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§ 5. The Common Law as Compared with the Civil Law.—

The common law was then utterly incapable of doing complete justice in
many cases ; and, in not a few cases, it furnished no remedy or relief whatever. It had certain
rigid molds or formulas, into some one of which every cause of action had to be cast;
and if the cause could not be run into any of these molds, there was no redress;
and if it could be run into one of the molds, only such redress as
the formula gave could be had, regardless of the equities of the case, and the
real rights of the parties. The fictions, formalisms and arbitrary technicalities
of the common law, and its dialectical refinements, were inexplicable and incomprehensible
jargon to the public, and often a costly mockery of justice to the
litigants. Those who asked for bread were often given
a stone, and those
who applied for a fish sometimes received a serpent.
Equity, on the other hand, disregarded forms, ignored fictions, subordinated
technicalities to the requirements of justice, and indulged in no dialectical refinements.
Its pleadings were simple and natural, and its doctrines were
founded upon the eternal principles of right as interpreted by a lofty
Christian morality. Its great underlying principles, the constant sources, the never
failing roots of its particular rules, were the principles of equity, justice, morality and
honesty, enforced according to conscience and good faith, and so adapted to the
requirements of each case and the complications of business affairs, that the rights and duties of all the
parties were fully determined. 19