IV. Of the Public Courts of Common Law and Equity V. Of Courts Ecclesiastical, Military, and Maritime VI. Of Courts of a Special Jurisdiction IX. Of Injuries to Personal Property ................................................. 134 X. Of Injuries to Real Property, and first of Dispos- No. II. Proceedings on an Action of Trespass in Ejectment, by Original in the King's Bench § 2. Copy of the Declaration against the casual Ejector; who gives Notice thereupon to the Tenant in Possession ib. § 3. Bill of Middlesex, and Latitat thereupon, in the Court of King's Bench............ § 4. Writ of Quo Minus in the Exchequer ......... XXV § 5. Special Bail; on the Arrest of the Defendant, pursuant to the Testatum Capias, in page xiv, xxvi § 6. The Record, as removed by Writ of Error... xxvii ........................................................................ XXXV COMMENTARIES ON The Laws of England. BOOK III. OF PRIVATE WRONGS. CHAP. I. OF THE REDRESS OF PRIVATE WRONGS BY THE MERE ACT OF THE PARTIES. AT the opening of these commentaries municipal law was in general defined to be, "a rule of civil conduct, prescribed by the supreme power in a state, commanding what is right, and prohibiting what is wrong.' "b From hence therefore it followed, that the primary objects of the law are the establishment of rights, and the prohibition of wrongs, And this occasioned the distribution of these collections into two general heads; under the former of which we have already considered the rights that were defined and established, and under the latter are now to consider the wrongs that are forbidden, and redressed by the laws of England. In the prosecution of the first of these inquiries, we dis tinguished rights into two sorts: first, such as concern or are annexed to the persons of men, and are then called jura personarum, or the rights of persons; which, together with the means of acquiring and losing them, composed the first book of these commentaries: and, secondly, such as a man may acquire over external objects, or things unconnected with his person, which are called jura rerum, or the rights of things: and these, with the means of transferring them from man to man, were the subject of the second book. I am now therefore to proceed to the consideration of wrongs; which for the most part convey to us an idea merely negative, as being nothing else but a privation of right. For which reason it was necessary, that, before we entered at all into the discussion of wrongs, we should entertain a clear and distinct notion of rights: the contemplation of what is jus being necessarily prior to what may be termed injuria, and the definition of fas precedent to that of nefas. Wrongs are divisible into two sorts or species; private wrongs, and public wrongs. The former are an infringement or privation of the private or civil rights belonging to individuals, considered as individuals; and are thereupon frequently termed civil injuries: the latter are a breach and violation of public rights and duties, which affect the whole community, considered as a community; and are distinguished by the harsher appellation of crimes and misdemesnors. To investigate the first of these species of wrongs, with their legal remedies, will be our employment in the present book; and the other species will be reserved till the next or concluding volume. The more effectually to accomplish the redress of private injuries, courts of justice are instituted in every civilized society, in order to protect the weak from the insults of the stronger, by expounding and enforcing those laws, by which rights are defined, and wrongs prohibited. This remedy is therefore principally to be sought by application to these courts of justice; that is, by civil suit or action. For which reason our chief employment in this volume will be to consider the redress of private wrongs, by suit or action in courts. But as there are certain injuries of such a nature, that some of them furnish and others require a more speedy remedy, than can be had in the ordinary forms of justice, there is allowed in those cases an extrajudicial or eccentrical kind of remedy; of which I shall first of all treat, before I consider the several remedies by suit; and, to that end, shall distribute the redress of private wrongs into three several species: first, |