P L E 
P L E 
more advanced age. Locke .—The fervants fliould be hin¬ 
dered from making court to them, by giving them fruit 
and playthings. Locke. 
O Caftalio ! thou haft caught 
My foolifh heart ; and, like a tender child, 
Thattrufts his plaything to another hand, 
I fear its harm, and fain would have it back. Otway. 
PL AY'WRIGHT, f. A maker of plays.—He ended 
much in the character he had liv’d in ; and Horace’s rule 
for a play may as well be applied to him as a playwright. 
Pope. 
PLAZ'ZA, a city of Chili, in the province of Quillota. 
It is fituated in a beautiful valley, in the vicinity of feve- 
ral gold-mines. 
PLEA,/, [plaid, old Fr.] The ail or form of plead¬ 
ing. The thing offered or demanded in pleading.—Their 
refpeil of perfons was expreffed in judical procefs, in 
giving rafh fentence in favour of the rich, without ever 
ftayingto hear the plea, or weigh the reafons of the poor’s 
caufe. Kettlewell. 
The magnificoes have all perfuaded with him ; 
But none can drive him from the envious plea 
Of forfeiture of juftice and his bond. Shakefpeare. 
Allegation : 
They tow’rds the throne fupreme, 
Accountable, made hafte, to make appear, 
With righteous plea, their utrnoft vigilance. Milton. 
An apology; an excufe.—Whoever argues in defence of 
abfoiute power in a fingle perfon, though he offers the 
old plaufible plea, that it is his opinion, which he cannot 
help, unlefs he be convinced, ought to be treated as the 
common enemy of mankind. Swift. 
The fiend, with neceffity, 
The tyrant’s plea, excus’d his deviliflt deeds. Milton. 
Plea, in law, is what either party alleges for himfelf 
in court, in a caufe there depending; in a more re- 
ftrained fenfe, it is the defendant’s anfwer to the plaintiff’s 
declaration. 
Pleas are ufually divided into thofe of the crown, and 
common pleas. 
Pleas of the Crown comprehend all fuits in the 
king’s name, or in the name of the attorney-general in 
behalf of the king, for offences committed againft his 
crown and dignity, and againft his peace; as treafon, 
murder, felony, &c. 
Common Pleas are fuch fuits as are carried on be¬ 
tween common perfons in civil cafes. Thefe pleas are 
of two forts; dilatory pleas, and pleas to the aftion. Di¬ 
latory pleas are fuch as tend merely to delay or put off’ 
the fuit, by queftioning the propriety of the remedy, ra¬ 
ther than by denying the injury: pleas to the aition are 
fuch as difpute the very caufe of fuit. 
Dilatory Picas were formerly very often ufed without 
any foundation in truth, and calculated only for delay 5 
bpt now, by flat. 4& 5 Ann. c. 16. no dilatory plea is to be 
admitted without affidavit made of the truth thereof, or 
fome probable matter fiiown to the court to induce them 
to believe it true. And with refpeil to the pleas them- 
feives, it is a rule, that no exception (hall be admitted 
againft a declaration or writ, unlefs the defendant will 
in the fame plea give the plaintiff a better; that is, fltow 
him how it might be amended, that there may not be 
two objeilions on the fame account. 
A Pica to the AElion is to anfwer to the merits of the 
complaint. This is done by confeffing or denying it. 
A confeftion of the whole complaint is not very ufual ; 
for then the defendant wcuid probably end the matter 
fooner, or not plead at all, but fuffer judgment to go 
by default. Yet fometimes, after tender and refufal of 
a debt, if the creditor harafles his debtor with an action, 
it then becomes neceffary for the defendant to acknow¬ 
ledge the debt, and plead the tender; adding that he 
Vol, XX, No. 1400. 
