Exequatur

“ With the system of exegesis then in vogue, it was not difficult to discover an emphatic command to this effect in John, XV. 6. "If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch and is withered; and men gather them and cast them into the fire and they are burned." ”

“ If one drooped In the lovely Court—her dark glance dim, her feet Faint in the dance—the guiltless criminal Passed forth an exile from that Paradise, Lest he should see and suffer at her woe. Bright-eyed intendants watched to execute Sentence on such as spake of the harsh world Without, where aches and plagues were, tears and fears, And wail of mourners, and grim fume of pyres. ”

“ If, by the exercise of prophesy, he can forecast that, as a result of a chain of causation, following his proposed action a group may arise at some future date which will resort to force, he is bound to make the prophesy and abstain, under pain of punishment, possibly of execution. ”

“ What authority or call I had to pretend to be judge and executioner upon these men as criminals, whom Heaven had thought fit, for so many ages, to suffer, unpunished, to go on, and to be, as it were, the executioners of His judgments one upon another? ”

“ You are of opinion that the justice of an execution consists, not in the extent of the sufferer's crime, or in his having merited punishment, or in the wholesome and salutary effect which that example is likely to produce upon other evil-doers, but hold that it rests solely in the robe of the judge, the height of the bench, and the voice of the doomster? ”

“ The Court of Chancery.—Feeling a desire to see for myself the highest embodiment of English law where it lurked—a huge and bloated personification of all that was monstrous and discouraging to suitors—in the secret place of thunder, just behind the altar of sacrifice, forever spinning the web that for hundreds of years hath enmeshed and overspread the mightiest empire upon earth with entanglement, perplexity, and procrastination, till estates have disappeared and families have died out, sometimes, while waiting for a decision,—I dropped into the Court of Chancery. ”

“ Few, indeed, were there who courageously admitted their heresy when brought before the tribunal, and to the conscientious judge, eager to destroy the foxes which ravaged the vineyard of the Lord, the task of exploring the secret heart of man was no easy one. We cannot wonder that he speedily emancipated himself from the trammels of recognized judicial procedure which, in preventing him from committing injustice, would have rendered his labors futile. ”

“ In law, whether it be criminal or civil, execution always follows judgment, and someone must suffer. When you see the judge on his bench, you see through him, as clearly as if he were made of glass, the policeman to emprison, and the soldier to slay some actual living person. ”

“ Ancient judicial theory and practice comprehended not merely trials before a regular tribunal, in which the merits of a case were duly ascertained by the joint efforts of judge, counsel, and assize, but also an alternative method of arriving at the same result—namely, a solemn appeal to the bar of Almighty God. ”

“ That court of conscience which moderates the rigour of the law, we call a court of equity. Those who are found faulty were perhaps overtaken in the fault, and are therefore to be restored with the spirit of meekness. ”

“ Leaving the body under the earth, accompany the soul passing to a new and unknown region, where she expecteth the sentence of the eternal judge. Imagine with thyself that thou art present at this tribunal, and the whole court of heaven, waiting with deep silence, and great attention, the event and sentence of this judgment, here must be given a strict account of all receivings and disbursements. ”

“ We are told, for example, that a certain king puts a prince of his own house to death—and that is all. From some subsidiary document we may learn that the act was a judicial act, done after trial and sentence. Or we are told that a certain king leads his forces against another king and how the battle went—but we have to consult some other source to find that the action was taken in consequence of the refusal to pay tribute according to ancient claim and precedent. ”

“ God breathes, not speaks, his verdicts, felt not heard—Passed on successively to each court, I call Man's conscience, custom, manners, all that make More and more effort to promulgate, mark God's verdict in determinable words, Till last come human jurists—solidify Fluid results,—what's fixable lies forged, Statute,—the residue escapes in fume, Yet hangs aloft a cloud, as palpable To the finer sense as word the legist welds. ”

“ But, according to the scheme of absolute predestination, all is settled and fixed already; then there is no judging of every man “according to his works,” but according to what is before ordained concerning him. So that the clay of judgment is a solemn farce, or rather we may call it the day of execution, seeing it is only to execute what was long ago determined. What a ridiculous idea does this give us of the proceedings of that great and awful day! ”

“ The most horrible tribunal of irresponsible power, combined with the most remorseless priestcraft, was the Inquisition; for it not merely punished men for obeying their own consciences, but tried them in defiance of every principle of enquiry. ”

“ The heir of a great and powerful family has been involved in the destiny of so humble a man as myself—and the Tribunal of the Inquisition was compelled to intervene. An unguarded word may expose you to the vengeance of an undisciplined and powerful nobility, or to the severity of the legal authorities. ”

“ Whereas certain ill-disposed persons, under the mask of a pious zeal, but in reality under the impulse of avarice and ambition, have by their evil counsels persuaded our most gracious sovereign the king to introduce into these countries the abominable tribunal of the Inquisition, a tribunal diametrically opposed to all laws, human and divine, and in cruelty far surpassing the barbarous institutions of heathenism ”

“ An inquisition into every man's exigencies and means, — an inquisition which, to be commensurate to its object, must be perpetual,— an inquisition into every man's circumstances, one of the foundation stones in this plan of liberty! ”

“ I understand the matter thus, O judges:—when any man is accused of extortion, if there be a contest between any parties as to who may best be entrusted with the prosecution, these two points ought to be regarded most especially; first, whom they, to whom the injury is said to have been done, wish most to be their counsel; and secondly, whom he, who is accused of having done those injuries, would least wish to be so. ”

“ I should here observe to the reader, that a decree of the general assembly in this country, is expressed by the word hnhloayn, which signifies an exhortation, as near as I can render it: for they have no conception how a rational creature can be compelled, but only advised, or exhorted; because no person can disobey reason, without giving up his claim to be a rational creature.
I was struck with the utmost grief and despair at my master's discourse ”

