property did not justify the owner of land in committing a trespass on the land of his neighbor by casting rocks thereon in blasting for a canal on his own land for the use of his mill, although he exercised all due care in executing the work. In that case there was a physical plaintiff. This, the court held, could not be justified by any consideration of convenience or necessity connected with the work in which the defendant was engaged. In the conflict of rights the court considered that public policy required that the right of defendant to dig the canal on his own land must yield to the supe. rior right of the plaintiff to be protected against an invasion of his possession by the act of the defendant. The case of Benner v. Atlantic Dredging Co. 134 N. Y. 158, 17 L. R. A. 220, was the case of an injury to the plaintiff's house, resulting from the jarring caused by the blasting of rocks in Hell Gate; and it was held that the injury is remediless, for the reason that the defendant was acting under the authority of the government of the United States, by virtue of a contract authorized by congress. It has been held that the keeping of gunpowder in large quantities near inhab ited dwellings is a nuisance, and in the case of explosion subjects the party keeping it to liability for damages occasioned thereby. Myers v. Malcolm, 6 Hill, 292, 41 Am. Dec. 744; Heeg v. Licht, 80 N. Y. 579, 36 Am. Rep. 654. So, also, it has been held that the working of quarries by the use of gunpowder, to the in of adapting premises, to some lawful use. For example, the erection of an iron building adjacent to a dwelling might, for the time being, cause as much noise and discomfort as would arise from conducting the business of finishing steam boilers on adjacent premises; but this would not constitute a nuisance, and the own-invasion by the defendant of the land of the er of the dwelling would have no remedy. The streets may be obstructed temporarily, subject to municipal regulations, for the deposit of building materials, and the party would not be chargeable with maintaining a nuisance. The test of the permissible use of one's own land is not whether the use or the act causes injury to his neighbor's property, or that the injury was the natural consequence, or that the act is in the nature of a nuisance, but the inquiry is, Was the act or use a reasonable exercise of the dominion which the owner of property has by virtue of his ownership over his property, having regard to all interests affected, his own and those of his neighbors, and having in view, also, public policy? The rule announced by the trial judge, that the use, by an owner of property, of explosives, in excavating his land, is at his peril, and imposes liability for any injury caused thereby to adjacent property, irrespective of negligence, is far-reaching. It would constitute, if sustained, a serious restriction upon the use of property, and in many cases greatly impair its value. The situation in the city of New York furnishes an apt illustration. The rocky surface of the upper part of Manhattan island makes blasting necessary in the work of ex-jury of property in the vicinity, gives a right cavation, and, unless permitted, the value of lots, especially for business uses, would be seriously affected. May the man who has first built a store or warehouse or dwelling on his lot, and has blasted the rock for a basement or cellar, prevent his neighbor from doing the same thing, when he comes to build on his lot adjoining, on the ground that by so doing his own structure will be injured? Such a rule would enable the first occupant to control the uses of the adjoining property, to the serious injury of the owner, and prevent, or tend to prevent, the improvement of property. The first occupant, in building on his lot, exercised an undoubted legal right. But his prior occupation deprived his neighbor of no legal right in his property. The first occupant acquires no right to exclude an adjoining proprietor from the free use of his land, nor to use his own land to the injury of his neighbor subsequently coming there. Platt v. Johnson, 15 Johns. 213, 8 Am. Dec. 233; Thurston v. Hancock, supra; Tipping v. St. Helen's Smelt. Co. L. R. 1 Ch. App. 66; Campbell v. Seaman, 63 N. Y. 568, 20 Am. Rep. 567. The fact of proximity imposes an obligation of care, so that one engaged in improving his own lot shall do no unnecessary damage to his neigh bor's dwelling; but it cannot, we think, exclude the former from using the necessary and usual means to adapt his lot to any lawful use, although the meaus used may endanger the house of his neighbor. We have found no case directly in point upon the interesting and important practical question involved in this appeal. It was held in the leading case of Hay v. Cohoes Co. 2 N. Y. 159, 51 Am. Dec. 279, that the right of of action. Tiffin v. McCormack, 34 Ohio St. 638, 32 Am. Rep. 408; Scott v. Bay, 3 Md. 431. Many of the cases cited by counsel are cases of the permanent appropriation of property, for damages, or noxious uses causing damage. The