140 CASE OF THE POST-NATI OF SCOTLAND. 



ceased. To which it was answered, that there was 

 a possibility that it might execute, which was thus: 

 Put case, that tenant in tail should enter into 

 religion, having no issue : then the remainder should 

 execute, and the kings should hold the land during 

 the natural life of tenant in tail, notwithstanding his 

 civil death. But the court &quot; una voce&quot; exploded this 

 reason, and said, that monasteries were down, and 

 entries into religion gone, and they must be up again 

 ere this could be ; and that the law did not respect 

 such remote and foreign possibilities. And so we 

 may hold this for the like : for I think we all hope 

 that neither of those days shall ever come, either for 

 monasteries to be restored, or for the king s line to 

 fail. But the true answer is, that the possibility 

 subsequent, remote or not remote, doth not alter the 

 operation of law for the present. For that should 

 be, as if in case of the rent which you put, you 

 should say, that in regard that the rent may be 

 severed, it should be said to be, &quot; in esse&quot; in the 

 mean time, and should be grantable ; which is 

 clearly otherwise. And so in the principal case, if 

 that should be, which God of his goodness forbid, 

 &quot; cessante causa cessat effectus,&quot; the benefit of 

 naturalization for the time to come is dissolved. 

 But that altereth not the operation of the law; 

 &quot; rebus sic staritibus.&quot; And therefore I conclude 

 that this difference is but a device full of weakness 

 and ignorance ; and that there is one and the same 

 reason of naturalizing subjects by descent, and sub 

 jects by conquest ; and that is the union in the 



