, perhaps in the
very first generation, certainly in the second, the families of Papists,
however respectable, and their fortunes, however considerable, would be
wholly dissipated, and reduced to obscurity and indigence, without any
possibility that they should repair them by their industry or
abilities,--being, as we shall see anon, disabled from every species of
permanent acquisition. Secondly, by this law the right of testamentation
is taken away, which the inferior tenures had always enjoyed, and all
tenures from the 27th Hen. VIII; Thirdly, the right of settlement was
taken away, that no such persons should, from the moment the act passed,
be enabled to advance themselves in fortune or connection by marriage,
being disabled from making any disposition, in consideration of such
marriage, but what the law had previously regulated: the reputable
establishment of the eldest son, as representative of the family, or to
settle a jointure, being commonly the great object in such settlements,
which was the very power which the law had absolutely taken away.

The operation of this law, however certain, might be too slow. The
present possessors might happen to be long-lived. The legislature knew
the natural impatience of expectants, and upon this principle they gave
encouragement to children to anticipate the inheritance. For it is
provided, that the eldest son of any Papist shall, immediately on his
conformity, change entirely the nature and properties of his father's
legal estate: if he before held in fee simple, or, in other words, had
the entire and absolute dominion over the land, he is reduced to an
estate for his life only, with all the consequences of the natural
debility of that estate, by which he becomes disqualified to sell,
mortgage, charge, (except for his life,) or in any wise to do any act by
which he may raise money for relief in his most urgent necessities. The
eldest son, so conforming, immediately acquires, and in the lifetime of
his father, the permanent part, what our law calls the reversion and
inheritance of the estate; and he discharges it by retrospect, and
annuls every sort of voluntary settlement made by the father ever so
long before his conversion. This he may sell or dispose of immediately,
and alienate it from the family forever.

Having thus reduced his father's estate, he may also bring his father
into the Court of Chancery, where he may compel him to swear to the
value of his estate, and to