distinction between such cases and those where the injury arises from acts done in the necessary adjustment of property for a lawful use by means necessary, and not unusual, but involving damage to adjacent property, has been adverted to. We recognize the difficulty of formulating a general rule regulating the rights of adjacent landowners in the use of their property, and we realize how narrow the margin is which separates this from some decided cases. In Marvin v. Brewster Iron Min. Co. 55 N. Y. 557, 14 Am. Rep. 322, the opinion of the learned judge who wrote in that case sustains the conclusion we have reached in this case. But the point was not necessarily involved, since it was held that the defendant there had acquired by grant the right to employ blasting in removing the mineral, and that the plaintiff, a subsequent grantee of the surface, could not complain of injury to his house therefrom, in the absence of negligence on the part of the defendant in conducting the work. Judge Folger, in that case, said: "Whatever it is necessary for him [defendant] to do for the profitable and beneficial enjoyment of his own possession, and which he may do with no ill effect to the adjacent surface in its natural state, that he may do, though it harm erections lately put there.' If the learned judge intended to lay down the rule that the owner of land may do anything on his own land which would do no injury to the adjacent property if it had remained in its natural state, the propo sition is probably too broad. One may do in adjustment of conflicting interests through a a barren waste many things which he could reconciliation by compromise, each surrendernot lawfully do in or near an inhabited town. ing something of his absolute freedom so that But the defendant here was engaged in a law- both may live. To exclude the defendant ful act. It was done on its own land, to fit it from blasting to adapt its lot to the contemforļa lawful business. It was not an act which, plated uses, at the instance of the plaintiff, under all circumstances, would produce injury would not be a compromise between conflictto his neighbor, as is shown by the fact that ing rights, but an extinguishment of the right other buildings near by were not injured. of the one for the benefit of the other. This The immediate act was confined to its own sacrifice, we think, the law does not exact. land; but the blasts, by setting the air in mo- Public policy is sustained by the building up tion, or in some other unexplained way, caused of towns and cities and the improvement of an injury to the plaintiff's house. The lot of property. Any unnecessary restraint on freethe defendant could not be used for its roadbed dom of action of a property owner hinders until it was excavated and graded. It was to this. The law is interested, also, in the preserbe devoted to a common use; that is, to a busi-vation of property and property rights from ness use. The blasting was necessary, was injury. Will it, in this case, protect the plaincarefully done, and the injury was consequen- tiff's house by depriving the defendant of his tial. There was no technical trespass. Under right to adapt his property to a lawful use, these circumstances, we think, the plaintiff through means necessary, usual, and generally bas no legal ground of complaint. The pro- harmless! We think not. tection of property is doubtless one of the great reasons for government. But it is equal protection to all which the law seeks to secure. The rule governing the rights of adjacent landowners in the use of their property seeks an The judgment should be reversed, and a new trial ordered, with costs to abide the event. All concur. NOTE.-Unlawfulness of obscene and indecent publications. The above case, though it reports a mere special term order made for the guidance of a receiver, was made, as the court states, after consultation with other judges; and is of so much public interest that it ought not to be omitted from this series, in view of the improbability of getting a decision on the precise question from the court of last re sort. At common law. So long ago as 1770 John Wilkes was convicted "of an obscene and impious libel," consisting of his "Essay on Women." Rex v. Wilkes, 4 Burr. 2527. Again in Rex v. Curl, 7 Strange, 788, an obscene book was held indictable at common law. One Judge, Fortescue, was of a different opinion, basing it on the case of Queen v. Read, 6 Ann. in B. R., which was a case not brought to judgment, but one in which the question was made as to such an offense being punishable in the temporal courts, on the ground that it was cognizable in the spiritual courts only. This question was, however, settled in Rex v. Curl. Indecent pictures. The same doctrine was followed in Com. v. Sharpless, 2 Serg. & R. 91, 7 Am. Rep. 632, in which the exhibition of indecent pictures for money was held indictable at common law. So in Dugdale v. Reg. 1 El. & Bl. 425, 17 Jur. 546, Dears. C. C. 64, 22 L. J. M. C. 50, it was held to be a misdemeanor at common law to procure indecent