John Scott, 1st Earl of Eldon Quotes
d. 1838
John Scott, 1st Earl of Eldon (4 June 1751 – 13 January 1838) was Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain from 1801 to 1806 and from 1807 to 1827.
Also known as: John Scott Eldon, John Scott, 1st Lord Eldon, John Scott, Lord Eldon, Lord Eldon, Scott, John, 1st Earl of Eldon
Random John Scott, 1st Earl of Eldon quote
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I always thought it better to allow myself to doubt before I decided, than to expose myself to the misery, after I had decided, of doubting whether I had decided rightly and justly.
It is better that the law should be certain than that every judge should speculate upon improvements in it.
Where a person interposes his interest and good offices to procure a pardon, it ought to be done gratuitously and not for money.
Your lordships must look hardships in the face rather than break down the rules of law.
Where there is a decision precisely in point, it is better to follow it.
Townley v. Bedwell (1808)
Words used in the course of legal or judicial proceedings, however hard they might bear on the party of whom they were used, were not such as would support an action for slander.
Whatever may be the effect of the prevailing fashions of the times, I do not think that the argument of inconvenience, arising out of those fashions, can at any time be relied upon against a current of decisions.
When a general principle for the construction of an instrument is once laid down, the Court will not be restrained from making their own application of that principle, because there are cases in which it may have been applied in a different manner.
Though every attempt to shorten litigation is entitled to the favour of the Court,1 yet before we stop a party in a regular course of proceeding, we ought to be certain that we shall not deprive him of that justice which the law authorizes him to seek.
If the policy of the law has withheld from married women certain powers and faculties, the Courts of law must continue to treat them as deprived of those powers and faculties, until the legislature directs those Courts to do otherwise.