TESSIER v. WYSE.—3 BLAND. 39

very material change in the law. Williams v. Whinyates, 2 Bro.
C. C. 399.

This Act declares, that on the justice of the claim of such credi-
tor being fully established, if, upon consideration of all circum-
stances, it shall appear to be just, that such debt should be paid
by a sale of the real estate, the Court may order the whole or a part
of if to be sold. A plaintiff must, in all cases, establish the jus-
tice of his claim; in all cases the order passed by the Court must
appear to it to be just; and in no case ought more of a debtor's
property to be taken from him than is necessary to pay his debts.
In these particulars, therefore, this Act of Assembly is simply an
affirmance of the previously settled law, and nothing more.

But we have seen, that, under the law before this Act of Assem-
bly was passed, if any one of the claimants of the real estate was
an infant, the judicial proceedings were to be stayed, or the parol
demurred, as against all until the minor attained his full age. This
privilege of infancy had, in England, been considered as a perni-
cious and grievous hindrance to creditors; 3 Blac. Com. 430; Plasket
v. Beeby. 4 East, 485; and had become much more so here after the
adoption of the Statute of 1732, when it was so frequently relied
on to break, for a time, the promise of ample justice held out by
that statute. The Act of Assembly which allowed of a sale of the
real estate during the infancy of the heir, with the consent of his
guardian, was a poor mitigation of the evil, as it still left the creditor
at the mercy of his debtor. But this privilege of infancy, if it had
been suffered to remain, at this day, after the introduction of
partible inheritances, by the Act to Direct Descents, would have
been still more grievous, or altogether insufferable, as it might
have been interposed as a suspension of the relief prayed by the
creditor, in so many cases, and for such a length of time, in the
great majority of them, as to have amounted to an almost total
repeal, as to the heirs of deceased debtors, of the Statute of 1732,
by which lands were made liable to be sold for the payment of
debts. But this Act of Assembly has authorized the appointment
of a guardian to answer and defend for the infant heirs, so as to
enable the creditor, at once, to substantiate his case, and establish
his claim; and thereupon to obtain a decree for a sale * of
the real estate, in like manner as if the heirs were of full 52
age, without allowing the parol to demur. In this respect this
Act of Assembly has made a most important and valuable
change in the law in favor of creditors; and this is indeed the
only material alteration which it has made in the pre-existing
law.

Owing to some strange mistake as to the operation of what ap-
pears to be the very clear and unambiguous language of the Statute
of 1732, a notion appears to have been entertained by a few, and
for some time, that as it was only under this Act of Assembly, that