prints with intent to publish them, but not to keep them without such intent. Arts of Love, The Decameron of Boccaccio, The Heptameron of Queen Margaret of Navarre, Rousseau's Confessions, Tales from the Arabic, and Aladdin, are not so immoral that a receiver will be prevented from disposing of them when found among the assets which come into his hands. Somewhat akin is the decision in Reg. v. Grey, 4 Fost. & F. 73, that an offensive and disgusting figure of a man naked down to the waist, covered with eruptive sores, exposed by a herbalist, though with innocent motive, and though the exhibition was not indecent, was a nuisance. But under the Illinois Criminal Code, § 223, the mere possession of indecent and obscene pictures constitutes an offense. Fuller v. People, 92 Ill. 182. Under U. S. Stat. 1857, chap. 63, imported stereoscopic slides were condemned to be destroyed as indecent. United States v. One Case of Stereo scopic Slides, 1 Sprague, C. C. 467. Under New York Penal Code, § 317, photographs, as well as other pictures, books, and writings of an obscene and indecent character, cannot lawfully be sold. The section also prohibits that they be given away, or kept for that purpose. People v. Muller, 96 N. Y. 408, 48 Am. Rep. 635, affirming 32 Hun, 209. The sale of an obscene print in private is indictable, although the object of the purchaser was to get evidence to prosecute the seller. Carlile, 1 Cox, C. C. 229. Reg. v. A. The introduction of an obscene print into a school is indictable, under Tenn. Code, § 4847, making such introduction into a family, school, or place of education, as well as the sale or distribution thereof an offense. State v. Pennington, 5 Lea, 506. Tests of decency. In Reg. v. Hicklin, L. R. 3 Q. B. 360, 16 Week. Rep 801, 37 L. J. M. C. 89, 11 Cox, C. C. 19; S. C. Reg. v. Wol verhampton. 18 L. T. N. S. 395, the test of obscenity is thus stated: "Where the tendency of the matter (June 21, 1894.) for leave to sell certain assets which had come into their possession as the property of the Permission granted. PETITION by the trustees for the voluntary company. dissolution of the Worthington Company charged as obscene is to deprave and corrupt those whose minds are open to such immoral influences, and into whose hands a publication of this sort may fall," and "where it would suggest to the minds of the young of either sex, or even to persons of more advanced years, thoughts of an impure and libidinous character." The same language, substantially, is used in United States v. Slenker, 32 Fed. Rep. 691; United States v. Clarke, 58 Fed. Rep. 732; United States v. Harmon, 45 Fed. Rep. 414. The facts are stated in the opinion. Following the idea that the common sense of mankind should decide the question, it is held in the same case that the opinion of artistic experts as to the obscenity of photographs is not admissible. Ibid. Although in the case of Re WORTHINGTON COMPANY, the books in question are compared by the court with Shakespeare, Chaucer, Sterne, and the Old Testament Scriptures for the sake of determining their character, and this is clearly a valuable test in determining the question, the courts So in United States v. Bennett, 16) Blatchf. 338, have refused to allow the jury to make comparithe court uses similar language. InUnited States v. Harmon, supra, the court says: "While there may be individuals and societies of men and women of peculiar notions or idiosyncrasies, whose moral sense would neither be depraved nor offended by the publication now under consideration, yet the exceptional sensibility, or want of sensibility, of such, cannot be allowed as a standard by which its obscenity is to be tested. Rather is the test, "What is the judgment of the aggregate sense of the community reached by it? What is its probable, reasonable effect on the sense of decency, purity, and chastity of society, extending to the family, made up of men and women, young boys and girls?" And in another case the court said: "That which shocks the ordinary and common sense of men as an indecency, is the test." United States v. Davis, 38 Fed. Rep. 326. In this case it is said that one can be vulgar without being indecent, within the meaning of the stat ute. lbid. So a letter may be indecent and not obscene. See United States v. Clarke, supra. sons of this sort. Thus in United States v. Clarke, 38 Fed. Rep. 732, the court directed the jury that they were not called upon to decide whether the Bible, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Sterne, Suetonius must be excluded from the mails, but were to judge only of the publication involved in that case. So in Montross v. State, 72 Ga. 261, 53 Am. Rep. 840, counsel were not allowed to read other articles and show other pictures to the jury for comparison with the publications involved in that case. Under Texas Penal Code, § 343, respecting words "manifestly designed to corrupt the morals of youth," a composition so intended need not be on its face and of itself manifestly of this character. Smith v. State, 24 Tex. App. 1. Questions for court and jury. It is generally held that the question of obscenity in any particular publication is for the jury and not for the court. United States v. Bennett, 16 Blatchf. 