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20 Denning L.J 1 (2008)

handle is hein.journals/denlj20 and id is 1 raw text is: THE DENNING LAW JOURNAL Denning Law Journal 2008 Vol 20 pp 1-19 TWO KINDS OF JUSTICE: HUMAN AND DIVINE, RANDOM THOUGHTS A PROPOS MILTON'S PARADISE LOST1 Sir Basil Markesinis* It is an honour to be asked to give the Denning Lecture and I must confess from the outset that I can never do justice to such a great man and jurist. I say that not out of modesty, being conscious of his great legacy, but also because I was fortunate enough to meet him, talk to him in extenso on several occasions, and even had the privilege of holding a chair that once bore his name. I shall return to him briefly at the end of this short talk but first I must explain here why I chose tonight's subject. Having spent the last three years or so working on my latest volume on the German law of Obligations written for an Anglo-Saxon legal audience in mind the temptation was to take something out of that unending research project and turn it into tonight's lecture.2 But Sir Martin Nourse, to whom I owe tonight's honour and to whose judgment I have always deferred, asked for a wider theme that could appeal to an audience not only of lawyers. What better way to achieve this than by connecting some random thoughts on law and literature? Given my chosen theme, Milton's Paradise Lost seemed an obvious choice allowing one to compare not only substance but also style in law and literature. Even non specialists and I include myself in this group know that the literature on Milton is enormous. They also know that in Paradise Lost his account derogates from Genesis as well as containing seeds, developed more fully in other works of his, of religious deviation from established doctrine. To reflect all this accurately as well as his political views in a lecture of this kind would produce a text unsuitable for the text of the Denning Lecture addressed to an educated but not specialist audience. It was delivered at the Old Hall of Lincoln's Inn on November 22nd , 2006 at the invitation of the Chairman of the Denning Society, Sir Martin Nourse PC. * QC, FBA, Corresponding Fellow of the French Academy, Socio Straniero of the Accademia dei Lincei (Rome). 2 The first volume entitled The German Law of Torts: a Comparative Treatise is now in its fourth edition (2003); the second The German Law of Contract: a Comparative Treatise is now in its second edition (2005). These last editions were co-authored with three favourite pupils the first with Professor Hannes Unberath, the second with professor Hannes Unberath and Dr Angus Johnston who I hope will maintain these works of love in the years to come.

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