Page:William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (3rd ed, 1768, vol II).djvu/353

 Ch. 20., the courts of equity, in the exercie of this new juridiction, have wiely avoided in a great degree thoe michiefs which made ues intolerable. They now conider a trut-etate (either when exprely declared or reulting by neceary implication) as equivalent to the legal ownerhip, governed by the ame rules of property, and liable to every charge in equity, which the other is ubject to in law: and, by a long eries of uniform determinations, for now near a century pat, with ome aitance from the legilature, they have raied a new ytem of rational juriprudence, by which truts are made to anwer in general all the beneficial ends of ues, without their inconvenience or frauds. The trutee is conidered as merely the intrument of conveyance, and can in no hape affect the etate, unles by alienation for a valuable conideration to a purchaor without notice ; which, as cetuy que ue is generally in poeion of the land, is a thing that can rarely happen. The trut will decend, may be aliened, is liable to debts, to forfeiture, to leaes and other incumbrances, nay even to the curtey of the huband, as if it was an etate at law. It has not yet indeed been ubjected to dower, more from a cautious adherence to ome haty precedents, than from any well-grounded principle. It hath alo been held not liable to echeat to the lord, in conequence of attainder or want of heirs : becaue the trut could never be intended for his benefit. But let us now return to the tatute of ues.

only ervice, as was before oberved, to which this tatute is now conigned, is in giving efficacy to certain new and ecret pecies of conveyances; introduced in order to render tranactions of this ort as private as poible, and to ave the trouble of making livery of eiin, the only antient conveyance of corporeal freeholds: the ecurity and notoriety of which public invetiture abundantly overpaid the labour of going to the land, or of ending an attorney in one's tead. But this now his given way to Rh