338; United States v. Clarke, 38 Fed. Rep. 500; Com. v. Landis, 8 Phila. 453. So in respect to photographs or other pictures, the obscenity is a question for the jury. People v. Muller, 32 Hun, 209, affirmed in 96 N. Y. 408, 48 Am. Rep. 635; United States v. One Case of Stereoscopic Slides, 1 Sprague, C. C. 167. against evidence and reason. While in McNair v. People, 89 Ill. 441, this question is declared to be for the court and not for the jury. The court in the case of United States v. Harmon, supra, referring to a newspaper report of an opinion by the supreme court of New South Wales, This rule is limited in United States v. Smith, 45 holding that a pamphlet on "The Law of Popula- Fed. Rep. 476, by holding that the question is ordition" by Mrs. Besant was within the pale of legiti-narily for the jury, but that it is within the provmate discussion, said that it had no access to the ince of the court to determine whether a verdict pamphlet to determine the character of the lan-establishing the obscenity would be set aside as guage employed, and proceeded to say concerning the newspaper publication which was before it for decision: "The problem of population and other questions of social ethics and the sexual relations, may be publicly discussed on such a high plane of philosophy, thought, and fitness of language as to make it legally unexceptionable. They may be discussed so as to be plain yet chaste, so as to be instructive and corrective without being coarse, vulgar, or seductive. But when such publication descends to the low plane of indecent illustrations and grossness of expression as adopted by Dr. O'Neill, it loses all claim to respectability." In People v. Muller, 32 Hun, 209, the court said in respect to vicious and immoral photographs: "The difference between such photographs and pictures and those which avoiding all decency of position are calculated by their symmetry, beauty, or purity simply to inspire admiration, or produce emotions of chaste pleasure, is striking and apparent to all. In the one case the effect is coarse, demoralizing, and sensual, while in the other the chaste elegance and beauty would not be debasing but refining by the degree of admiration produced by it. And the court of appeals in the same case declared "mere nudity in painting and sculpture is not obscenity” and that "the proper test of obscenity in a painting or statue is whether the motive of the painting or statue, so to speak, as indicated by it, is pure or impure." People v. Muller, 96 N. Y. 408, 48 Am. Rep. 635. Motives and object of publication. Where a publication is manifestly obscene, the defendant's motive in publishing it is immaterial. United States v. Bennett, 16 Blatchf. 338; United States v. Harmon, 45 Fed. Rep. 414; Reg. v. Hickin, L. R. 3 Q. B. 360, 16 Week. Rep. 801, 37 L. J. M. C. 89, 11 Cox, C. C. 19; S. C. Reg. v. Wolverhampton, 18 L. T. N. S. 395. Thus in Reg. v. Hicklin, supra, the fact that the sincere motive of a person in selling an obscene book entitled "The Confessional Unmasked” was to expose what he deemed errors of the Church of Rome, was held not to relieve him from an indictment for selling the book indiscriminately, although with no purpose of gain. But the purpose with which a book is published may have a bearing on the question whether or not it is indecent, as the cases agree in holding that books which are perfectly lawful when published for scientific and medical purposes may, especially when accompanied by illustrations. be indecent and obscene for purposes of general circulation. Com. v. Landis, 8 Phila. 453; United States v. Chesman, 19 Fed. Rep. 497; United States v. Harmon, supra; United States v. Clarke, 38 Fed. Rep. 500; United States v. Smith, 45 Fed. Rep. 476. O'Brien, J., delivered the opinion of the Mr. James M. Fisk for petitioners. Mr. Anthony Comstock filed a brief in court: opposition to the petition. After consultation with some of my breth at which the unlawful articles can be procured, or as to the effect of such articles, is immaterial. United States v. Bott, 11 Blatchf. 346. And the sale of a pamphlet, which is a substan- | ter purports to give is false in respect to the place tially correct report of the trial of a person for selling the obscene book called "The Confessional Unmasked," is within the Statute,20 & 21 Vict. chap. 83, prohibiting the sale of obscene publications. Steele v. Brannan, 7 L. R. C. P. 261, 41 L. J. M. C. 85, 26 L. T. N. S. 509, 20 Week. Rep. 607. Mailing obscene letters. A letter was held in Thomas v. State, 103 Ind. 419, to be a "paper" within the meaning of Ind. Rev. Stat. 1881, § 1997, prohibiting mailing or otherwise sending any obscene book, paper, pamphlet, etc. But this case follows United States v. Gaylord, 17 Fed. Rep. 438, which was subsequently overruled. In addition to United States v. Gaylord, which held that a letter was a "writing," within