The inventor's guide - 1837 Author:Willard Phillips Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Such is a general outline of the provisions of the patent laws of this and other countries. Each of these provisions, as far as they have been introduced into th... more »e laws of the United States, will be considered in the following chapters. CHAPTER V. Character and Spirit of the Jurisprudence upon Patent Rights. The jurisprudence on patents has been said to constitute the metaphysics of the law. The difficulty of administering and giving a construction to this branch of law, lies, says Mr. Justice Story, " not so much in the general principles, as in the minute and subtle distinctions which occasionally arise in the application of these principles."l For instance, the subject of a patent must be new, and useful, and clearly described, for so the law requires. There is not the least difficulty respecting these general doctrines ; but when we come to inquire what is new, that is, whether the thing is so similar to, or di- 1 1 Mason R. 472. verse from, what has already been done or produced, as lo be substantially the same, or different, the question is often of a subtile metaphysical character. The same remark is applicable to the question whether a thing is useful, and a decision on the other of these questions, relating to the sufficiency of the specification, involves a nice analysis of the invention and the description of it by the patentee. It follows, from this character of the jurisprudence on this branch of law, that the beneficial effect of the law depends quite as much upon the principles and spirit with which it is interpreted and administered, as upon the general provisions of the law itself, since it is to no purpose to provide for a temporary monopoly of a thing on condition that it shall be described with greater clearness and precision than the nature of th...« less