can be unpunished.  Therefore, if the intent and tendency be left to the judge, as legal conclusions growing from the fact, you may depend upon it you can have no public discussion of a public measure; which is a point which even those who are most offended with the licentiousness of the press (and it is very exorbitant, very provoking) will hardly contend for.