472 MORETON v. HARRISON.—1 BLAND.

This equitable lien is so far a mortgage, that the limitation or
* presumption of satisfaction arising from the lapse of
500 twenty years, as applicable to ordinary mortgages, does, in
like manner, furnish evidence, or a presumption, that such equitable
lien has been satisfied or discharged. An equitable lien is founded
upon the principle, that the legal title has not been parted with, or
ought not to be considered as completely vested in the vendee
until the whole purchase money has been paid; because it is
deemed unjust to consider any one as the absolute legal owner of
property which he has purchased, but has not paid for. If the
whole legal title remains in the vendor, he may bring an eject-
ment, to which a limitation of not less than twenty years is a bar:
but if the formal legal title has been parted with by the vendor
before payment, then his having so ceded it, gives him an equita-
ble right to enforce payment here with all the advantages he had
as the actual holder of the legal title; that is, as a mortgagee
coming here to foreclose; in which case, by analogy to the Statute
of Limitations, no time short of the lapse of twenty years is ever
deemed sufficient to raise a presumption of satisfaction. This
Court ha.s repeatedly acted upon these principles. Lingan v.
Henderson, ante, 282.

This bill has been treated by the defendant as a suit instituted
to recover the money secured by the bond alone, or a debt due by
simple contract. If that were the fact, the conclusions which he
has deduced, it is admitted, must inevitably follow. But it has
been shewn that such is not the fact; and the circumstance, of the
purchase money having been secured by a bond, in addition to the
security of the equitable lien, cannot in the slightest degree affect
the plaintiffs1 right to the relief they ask by this bill. In all cases
of the sale of real estate the purchase money, if not paid, may be
secured in various ways. The vendor may take a mortgage, but
by doing so he virtually waives his equitable lien; he may take a
bond, and also a note in addition to a mortgage, or the equitable
lien, of which the bond or note will not generally amount to a
virtual waiver. If he takes all these assurances, then it is well
settled, that he may proceed at law and in equity upon each of
them at one and the same time, and recover upon all, although he
can have but one satisfaction. Pow. Mart. 966, note G; Hughes v.
Edwards, 9 Wheat. 494. To his ejectment at law and bill in equity
to foreclose, twenty years is the limitation; to his suit upon the
bond, twelve years constitutes a bar; and to his action * upon
501 the simple contract a limitation of three years is a bar.
But although in the actions upon the bond and the simple contract
judgment may be rendered against him, upon the plea of limita-
tion applicable to each, that cannot, in any manner, affect his
remedy by ejectment or the bill to foreclose. Toplis v. Baker, 2
Cox, 123.