were published by the bishop of Salisbury, forbidding clerks1 ano: priests to practise as advocates in the common law courts. (Nec advocati tint clerici vel sacerdotes in foro speculari, nisi velproprias causas vel miserabilium personarum prosequantur.*) Towards th close of the same reign, (A. JD. 1254,) Pope Innocent IV. forbade the reading of the common law by the clergy in the English universities and seminaries of learning, because its decrees were not founded on the imperial constitutions, but merely on the customs of tie hity.f As the common law consequently gradually ceased to be studied and taught by the clergy, who were the great depositaries of legal learning, as of all other knowledge in those days, it became necessary to educate and train up a body of laymen to transact the judicial business of the country ; and Edward the First, who, from his many legal reforms and improvements, has been styled "the English Justinian," made the practice of tbe common law a distinct profession. In antient times the Court of Common Pleas had the exelusive administration of the common law, and settled and decided all the disputes which arose between subject and subject ; and in the twentieth year of the reign of Edward the First, (A. D. 1292,) the privilege of pleading causes in this court was confined to a certain number of learned persons appointed by authority. By an order in council, the king commanded John de Metingham, chief justice of the Court of Common Pleas, and the rest of his fellow justices, that they, according to their discretions, should provide * Speb*. ConeU., torn, fi, ad aan. 12] 7. + INNOCKNTIUS, &c.. . . Praterea cum in AngliiC, Scotia*, W aliiκ reguis, causai laicorum non imperatorus legibus, aed laico'rutn consuetudinibus decidantur, fratrum nostrorum, et ah'orum reUgiosorum Consilio et rogatu, statniraus quod in predictis regnii lega sxeulares de estero non legantur. Matt. Par., p. 833, ad ann. 1254, el in ad. ditamentis, p. 191.