EQUITY, PRINCIPLES OF, in their widest sense, are the principles of eternal justice, of which all human laws are but adaptations. "Equity," says lord Stair (i. 1, s. 17)," is the body of the law, and the statutes of men are but as the ornaments and vestiture thereof." In this sense equity coincides with the Roman precepts of law—" honeste virere, alterum non laclere, scum, cuique tribuere"—(Inst. i. 1, s. 3), and with the prin ciples of justice as laid down by the inspired writer—" to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God"—Micah, vi. 8. As the object of human law is to give expression to these principles, equity is thus the basis of law. But it is impossible, in the nature of things, that any code of laws should provide a remedy suited to every particular case; it has, therefore, been found necessary in every civilized nation, to establish some form, of authority which should control the rigor and remedy the defi ciency of positive law. Thus, it is the function of the law to lay down a code of rules whereby the rights of property and the transactions of commerce shall be regulated; but by the diversities of life it happens that various circumstances will occur to cause these fixed rules to operate harshly or unjustly in particular cases. A party may complain that a contract duly entered into with all legal formalities has been obtained by fraud; the owner of an estate is incapable from infacy or lunacy of managing his affairs; a person ostensibly the owner of large property is found to be placed in possession in trust only for the benefit of others. In these and many other cases, the party who, in com pliance with every rule of the law, is in possession, is not in fact the person who should in justice exercise the right. Here equity steps in. While, then, all law may be said to be equitable, inasmuch as it is the purpose of law to dispense justice, yet, in the technical sense, the term equity is confined to those cases not specially provided for by positive law. But, on the other hand, experience has shown that it would be most inconvenient, and subversive of order, if equity should arbitrarily interpose to remedy every apparent grievance, and therefore it is that the operation of equity is checked within certain limits. " There are many cases against natural justice which are left
wholly to the conscience of the party, and are without any redress, equitable or legal ; and so far from a court of equity supplying universally the defects of positive legislation, it is governed by the same rules of interpretation as a court of common law, and is often compelled to stop where common law stops. It is the duty of every court of justice, whether of law or of equity, to consult the intention of the legislature."—Story, Prin ciples of Equity, s. 14. Hence arises the maxim, that "equity follows the law." The principles of equity, therefore, as understood in modern times, may be said to be those principles of natural justice which are permitted to modify the rigor of positive law. In applying these principles to practice, the equitable jurisdiction has been intrusted by all nations, with the exception of England (but see EQUITY COURTS), to the same courts in which the positive law was administered. In the infacy of states. the boundaries of law and equity, and the functions of the equity judge, were not so clearly defined as in the present day. By the Roman law, a power, called the jus honorarium or ',while opium, was reposed in the prfctor of controlling on equitable grounds the decisions of the ordi nary tribunals.* Each prretor, on entering upon his office, published an edict declaring the principles by which he would be guided in discharging his duty as an equitable magistrate. The principles so declared were binding on the praetor during his year of office, but not on his successor. There can, however, be little doubt that in process of time a system of equity was gradually evolved: and ultimately, in the reign of the emperor Hadrian, the edicts of the praetors were collected by a civilian named Julianus, and •embodied in a single code called the perpetual edict. See Emur. According to the practice of modern nations, the courts of law are accustomed to exercise a certain equitable jurisdiction whereby, within prescribed limits, the rules of law may be modified. In Scotland, the equitable power of the court of session is called the nobile officium (q.v.).