JB/091/315/001

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1 March 1808

In the opinion of the plaintiff? – No such thing.
By the plaintiff no such opinion of the veracity probity of the Defendant
is entertained: the by the transaction not the slightest
proof of any such opinion is afforded. What is proved
is this, and this alone over that of under the circumstances of the
individual cases, all other evidence, all other chance of
justice being wanting inaccessible, this chance, how feeble minute soever, is
preferred to none. A chance of one to a hundred is better
than a chance of 0 to the same number.

Behold the encouragement the persuasion given to perjury: success
and safety: success by the gain of the which
by false testimony it depends upon the defendant to command:
safety by the exemption exclusion of the only scrutiny by
which the falshood could be detected exposed.

In Scottish procedure this point of practice is like
so many others copied from Roman law. The case of the oath thus
denominated is but one out of three cases in which this
persuasion for perjury so absurdly and mischievously is held out. supplanting that of the
suppletory oaths where the oath is called suppletory and
that where it is called expurgatory being the two others.

The case of the English wager of law a practice at present
obsolete carried to the absurdity still further. Without the consent
of the defendant plaintiff it depended on the defendant to exonerate
himself by his own single allegation, upon an oath rendered trustworthy in
appearance by the solemnity ceremony of an oath, while deprived of all
title to credit by being exempted from the scrutiny of cross-examination
as well as from all fear of prosecution as for perjury.

Under the name of compurgators, a multitude of other persons
procured by the party, were to swear at the same time. But all this was
mere character evidence: what they swore to was – nothing that had anything
to do with the transaction;
nothing but their
opinion, real or pretended,
in favour of opinion to his trustworthiness:
in the instance
of every one of them, were
the persuasion really entertained ever so contrary to the persuasion professed,
not one of them all was in any way punishable.

Identifier: | JB/091/315/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 91.
Date_1	1808-03-01	Marginal Summary Numbering
Box	091	Main Headings	scotch reform
Folio number	315	Info in main headings field
Image	001	Titles
Category	text sheet	Number of Pages	1
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering	e4
Penner	jeremy bentham	Watermarks
Marginals		Paper Producer
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year
Notes public		ID Number	29311
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