ABSTRACT
The parliamentary party found a leader in Oliver Cromwell, a member of Parliament who proved to be an able general. Cromwell's forces prevailed. Unlike in previous depositions, England did not merely exchange one royal house for another, but put an end to the monarchical form of government - for the time being. Blackstone was just eighteen when he graduated from Oxford and entered the Middle Temple. He seems to have worked as hard there as at Oxford. But after Oxford Temple life was profoundly depressing. His companions were "obscure and illiterate". Blackstone spent less and less time in Oxford after his election to the Vinerian Chair, and he was harried by political enemies for lecturing through a deputy and for allegedly committing other breaches of the Statute which had established his Chair. The common law was incomparably more perfect than statute law. When the legislature attempted "to improve" the native law, its intervention was rarely helpful and frequently inept.
