532 R1DGELY v. IGLEHAET.—3 BLAND.

The plaintiff alleges that he has an equitable lien upon the land
held by this defendant, and seems to rest his claim to relief mainly
upon that foundation. But an equitable lien is inseparably inci-
dent to a contract of purchase. It is a vendor's privilege and
security, founded not upon any thing expressed in the contract of
sale itself, nor on any legislative enactment or rule of the common
law; but on the principles of equity which declare it to be unjust,
that any such sale should be made absolute, in all respects, until
the whole purchase money has been paid. An equitable lien can
* only exist in a vendor as against a vendee, and those claim-
544 ing under the vendee with notice. It may be waived or ex-
tinguished by a separate express agreement, or by an analogous
express provision in the contract of sale itself; or by an implica-
tion arising from the acts of the vendor. And it can only be sus-
tained and enforced in a Court of equity. Mackreth v. Symmons,
15 Ves. 330; Iglehart v. Armiger, 1 Bland, 519. Here, however,
that sale upon which this plaintiff claims the benefit of an equit-
able lien was not made by himself; but under a judicial authority,
and according to the very peculiar provisions of an Act of Assem-
bly regulating the whole subject; so that, as on a sale made under
a decree of this Court, the equitable lien, if any such lien arose,
could only be held and eniorced by the Court under whose author-
ity the sale was made, and not by this plaintiff. Iglehart v. Armi-
ger, 1 Bland, 527; Andrews v. Scotton, 2 Bland, 656. But this
plaintiff can have no lien of any description; nor obtain relief in
any other mode than that given and prescribed by the Act of As-
sembly under which the sale was made.

By several statutes lands have been made liable to be taken in
execution and sold for the satisfaction of debts; and as a conse-
quence of such liability, it has become a well established princi-
ple, that it gives to the creditor a lien which fastens from the date
of the judgment upon all the lands which the debtor then has, or
may thereafter acquire, so as to be liable to be taken in execution
on such judgment. The principles upon which this judicial lien
rest have, however, no analogy to that kind of lien on which this
plaintiff relies.

By an Act of Assembly it is declared, that all lands and tene-
ments belonging to any public debtor, after the commencement of
suit against him, shall be liable to execution in whosoever hands
or possession they may be found. March, 1778, ch. 9, s. 6. This
law gives the State a lieu of a peculiar character which, it is evi-
dent, may, and, perhaps, can only, under any circumstances, be
enforced at common law. Davidson v. Clayland, 1 H. & J. 546.
In England the king is allowed a similar lien upon the real estate
of public debtors. The United States v. Fisher, 2 Craw. 358; Jones
v. Jones, 1 Bland, 443. But this lien has been given for the bene-
fit of the State alone; and therefore cannot be permitted, in any