“ In America greater emphasis is placed on the right of an inventor to have his merits rewarded. Again, under the Statute of Monopolies an inventor's exclusive privilege arises only in regard to inventions not known or used at the date of the grant, although it should be observed that under the modern Patents Acts the date of a patent, once granted, relates back to the date of the application. In the United States, on the other hand, the right is conferred on inventors to an exclusive privilege in such inventions as were not known or used before their discovery by the patentees. ”

“ A man is not permitted to allege that the patent is for a combination, and that, the identical combination not having been used, there has been no infringement. If he has borrowed the substance of the invention, it will be held that he has infringed the patent. At common law a person who, alleging that he has a patent, threatens his rivals in trade, is liable to an action for damages, but the plaintiff cannot succeed without showing that the threats were made maliciously. ”

“ A limited property must therefore be allowed—large enough to give the inventor an opportunity of reaping a fair reward, but not barring the way for an unreasonable period. And, when this compromise has been decided on, it will be seen how difficult it may be to determine beforehand what is the real merit of an invention, and apportion the time to that merit. Hence it has been found necessary to allot one fixed period for all kinds of inventions falling within the purview of the patent laws. ”

“ It may be remarked here that a scientific principle cannot form the subject of a valid patent unless its application to a practical and useful end and object is shown. An abstract notion, a philosophical idea, may be extremely valuable in the realm of science, but before it is allowed to form a sound basis for a patent the world must be shown how to apply it so as to gain therefrom some immediate material advantage. ”

“ Suppose A in London patents an invention the result of his own ingenuity and patient study, and it afterwards appears that B, in some distant part of the kingdom, had been previously openly using the same thing in his workshop, A's patent is good for nothing. ”

“ The inventor himself is not allowed to use his invention, either in public or secretly, with a view to profit, before the date of the patent. Thus, if he manufactures an article by some new process, keeping the process an entire secret, but selling the produce, he cannot afterwards obtain a patent in respect of it. ”

“ Patents for inventions, instruments which formerly bore the great seal of the United Kingdom, are now issued at the Patent Office in London under the seal of that office. By their means inventors obtain a monopoly in their inventions for fourteen years, a term which, if insufficient to remunerate the inventor, can be extended. ”

“ With regard to a patent for the new application of a well known object it may be remarked that there must be some display of ingenuity, some amount of invention, in making the application, otherwise the patent will be invalid on the ground that the subject-matter is destitute of novelty. ”

“ Under the old law a foreign patentee could take out a patent in America for the same invention at any time during the life of the foreign patent, provided it had not been in use in America more than two years prior to his application, unless anticipated by a prior invention or publication. ”

“ There is no preliminary examination as to novelty, and there is no provision as to importation from abroad. A patent for a new industry is void when such industry is idle for a whole year, unless inevitable circumstances have intervened. An applicant pays a sum of 20 pesos, which is forfeited if the patent is refused, and taken in part payment of the patent fee if it is granted. The patent tax is from 5 to 20 pesos a year for every year of the privilege. ”

“ Patents, it may be observed in passing, may be granted and issued or reissued to the assignee of the inventor or discoverer, and every patent or any interest in it is assignable, the assignment being recorded in the Patent Office, for the term of seventeen years, of the exclusive right to make use of and vend the invention or discover throughout the United States and the territories thereof. The rights of property in patents granted in Cuba, Porto Rico, the Philippines and other ceded territory under Spanish law are to be respected in those territories as if that law were still in force there. ”

“ The attributes of novelty and utility being possessed in due degree by an invention, it remains to put in motion the machinery for its protection. The Patents Act 1907, re-enacting former provisions, requires an application to be made in a prescribed form (the forms and stamps are on sale at all postal money order offices in the United Kingdom) , and left at or sent by post to the patent office in the prescribed manner. The application must contain a declaration that the applicant is the true and first inventor, and it must be accompanied by either a provisional or complete specification. ”

“ The words " or more than two years prior to his application, " merely give the same force to a foreign patent or publication that had previously been given to prior use. An invention to be patentable must, according to American law, be both novel and useful. Utility may be evidence of novelty and vice versa, and commercial success is relevant evidence of utility. As in England, a bare principle is not patentable. ”

“ Again, where the invention patented consists of a combination of parts, some old and some new, the whole constituting a new machine or a new process, it is not open to the world to copy the new part and reject the rest. ”

“ Their position is now regulated by statute. By the Patents Act 1888, it was provided that no person should, after July 1, 1889, be entitled to describe himself (and whoever does so knowingly incurs liability to a maximum penalty of £20) as a patent agent whether by advertisement, description of his place of business or otherwise, without being registered as such in pursuance of the act. But the act preserves the right to registration of every person who, to the satisfaction of the Board of Trade, shows that he had been bona fide practising as a patent agent before it passed. ”

“ A patentee is not obliged to mark patented articles as such, but, if he does, the words Sans Garantie du Gouvernement, or the initial letters of these words—S. G. D. G.—must be added, under liability to a penalty for omission of from 50 francs to 1000 francs. The provisions as to compulsory working (exploitation) are in the main so interpreted as to strike only at voluntary and calculated inactivity. The law of July 5, 1844 is applied to the French colonies by a decree of October 21, 1848, to Madagascar by decree of 1902, and as to French Indo-China, see decree of June 24, 1893. ”

“ No person otherwise^ entitled thereto shall be debarred from receiving a patent for his invention or discovery, nor shall any patent be declared invalid by reason of its having been first patented or caused to be patented by the inventor or his legal representatives or assigns in a foreign country, unless the application for the said foreign patent was filed more than seven months prior to the filing of the application in this country, in which case no patent shall be granted m this country. ”

“ There are persons who argue that no such privilege should be permitted; there are others who think that the most trifling exertions of the inventive faculties should be protected. The right course clearly lies between these extremes. To grant a very long term of exclusive possession might be detrimental to the public, since it would tend to stop the progress of improvement. ”

“ On the other hand, when the principle is not new, a patentee can only secure the particular method which he has invented, and other persons may safely use other methods of effecting the same object. Instances of this occur every day ”

“ Australia, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Brazil, Ceylon, Cuba, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Domingo, Servia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunis and the United States. Under the powers of the Foreign Jurisdiction Act 1890 penalties have been imposed on British subjects committing offences against the Patents, &c., Acts 1883–1888, and the orders in council issued thereunder, in Africa, East Africa, Morocco, Persia, Persian coast and Zanzibar. ”

“ The patent commission may release the patentee from the obligation of manufacturing the patented article in Denmark, if satisfied that the cost of such manufacture would be unreasonable, on condition that the patented article is always kept on sale in Denmark. The tax is an annual fee of 25 kroner for the first 3 years, 50 kroner for the next 3, 100 for the following 3; then for 3 years 200 kroner yearly, and for the last 3, 300 kroner yearly. ”

“ The inventions for which patents are obtained are chiefly either vendible articles formed by chemical or mechanical operations, such as cloth, alloys, vulcanized india-rubber, &c., or machinery and apparatus, or processes. ”

“ The rule that an inventor's use of the invention invalidates a subsequent patent does not, however, apply to cases where the use was only by way of experiment with a view to improve or test the invention {Elias v. ”