“ Non-execution, or wrong execution, is no forfeiture. It is the most tender and important of all trusts; yet no crimes, how heinous or black soever, will disqualify a man from holding and executing it. ”

“ In imposing pecuniary penalties, let his face preserve the severity of justice as though he were compelled by necessity and not allured by cupidity. Let truth and mercy, which should never leave the heart of a judge, shine forth from his countenance, that his decisions may be free from all suspicion of covetousness or cruelty. [327]
To appreciate rightly the career and influence of the Inquisition will require a somewhat minute examination into its methods and procedure. ”

“ As in courts of judgment among men the proceedings are in writing and upon record, which is laid open when the cause comes to a hearing, the examination of witnesses is produced, and affidavits are read, to clear the matter of fact, and the statute and common-law books are consulted to find out what is the law, so, in the judgment of the great day, the equity of the sentence will be as incontestably evident as if there were books opened to justify it. ”

“ In no possible case can it be justifiable for the temporal power to intermeddle with the private 161 devotions or doctrines of any man. But least of all, can it carry its inquisition into the heart's recesses, and bend the reluctant conscience to an insincere profession of truth, or extort from it an acknowledgment of error, for the purpose of inflicting punishment. ”

“ This last deliverance is memorable on several grounds—memorable as showing the need, from the point of view of one more judge, for a repeal of the brutal laws of the past against heresy; and further memorable as showing once more how ready are judges to rest alternately on mutually exclusive principles of interpretation. ”

“ By thy decree was spilt,
Whose head, upon the charger brought,
Appeased revengeful guilt,
His name, amid a deathless page,
Gleams forth with living ray,
While all thy royalty and pride
Are swept like foam away. ”

“ Who should say that even in their own midst there might not be standing a creature of the Inquisition, bribed to the hideous work by promises of titles, lands, position, or Paradise without Purgatory? ”

“ If you, with an impoverished estate, build a church and endow a priest, there will be questions asked; it will needs be known that you have found a treasure, and it will come, perhaps, to the ears of the King's Grace, and inquisition will be made; so I shall go this morning to a Lord of the Court, an ancient friend of mine, a discreet man ”

“ Now, therefore, the king usually assumes to himself whatever was wrought, elaborated, or formed, as it were, in the womb of the council (unless it be a matter of an invidious nature, which he is sure to put from him) , so that the decree and the execution shall seem to flow from himself.650 And as this decree or execution proceeds with prudence and power, so as to imply necessity, it is elegantly wrapped up under the figure of Pallas armed. ”

“ I will that mine executors do ordain XX comely torches of wax to burn at the time of mine exequies, and to be holden about my corpse by poor men. And on that four comely tapers of wax to be holden by four poor men in likewise ... I will that in nowise mine executors keep any solemn month’s mind in such manner as oftentimes it is used, but that which shall be done for me, I will it be done at my burying, and that without any hault or sumptuous manner of charge to be done. ”

“ Worse still are words which seek to turn the edge of the divine threatenings against some sin by a jest; as when in France a subtle poison, by whose aid impatient heirs delivered themselves from those who stood between them and the inheritance which they coveted, was called 'poudre de succession.' We might suppose beforehand that such cloaks for sin would be only found among people in an advanced state of artificial cultivation. ”

“ And they made this, moreover, an occasion, by an act of legislation of the General Court, in 1646, 'to bear witness,' in the language of the act, 'against the heinous and crying sin of man-stealing, as also to prescribe such timely redress for what is past, and such a law for the future, as may sufficiently deter all others belonging to us to have to do in such vile and most odious courses, justly abhorred of all good and just men.' ... ”

“ Are you, according to the promise of the serpent-tempter, 'gods, knowing good from evil?' of such clear omniscience, that you can hurl an unprepared soul before the tribunal of its Maker, in the full assurance that you have rightly loosed the silver cord which he had measured, have justly broken the golden bowl which he had fashioned! ”

“ In truth, if the praetor, who allows the trials to proceed, never prescribes to a claimant what form of action he wishes him to adopt, consider how scandalous a thing it must be, when the matter is so far settled, for a judge to ask what might have been done, or what can be done now, and not what has been done. ”

“ Trial by jury, for example, is looked upon by all as the Palladium of our liberties; yet a jury, at a very recent period of our own history, the reign of Charles II., was a tribunal as iniquitous as the Inquisition.’ And a graver expression stole over the countenance of Sidonia as he remembered what that Inquisition had operated on his own race and his own destiny. ”

“ What court, what tribunal of last resort, is to define this God, and who is to make known his will? In his presence, laws passed by men will be of no value. The decisions of courts will be as nothing. ”

“ The words 'due process of law' cannot mean less than a prosecution or suit instituted and conducted according to the prescribed forms and solemnities for ascertaining guilt or determining the title to property. ”

“ On the contrary, all which, in history, is realized in an entire series of judicial acts, to be at last consummated in the final judgment, is there comprehended in one great harvest—in one great vintage. ”

“ And I charge my said Executors, as they will answer before God at the dredfull day of Judgement, and as they will avoyde such commynacyons, threatnyngs, and the severe justice of God pronounc’d and executed against such as are brekers and violaters of wills and testaments, that they to the uttermost of ther powers and wyttes, shall see this my present Testament & last will perform’d and executed, for the which I trust, God shall reward them, and the world commend them. ”

“ Hence we see the fate of a delinquent changed many times in passing through the different courts of judicature, and his life and liberty, victims to the false ideas, or ill humour of the judge; who mistakes the vague result of his own confused reasoning, for the just interpretation of the laws. ”