Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 1.djvu/69

 land, and did not require any change of possession. Equity introduced the hypotheca without any violation of law, and with the most beneficial effects. Why? Because equity introduced it as a right in personam only.

Legal personal obligations may be created without limitation, either in respect to the persons between whom, or the purposes for which, they are created, provided the latter be not illegal. But it is otherwise with equitable obligations; for, as they must be founded originally upon legal rights, so they can be imposed originally only upon persons in whom legal rights are vested, and only in respect of such legal rights; i.e., only for the purpose of imposing upon the obligors in favor of the obligees some duty in respect to such legal rights. But the original creation of equitable obligations is subject to still further limitations, for it is not all legal rights that can be the subjects of equitable obligations. Only those can be so which are alienable in their nature. Of absolute rights, therefore, none of those which are personal can ever be the subjects of equitable obligations, while nearly all rights which consist in ownership can be the subjects of such obligations. Relative rights can generally be the subjects of equitable obligations, but not always. For example, some rights arising from real obligations, are inseparably annexed to the ownership of certain land, and, therefore, are not alienable by themselves. So, also, some rights arising from personal obligations are so purely personal to the obligee as to be obviously inalienable. It is only necessary to mention, as an extreme case, the right arising from a promise to marry.

What has thus far been said applies to equitable rights as originally created, i.e., to equitable rights which are derived immediately from legal rights; but there are equitable rights which are derived from legal rights only mediately. For, when an