trine of inheritance,' which, and which only, it will now be our business to explain. And, as this depends not a little on the nature of kindred, and depends on the several degrees of consanguinity, it will be previously nec- consanguindegrees of essary to state, as briefly as possible, the true notion of this ity. kindred or alliance in blood.d Consanguinity, or kindred, is defined by the writers on these Consanguin subjects to be "vinculum personarum ab eodem stipite descen- ity defined dentium;" the connection or relation of persons descended from the same stock or common ancestor. This consanguinity is either lineal or collateral. Lineal consanguinity is that which subsists between persons, [203] of whom one is descended in a direct line from the other, as be- Lineal con tween John Stiles (the propositus in the table of consanguinity) sanguinity and his father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and so upward in the direct ascending line; or between John Stiles and his son, grandson, great-grandson, and so downward in the direct descending line. Every generation, in this lineal direct consanguinity, constitutes a different degree, reckoning either upward or downward; the father of John Stiles is related to him in the first degree, and so, likewise, is his son; his grandsire and grandson in the second; his great-grandsire and great-grandson in the third. This is the only natural way of reckoning the degrees in the direct line, and, therefore, universally obtains, as well in the civile and canon,f as in the common law.g lineal arces The doctrine of lineal consanguinity is sufficiently plain and Number of obvious; but it is at the first view astonishing to consider the tors. number of lineal ancestors which every man has, within no very great number of degrees; and so many different bloodsh is a man said to contain in his veins as he hath lineal ancestors. Of these he hath two in the first ascending degree, his own parents; he hath four in the second, the parents of his father and the parents of his mother; he hath eight in the third, the parents of his two grandfathers and two grandmothers; and, by the same rule of progression, he hath a hundred and twentyeight in the seventh; a thousand and twenty-four in the tenth ; and, at the twentieth degree, or the distance of twenty generaTracts, Oxoniensis, 1762, 8vo, or 1771, 4to.) For a fuller explanation of the doctrine of consanguinity, and the consequences resulting from a right apprehension of its nature, see "An Essay on Collateral Consanguinity."—(Law (3) The devolution of an estate-tail is of a very different nature from a descent in fee-simple at common law; in the former, the heir of the original purchaser or donee in tail succeeds; in the latter, the succession devolved upon the heir of the person last seized; and, consequently, the rule excluding the half blood, and the effect of a possessio fratris, e Ff., 38, 10, 10. h Ibid., 12. had no application to a descent in tail (8 tions, every man hath above a million of ancestors, as common arithmetic will demonstrate. This lineal consanguinity, we may observe, falls strictly within the definition of vinculum per[204] sonarum ab eodem stipite descendentium; since lineal relations are such as descend one from the other, and both, of course, from the same common ancestor. Collateral ity. Collateral kindred answers to the same description; collatconsanguin eral relations agreeing with the lineal in this, that they descend from the same stock or ancestor; but differing in this, that they do not descend one from the other. Collateral kinsmen are such, then, as lineally spring from one and the same ancestor, who is the stirps, or root, the stirpes, trunk, or common stock, from whence these relations are branched out. As, if John [205] Stiles hath two sons, who have each a numerous issue; both these issues are lineally descended from John Stiles as their common ancestor; and they are collateral kinsmen to each other, because they are all descended from this common ancestor, and all have a portion of his blood in their veins, which denominates them consanguineous. We must be careful to remember, that the very being of collateral consanguinity consists in this descent from one and the same common ancestor. Thus, Titius and his brother are related: why? Because both are derived from one father. Titius and his first cousin are related: why? Because both descend from the same grandfather; and his second cousin's claim to consanguinity is this, that they both are derived from one and the same great-grandfather. In short, as many ancestors as a man has, so many common stocks he has from which collateral kinsmen may be derived. And as we are taught by Holy Writ that there is one couple of ancestors belonging to i This will seem surprising to those speak more intelligibly, it is evident, who are unacquainted with the in- for that each of us has two ances creasing power of progressive num- tors in the first degree; the num bers, but is palpably evident from the ber of whom is doubled at every re following table of a geometrical pro- move, because each of our ancestors gression, in which the first term is 2, has also two immediate ancestors of and the denominator also 2; or, to his own. us all, from whom the whole race of mankind is descended, the obvious and undeniable consequence is, that all men are in some degree related to each other. For, indeed, if we only suppose each couple of our ancestors to have left, one with another, two children; and each of those children, on an average, to have left two more (and without such a supposition, the human species must be daily diminishing), we shall find that all of us have now subsisting near two hundred and seventy millions of kindred in the fifteenth degree, at the same distance from the several common ancestors as ourselves are; besides those that are one or two descents nearer to or further from the common stock, who may amount to as many more. And This will swell more considerably since each couple of ancestors has two than the former calculation; for here, descendants, who increase in a duplithough the first term is but 1, the de- cate ratio, it will follow that the ratio, nominator is 4; that is, there is one in which all the descendants increase kinsman (a brother) in the first degree, downward, must be double to that in who makes, together with the propositus, the two descendants from the first couple of ancestors; and in every other degree the number of kindred must be the quadruple of those in the degree which immediately precedes it. For, Collateral Degrees. 1. 2 which the ancestors increase upward; but we have seen that the ancestors increase upward in a duplicate ratio: therefore, the descendants must increase downward in a double duplicate, that is, in a quadruple ratio. 11. 4 12. This calculation may also be formed by squaring the couples, or half the numa more compendious process, viz., by ber of ancestors, at any given degree; (4) The learned judge's reasoning is marries a relation; but to avoid such a just and correct; and that the collateral connection, it will very soon be necesrelations are quadrupled in each genera- sary to leave the kingdom. How these tion may be thus demonstrated: As we two tables of consanguinity may be reare supposed, upon an average, to have duced by the intermarriage of relations, one brother or sister, the two children will appear from the following simple by the father's brother or sister will case: If two men and two women were make two cousins, and the mother's put upon an uninhabited island, and bebrother or sister will produce two more; came two married couple, if they had in all, four. For the same reason, my only two children each, a male and fe father and mother must each have had male, who respectively intermarried, and four cousins, and their children are my in like manner produced two children, second cousins; so I have eight second. who are thus continued ad infinitum, it cousins by my father, and eight by my is clear that there would never be more mother, together sixteen. And thus, than four persons in each generation; again, I shall have 32 third cousins on and if the parents lived to see their greatmy father's side, and 32 on my mother's; grandchildren, the whole number would in all, 64. Hence it follows that each never be more than sixteen; and thus the preceding number in the series must be families might be perpetuated without multiplied by twice two or four. any incestuous connection.-[CHRISTIAN.] This immense increase of the numbers depends upon the supposition that no one |