U. S. Rev. Stat., § 3893, prohibiting the mailing of obscene writings, the same decision was made in United States v. Hanover, 17 Fed. Rep. 444: United States v. Britton, Id. 731: United States v. Morris, 18 Fed. Rep. 900; United States v. Thomas, 27 Fed. Rep. 682. But these decisions were contrary to other decisions in the federal courts, and were overruled in United States v. Chase, 135 U. S. 255, 34 L. ed. 117. which held that obscene matter in a sealed letter, with only the address on the outside, was not unmailable as a "writing," within the meaning of U. S. Rev. Stat., § 3893; and to the same effect were the decisions in United States v. Mathias, 36 Fed. Rep. 892; United States v. Loftis, 8 Sawy. 194, 12 Fed. Rep. 671; United States v. Comerford, 25 Fed. Rep. 902; United States v. Williams, 3 Fed. Rep. 484; United States v. Huggett, 40 Fed. Rep. 636. This section 3893 was amended in 1888 so as to prohibit the mailing of a "letter" as well as other publications named. And while it was held in United States v. Wilson, 58 Fed. Rep. 768, that a private letter, which is sealed, although containing obscene matter, is not within that section as amended, since the letter must be a "publication" to be prohibited thereby, all other federal cases since that amendment have held that a letter, although sealed, is within the prohibition of that section, if it contains obscene matter. United States v. Andrews, 58 Fed. Rep. 861; United States v. Gaylord, 50 Fed. Rep. 410; United States v. Martin, Id. 918: Re Wahll, 42 Fed. Rep. 822. And even an absence of any words which are in themselves obscene will not relieve a letter from a charge of illegality, under said section 3893, if the meaning of the letter is plainly improper, as in case of a proposal, however guardedly worded, for illicit intercourse. United States v. Martin, supra. So a charge on a postal card of such relations between the person addressed and a third person is indecent or scurrilous. United States v. Pratt, 2 Am. L. T. N. S. 228. And the same rule applies to letters giving prohibited information as to where obscene pictures may be obtained, though the letters did not in themselves show that the pictures are obscene. United States v. Grimm, 50 Fed. Rep. 528. And a similar rule applies to a newspaper advertisement by a physician of unlawful treatment, although the unlawful purpose is guardedly expressed. United States v. Kelly, 3 Sawy. 566. A sealed letter is also "notice" within the clause of U. S. Rev. Stat., § 3893, as to prohibited information. United States v. Foote, 13 Blatchf. 418. And the fact that the information in respect to prohibited matters under that section which a let A letter may be indecent and not obscene under U. S. Rev. Stat., § 3893, as amended in 1888, and if not obscene cannot be excluded from the mails as a "publication of an indecent character." United States v. Clark, 43 Fed. Rep. 574. Under the New Jersey statute prohibiting the sending of indecent letters to women, a letter is "sent to" a woman when enclosed in an envelope directed to her husband with a request that he hand it to her. Larison v. State, 49 N. J. L. 256, 60 Am. Rep. 606. Constitutionality of statutes. That the act of congress prohibiting the mailing of obscene matter is not an unconstitutional abridgment of the freedom of speech or of the press has been expressly decided in United States v. Harmon, 45 Fed. Rep. 414, and Harman v. United States, 50 Fed. Rep. 921. The same question in substance was decided in respect to mailing lottery circulars, in Re Jackson, 96 Ü. S. 727, 24 L. ed. 877. And although the statute was held to be unconstitutional, the court sustained a conviction under Ill. Crim. Code, § 223, for the mere possession of an obscene and indecent picture. Fuller v. People, 92 Ill. 182. Propriety of legislation. The necessity and reasonableness of legislation against obscene publications is very well stated by the court, in United States v. Harmon, 45 Fed. Rep. 414, in the following language: "To the pure all things are pure, is too poetical for the actualities of practical life. There is in the popular conception and heart such a thing as modesty. It was born in the Garden of Eden. After Adam and Eve ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge they passed from that condition of perfectibility which some people nowadays aspire to, and, their eyes being opened, they discerned that there was both good and evil; and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.' From that day to this civilized man has carried with him the sense of shame,-the feeling that there were some things on which the eye-the mind-should not look; and where men and women become so depraved by the use, or so insensate from perverted education, that they will not veil their eyes, nor hold their tongues, the government should perform the office for them in protection of the social compact and the body politic." One extreme illustration of nastiness is enough to convince any one who really thinks and who is not altogether corrupt in thought that the words above