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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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P 24 Grievous Expense of Law Proceedings .
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Hke the mighty shade of Troy of his country ' s glory and independence , 1 si ——decctrd Defehdi possent , etiam hdc defensa fuissent . 1 mention babe-sprinkling because the terms infant and baptism are not sufficiently precise on a question which carries the diligent inquirer into
ecclesiastical -antiquity , through ages and countries , where they have described such different persons and practices . Learned Pcedobaptists acknowledge this , though Pcedobaptism has been assisted not a little by such ambiguity .
. Here , however , 1 leave the question , now happily narrowed into the authority of tradition ^ in the hands of two disputants well prepared to exhaust the subject . Should they proceed in the discussion , it will , I trust , speedily become a collatio arnica w 7 orthy to be classed with that of Limborch and
Orobio 9 or Price and Priestley , displaying all Ihe coolness which the subject seems , at first view , naturally to encourage . Yet , however it has happened , on no question has more
unseemly warmth been frequently excited . That controversy has , indeed , abounded in «« words that burn , " as if arguments , like some combustibles , flamed most fiercely in the element of water .
My learned kinsman will , I hope , allow me to take advantage of a priority , due only to a much earlier appearance on your pages , and henceforth to subscribe myself IGNOTUS—SENIOR .
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Grievous Expense of Law Proceedings . ( From Edinburgh Review , No . LIV . pp . 356—358 . ) THE grievous expense of law proceedings has long been a theme of complaint among the vulgar ; but they who are the best acquainted with
the profession of the law , are best able to say ( as they must if they speak the truth ) that none of the complaints ever made upon this trite subject are in the least degree exaggerated . That a poor man cannot obtain justice , is quite obvious , at least that lie cannot obtain it unless he finds some one to
lend him the money without security , 'which is next to impossible ; or to lend it him for a share of the property at stake which the law prohibits . . But
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it is said that the poor may sue in forma pauperis . To what does this privilege amount- ? First , it extends to those only who are not worth above five pounds besides their wearing apparel ; whereas a man may be worth much more , and yet be a ffreat deal
too poor to support a suit in Chancery . But next suppose he is of the class of mere paupers ; he obtains an exemption from the costs of stamps and counsel ' s fees and court fees ; and we shall suppose that his counsel exerts
himself to the utmost ; that no time is lost by his special pleader ' s slowness or his counsel ' s laying aside his case , to make way for others upon which his opinion is requested with peculiar dispatch . What chance has he of an active and industrious
attorney to serve this poor client , while he has rich ones on his hands , as he must have if he be an able practitioner and a man who will let no opportunity escape him ? But this is not all—who is to pay for his witnesses ? Who is to advance him
money for this most necessary expense , when it is known that he may gain his cause , and yet not have enough to pay it ? This leads us to the much more grievous case of a man
prevailing and yet being nothing the better , nay , actually being a loser , by his contest . Nothing is more certain than that the recovery of a small debt , or the successful resistance of a small
demand , is more costly than acquiescing in positive injustice . If , for example , a person is called upon by one he never saw or heard of to pay fif teen or twenty pounds , and refuses , and suffers an action to be brought
against him ; and if he gain , as it to be presumed he will under such circumstances , he will , in all probability , lose more upou the whole than he would have done had he at once paid the sum unjustly demanded . No doubt he gains with costs , but the actual costs always considerably
exceed the costs allowed ; and in the case of small sums the excess is greater than the sum in dispute . We think it enough at present merely to broach this subject . It forms one of the most intolerable abuses known in the law ; and no reform could be more wholesome than one directed to remedy it * The share which the Govern ment bears of the blame does not come
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1817, page 724, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2471/page/28/
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