Mr. A. Council for Woolston, addressing himself to the judge, said,

May it please your Lordship, I conceive the Gentleman on the other side ought to begin, and lay his evidence, which he intends to maintain, before the court; till that is done, it is to no purpose for me to object.  I amy perhaps object to something which he will not admit to be any part of his evidence; and therefore I apprehend, the evidence ought in the first place to be distinctly stated.

        Judge.  Mr. B What say you to that?

        Mr. B. Council on the other side: 

My Lord, If the evidence I am to maintain, were to suppose any new claim; if I were to gain any thing which I am not already possessed of, the Gentleman would be in the right:  but the evidence is old, and is matter of record; and I have been long in possession of all that I claim under it.  If the Gentleman has anything to say to dispossess me, let him produce it; otherwise I have no reason to bring my own title into question.  And this I take to be the known method of proceeding in such cases:  no man is obliged to produce his title to his possession; it is sufficient if he maintain it when it is called in question.

Mr A. Surely, my Lord, the Gentleman mistakes the case.  I can never admit myself to be out of possession of my understanding and reason; and since he would put me out of this possession, and compel me to admit things incredible, in virtue of the evidence he maintains, he ought to set forth his claim, or leave the world to be directed by common sense.

Judge.  Sir, you say right, upon supposition that the truth of the Christian religion were the point in question.  In that case it would be necessary to produce the evidence for the Christian religion.  But the matter now before the court is, Whether the objections produced by Mr. Woolston, are of weight to overthrow the evidence of Christ’s resurrection?  You see then the evidence of the resurrection is supposed to be what it is on both sides; and the thing immediately in judgement is, the value of the objections; and therefore they must be set forth.  The court will be bound to take notice of the evidence, which is admitted as a fact on both parts.  Go on, Mr. A.

Mr. A. My Lord, I submit to the direction of the court, I cannot but observe, that the Gentleman on the other side, unwilling as he seems to be to state his evidence, did not forget to lay in his claim to prescription; which is perhaps, in truth, tho’ he has too much skill to own it, the very strength of his cause.  I do allow, that the Gentleman maintains nothing, but what his father and grandfather, and his ancestors, beyond time of man’s memory, maintained before him:  I allow too, that prescription in many cases makes a good title; but it must always be with this condition, that the thing is capable of being prescribed for:  and I insist, that prescription cannot run against reason and common sense.  Customs