673 
has always been ready, tout tempsprijl, and is ftill ready, 
uncore prijl, to difcharge it: for a tender by the debtor 
and retufal by the creditor will in all cafes difcharge the 
cofts, but not the debt itfelf; though in fome particular 
cafes the creditor will totally lofe his money. But fre¬ 
quently the defendant confeffes one part of the complaint 
(by a cognovit aSlionem in refpeil thereof), and traverfes 
or denies the reft; in order to avoid the expenfe of car¬ 
rying that part to a formal trial, which he has no ground 
to litigate. A fpecies of this fort of confeftion is the 
“payment of money into court,” which is for the ntoft 
part neceffary upon pleading a tender, and is itfelf a kind 
of tender to the plaintiff; by paying into the hands of 
the proper officer of the court as much as the defendant 
acknowledges to be due, together with the cofts hitherto 
incurred, in order to prevent the expenfe of any farther 
proceedings. Tnis may be done upon what is called a 
motion; which is an occafional application to the court 
by the parties or their counfel, in order to obtain fome 
rule or order of court, which becomes neceffary in the 
progrefs of a caufe : and it is ufually grounded upon an 
affidavit, (the perfeit tenfe of the verb affido ,) being a 
voluntary oath before fome judge or officer of the court, 
to evince the truth of certain fails, upon which the mo¬ 
tion is grounded; though no fuch affidavit is neceffary 
for payment of money into court. If, after the money 
is paid in, the plaintiff proceeds in his fuit, it is at his 
own peril: for, if he does not prove more due than is fo 
paid into court, he fliall be nonfuited and pay the de¬ 
fendant’s cofts; but he ftiall ftill have the money fo paid 
in, for that the defendant has acknowledged to be his due. 
To this head may alfo be referred the practice of what is 
called a Jet■ off; whereby the defendant acknowledges 
the juftice of the plaintiff’s demand on the one hand ; 
but, on the other, fets up a demand of his own, to coun¬ 
terbalance that of the plaintiff, either in the whole or in 
part; as, if the plaintiff lues for ten pounds due on a 
note of hand, the defendant may fet off nine pounds due 
to himfelf for merchandize fold to the plaintiff; and, in 
cafe he plead fuch fet-off, rnuft pay the remaining ba¬ 
lance into court. Blachjlone , vol. iii. 
Pleas that totally deny the caufe of complaint are either 
the general iffue, or a fpecial plea in bar. 
1. The general iffue, or general plea, is what traverfes, 
thwarts, and denies at once, the whole declaration, with¬ 
out offering any fpecial matter whereby to evade it. As 
in trefpafs either vi et armis or on the cafe, “ non culpa- 
hilis, not guilty in debt upon contrail, “ nihil (lebet, he 
owes nothing;” in debt on bond, “non eftfadum, it is not 
his deed 5” on an affumpjit, “ non affumpjit, he made no 
fuch promife or in real ailions, “mil tort, no wrong 
done; mil diffeifin, no diffeifin;” and in a writ of right, 
the mife or iffue is, that “ the tenant has more right to 
hold than the demandant has to demand.” Thefe pleas 
are called the general iffue, becaufe, by importing an 
abfoiute and general denial of what is alleged in the de¬ 
claration, they amount at once to an iffue ; by which 
we mean a fail affirmed on one fide and denied on the 
other. 
2. Special Pleas, in bar of the plaintiff’s demands, are 
very various, according to the circumftances of the de¬ 
fendant’s cafe. As, in real adlions, a general releafe 
or a fine ; both of which may deftroy and bar the plain¬ 
tiff’s title. Or, in perfonal aftions, an accord, arbitra¬ 
tion, conditions performed, nonage of the defendant, 
or fome other fail which precludes the plaintiff’ from his 
ailion. A jujiification is likewife a fpecial plea in bar; 
as in ailions of affault and battery, Jon affault dcmefne, 
that it was the plaintiff’s own original aifauit; in tref¬ 
pafs, that the defendant did the thing complained of in 
right of fome office which warranted him fo to do; or, 
in an ailion of Hander, that the plaintiff is really as bad 
a man as the defendant faid he was. 
Alfo a man may plead the ftatutes of limitation in 
bar ; or the time limited by certain ails of parliament, 
81 beyond 
