264 CASE OF IMPEACHMENT OF WASTE. 



the feoffee shall not fell timber, the clause of condition is 

 void. And so on the other side, if I make a lease with a, 

 power that he shall fell timber, it is void. 



So if I make a lease with a power that he may make 

 feoffment, or that he may make leases for forty years, or 

 that if he make default I shall not be received, or that the 

 lessee may do homage ; these are plainly void, as against 

 law, and repugnant to the state. No, this cannot be done . 

 by way of use, except the words be apt, as in Mild may s 

 case : neither is this clause, in the sense that they take it,, 

 any better. 



Therefore, laying aside these two constructions, whereof 

 the one is not maintained to be, the other cannot be : let us 

 come to the true sense of this clause, which is by way of 

 discharge of the action, and no more: wherein I will speak 

 first of the words, then of the reason, then of the authorities 

 which prove our sense, then of the practice, which is pre 

 tended to prove theirs ; and, lastly, I will weigh the mis 

 chief how it stands for our construction or theirs. 



It is an ignorant mistaking of any man to take impeach 

 ment for impedimentum, and not for impetitio ; for it is true 

 that impedimentum doth extend to all hindrances, or dis 

 turbances, or interruptions, as well mpais as judicial. But 

 impetitio is merely a judicial claim or interruption by suit 

 in law, and upon the matter all one with impladtatio. 

 Wherein first we may take light of the derivation of impe 

 titio, which is a compound of the preposition in and the 

 verb peto, whereof the verb peto itself doth signify a de 

 mand, but yet properly such a demand as is not extrajudi- 

 cial: for the words petit judicium petit auditum brevis, 8cc. 

 are words of acts judicial ; as for the demand in pais, it is 

 rather requisitio than petitio, as licet s&pius requisitus ; so 

 much for the verb peto. But the preposition in enforceth 

 it more, which signifies against: as Cicero in Verrem, in 

 Catilinam ; and so in composition, to inveigh, is to speak 

 against ; so it is such a demand only where there is a party 

 raised to demand against, that is an adversary, which must 

 be in a suit in law ; and so it is used in records of law. 



As Coke, lib. 1. f. 17, Porter s case, it was pleaded in 

 bar, that dicta domina regina mine ipsos Johannem et Hen- 

 ricum Porter petere sen occasionare nondebet, that is, impla- 

 citare. 



So likewise Coke L 1. f. 27, case of Alton Woods, quod 

 dicta domina regina mine ipsum proinde aliqualiter impetere 

 seu occasionare non debet. 



So in the book of entries, f. 1. lit. D. 15 H, VIL rot. 2, 



