11 Jan y 1808

Table VII

In the English Equity mode, two characteristic features, viz. the two modes of collecting evidence: 1. the secret mode, performed vivâ

voce, for judicum àd leve[?]; applied principally to the evidence of extraneous witnesses: a mode bad in all cases: - 2. the epistolary mode; - a mode confined in its application to parties when examined as witnesses, and (for the sake of making two sorts[?] out of one) to the defendant's side of the suit: but, if good as applied to parties on one side, not less so as applied to parties on both sides: if good as applied to parties, not less so if applied to extraneous witnesses: if good as employed in Equity Law causes, not less so if employed in Common Law causes.

Under natural procedure[?], in which the ends of justice (viz. such of them as on each occasion are concerned are the only objects arrived at, viz prevention of misdecision, prevention of delay, vexation and expence, in so far as the evil is either unnecessary or preponderant, the secret mode of collecting the evidence, as practised in the Equity Courts is excluded altogether; the epistolary mode is employed, on each occasion, just so far as it is subservient to one or more of those ends of justice, without being productive of inconvenience to a greater amount to the prejudice of the rest.