ΤΟ THE RIGHT HONOURABLE JOHN LORD ELDON, BARON OF ELDON, IN THE COUNTY PALATINE OF DURHAM, LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR OF GREAT BRITAIN, THIS WORK IS WITH HIS LORDSHIP'S PERMISSION, RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED. PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. ALTHOUGH the Law of Real Property forms the most extensive and abstruse branch of our jurisprudence, yet no attempt has hitherto been made to reduce it to a distinct and comprehensive system. A Digest of this part of the Law is therefore here offered to the Profession; in which, a systematic distribution is framed of the general principles of each title; supported by abridgements of the cases, in which those principles have been established, or confirmed. It is but of late years that this mode of treating legal subjects has been adopted. Our abridgements and treatises on particular titles of the law, formerly contained little more than a collection of the adjudged cases, that had been determined on each title; disposed without much method, and without establishing or deducing any general principles. There was, however, one eminent exception; the excellent Essay on Contingent Remainders by the late Mr. Fearne. The perusal of that admirable work, first suggested to the Author the idea of attempting to form a methodical arrangement of the general principles of the Law of Real Property. And upwards of twenty years since, he submitted to the profession his Essay on Fines, written avowedly on that plan. The favourable reception with which the Profession honoured that attempt, encouraged him to proceed in discussing all the other titles belonging to this part of the law in the same manner. In the prosecution of this work he became every day more sensible, that the true mode of treating legal subjects, as well as other branches of science, is by a systematic distribution of abstract principles, illustrated and supported by adjudged cases. In this idea he was fully confirmed by the authority of the late Sir William Jones; who has truly said, "If law be a science, and |