I take it that the judgment is an essential point in every conviction, let the punishment be fixed or not. - Lloyd Kenyon, 1st Baron Kenyon

The practice of the Court forms the law of the Court.

The wishes of every human man are, that guilt may not be fixed upon any man; but I confess I am one of those who have not the weakness—which weakness, a Judge at least, and a jury, must get rid of, before they fit themselves to fill the respective stations which they are to fill in the administration of the justice of the country— I say, therefore, I am not one of those who wish under false compassion, inconsistent with the administration of criminal justice, that a person on whom guilt is fairly fixed, should escape the punishment which the law annexes to his guilt.

Notwithstanding all the care and anxiety of the persons who frame Acts of Parliament to guard against every event, it frequently turns out that certain cases were not foreseen.