made to form a checque upon each other: the court of chancery iſſuing all original writs under the great ſeal to the other courts; the common pleas being allowed to determine all cauſes between private ſubjects; the exchequer managing the king's revenue; and the court of king's bench retaining all the juriſdiction which was not cantoned out to other courts, and particularly the ſuperintendence of all the reſt by way of appeal; and the ſole cognizance of pleas of the crown or criminal cauſes. For pleas or ſuits are regularly divided into two ſorts; pleas of the crown, which comprehend all crimes and miſdemeſnors, wherein the king (on behalf of the public) is the plaintiff; and common pleas, which include all civil actions depending between ſubject and ſubject. The former of theſe were the proper object of the juriſdiction of the court of king's bench; the latter of the court of common pleas. Which is a court of record, and is ſtiled by ſir Edward Coke[1] the lock and key of the common law; for herein only can real actions, that is, actions which concern the right of freehold or the realty, be originally brought: and all other, or perſonal, pleas between man and man are likewiſe here determined; though in ſome of them the king's bench has alſo a concurrent authority.
The judges of this court are at preſent[2] four in number, one chief and three puiſne juſtices, created by the king's letters patent, who ſit every day in the four terms to hear and determine all matters of law ariſing in civil cauſes, whether real, perſonal, or mixed and compounded of both. Theſe it takes cognizance of, as well originally, as upon removal from the inferior courts before-mentioned. But a writ of error, in the nature of an appeal, lies from this court into the court of king's bench.
- ↑ 4 Inſt. 99.
- ↑ King James I, during part of his reign, appointed five judges in every court, for the benefit of a caſting voice in caſe of a difference in opinion, and that the circuits might at all times be fully ſupplied with judges of the ſuperior courts. And, in ſubſequent reigns, upon the permanent indiſpoſition of a judge, a fifth hath been ſome times appointed. Raym. 475.