quoted truly indicate the relation of law to indecency. While overzealous or overnice people may attempt undue interference with publications that are not condemned by people of average sentiment and thus discredit the law in popular estimation, and on the other hand people of coarse mind or impure character may condemn the law as an unwarrantable interference, the "aggregate sense of the community" must determine what is obscene or indecent in the same way that it is in the final event the test of all questions of reasonableness or propriety including the most common of all, that of negligence. B. A. R. ren, we have concluded that the following character in question, entirely apart from such views should be expressed concerning the gross and obscene writings as it is the duty of merits of this motion: This is an application the public authorities to suppress. It would made by the receiver of the Worthington Com- be quite as unjustifiable to condemn the writpany for instructions concerning the final dis- ings of Shakespeare, and Chaucer, and Laur position of certain books which were found ence Sterne, the early English novelists, the among the assets of that company, and which playwrights of the Restoration, and the draare now in his custody and respecting which matic literature which has so much enriched it is alleged by certain parties that they are the English language, as to place an interdict unfit for general circulation and come under upon these volumes which have received the the designation of immoral literature, and as admiration of literary men for so many years. such should be excluded from sale. That What has become standard literature of the these books constitute valuable assets of this English language,-has been wrought into the receivership cannot be doubted, and the ques- very structure of our splendid English literation before the court for decision on this ture,-is not to be pronounced at this late day motion is, whether or not they are of such a unfit for publication or circulation and character as should be condemned and their stamped with judicial disapprobation as hurtsale prohibited. The books in question con- ful to the community. The works under consist of Payne's edition of The Arabian sideration are the product of the greatest litNights," Fielding's novel "Tom Jones," erary genius. Payne's "Arabian Nights" is a "The Works of Rabelais," "Ovid's Art of wonderful exhibition of oriental scholarship, Love," "The Decameron of Boccaccio," "The and the other volumes have so long held a Heptameron of Queen Margaret of Navarre," supreme rank in literature that it would be "The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau,' absurd to call them now foul and unclean. 'Tales from the Arabic," and "Alladin." A seeker after the sensual and degrading parts Most of the volumes that have been submit- of a narrative may find in all these works, as ted to the inspection of the court are of in those of other great authors, something to choice editions, both as to the letter press and satisfy his pruriency. But to condemn a the bindings, and are such, both as to their standard literary work because of a few of its commercial value and subject-matter, as to episodes would compel the exclusion from cirprevent their being generally sold or pur- culation of a very large proportion of the chased, except by those who would desire works of fiction of the most famous writers of them for their literary merit, or for their the English language. There is no such evil worth as specimens of fine book-making. It to be feared from the sale of these rare and is very difficult to see upon what theory these costly books as the imagination of many, even world-renowned classics can be regarded as well-disposed people might apprehend. They specimens of that pornographic literature rank with the higher literature, and would not which it is the office of the society for the be bought nor appreciated by the class of peosuppression of vice to suppress; or how they ple from whom unclean publications ought to can come under any stronger condemnation be withheld. They are not corrupting in than that high standard literature which con- their influence upon the young, for they are sists of the works of Shakespeare, of Chaucer, not likely to reach them. I am satisfied that of Laurence Sterne, and of other great Eng- it would be a wanton destruction of property lish writers, without making reference to to prohibit the sale by the receiver of these many parts of the Old Testament Scriptures, works; for if their sale ought to be prohibwhich are to be found in almost every house-ited, the books should be burned; but I find hold in the land. The very artistic character, the high qualities of style, the absence of those glaring and crude pictures, scenes, and descriptions which affect the common and vulgar mind, make a place for books of the no reason in law, morals, or expediency, why they should not be sold for the benefit of the creditors of the receivership. The receiver is therefore allowed to sell these volumes. |