Even superstition, though more prevalent
among ignorant nations, is but a poor supply for the defects in
knowledge and education; our European ancestors, who employed every
moment the expedient of swearing on extraordinary crosses and relics,
were less honorable in all engagements than their posterity, who from
experience have omitted those ineffectual securities. This general
proneness to assumed perjury was much increased by the usual want of
discernment in judges, who could not discuss an intricate evidence, and
were obliged to number, not weigh, the testimony of the witnesses,[*]
Hence the ridiculous practice of obliging men to bring compurgators,
who, as they did not pretend to know any thing of the fact, expressed
upon oath, that they believed the person spoke true; and these
compurgators were in some cases multiplied to the number of three
hundred.[**] The practice also of single combat was employed by most
nations on the continent as a remedy against false evidence;[***] and
though it was frequently dropped, from the opposition of the clergy, it
was continually revived, from experience of the falsehood attending
the testimony of witnesses.
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