WATKINS v. WORTHINGTON. 535

capacity of the debtor, as by his becoming a lunatic. (6) And it
is also settled, that no alteration in the civil, political, or pecuniary
condition of the debtor can authorize a court of justice to fetter or
abolish any of the creditor's remedies arising out of the personal
liability of his debtor, either by confining the creditor to a particu-
lar fund; or altogether to the person of the debtor; or by compel-
ing him to seek satisfaction of any one alone, where two or more
have been made liable by the nature of the contract, (c)

As where, in England, the debtor had been attainted of felony,
whereby all his property had become forfeited; or where he had
become a bankrupt, without a certificate, and had his whole estate
put into the hands of his assignees; or where by a special act of
the legislature all his estate had been vested in trustees for particu-
lar purposes; or where the estate of a British subject had, by an
act of assembly of one of the states of our Union, been confisca-
ted; such circumstances were not allowed, in any manner, to im-
pair the obligation of the contract, to diminish the rights of the
creditor, or to lessen the liability of the debtor, even although it
should clearly appear, that the surety could not have the security
assigned to him; or that it would be impossible for him to take
the place of the creditor in any respect whatever. A court of
equity cannot interpose to enlarge the effect of a legal contract,
nor can it be called upon to cut down its then subsisting legal
operation. Because, even as in the case of an attaint, according to
the law of England, by which the debtor is civilly dead, and all
his property forfeited, the law implies from such a contract, that
the creditor can charge his debtor's person in execution; and even
in circumstances from which there appears to be no ray of hope of
getting any thing by it, the creditor has a right to take his chance
of that; the court has no right to judge for him what he can make
out of the imprisonment of his debtor, operating by way of duress
upon the feelings and affections of third persons; or as it is ex-
pressed in an ancient English statute, 'until he have made agree-
ment, or his friends for him.' Because it is the contract of the
parties, and the court has no right to apply the terms, 'wilful, ma-
licious, and oppressive,' to what the law under those circumstances
allows. Such are the doctrines of the English Court of Chan-
cery, by which it appears, that no hardships or sufferings, however

(b) Owen v. Davies, J Ves. 82.—(e) Jennings v. Elster, 7 Cond. Cha, Rep. 115;
Wilkinson v. Henderson, 7 Cond. Cha. Rep. 173.