10 July 1805

Evidence

Introd

Ch. Complication Table

'. Equity Cases

When a chain is to a certain degree complex, it becomes altogether incapable of being decided upon by a Jury. To be pronounced by a Jury, a decision must not only [...?] to[?] its[?] grounds be confined to such evidence as can be compressed within the compass of a single sitting, but in its tenor must be such as can be comprized within /the compass of/ a grammatical proposition, of the utmost brevity and simplicity, guilty, not guilty: he did promise, he did not promise, and the like.

In one of its characteristic properties, an English Common law suit resembles an Epic poem, grounded on the laws of Aristotle. The unities of time and place must be observed with no less strictness on the one stage than on the other.

Among[?] the chronical cases which are at present treated with such perfect /consummate/ regularity by a Court of Equity, there is not one, of /in relation to/ which, when presented to view, it could readily be conceived, how the business of society could be carried on, unless provision of some sort or other were made for it, nor how any sort of provision should be made for it, under the forms of Common Law (Non-Equity). that is by any thing that could be done by a Jury.

Trial by Jury, in the sense now put upon the words, it seems generally agreed did not commence at an earlier point /period/ of time than the 13 th century: Equity practice some two centuries at least later. In what way could the business of chronical cases have been treated in that interval? I mention the question as a curious one, not as one that could find its discussion in this place. Suffice it to hint, that from a variety of causes an[?] quantity of cases of this description presenting themselves during that period would be very small in comparison of the present state of things.