The Preface to John Davies's Patent Cases (1816)

Reproduced below is the Preface to John Davies, A Collection of the most Important Cases relating to Patents of Invention (1816).
In this preface, John Davies explains that he has been working for upwards of thirty years in the Rolls Chapel of the Court of Chancery, where the records of that court, and in particular the patent rolls are kept. He has also been active as an agent assisting inventors in procuring patents for their inventions. He explains the need for a book of patent cases, and explains how his book relates to the earlier books of Collier and Hands. It may be worth noting that, in the final paragraph, he explains that cases taken in the Court of Chancery lead to grants of injunctions and orders for accounts of profits; issues regarding patent validity, novelty and sufficiency of the specification are determined in courts of law.

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John Davies, A Collection of the most Important Cases relating to Patents of Invention (1816)

Preface

The collector of these cases having been upwards of thirty years in the office of the Rolls Chapel, has frequently had his attention drawn to patents and specifications of inventions, that being one of the offices in which such specifications are enrolled; and having for many years been concerned for inventors, in soliciting patents for their inventions, he has consequently been led to think much upon the subject, and has felt great surprise, and regret, that no book of the kind, now proposed, has ever been produced by any gentleman versed in this sort of business, and competent to the work.
He has mentioned his plan to several gentlemen in the profession of the law, to others, who, like himself, are employed as agents for procuring patents, and also, to some scientific and mechanical persons, who have uniformly approved of the idea; and spoken in the strongest terms, both of the necessity and utility of such a work as is now offered to the public.
He has, it is true, in some degree, been anticipated by Mr. Collier's “Essay on the Law of Patents for Inventions,” and by Mr. Hands's book on “The Law and Practice of Patents for Inventions;” but as appears to the compiler and those whose opinion he has been favoured with upon the subject, not in such a manner as to preclude the necessity of the present undertaking, as they are neither of them regular reports of cases, shewing the arguments of counsel, and giving the dicta of the judges settling the various points; besides which, one has given much extraneous matter, and the other is almost exclusively confined to forms, with many of which the patentee or his agent has nothing to do, it being the duty of the officers of the offices through which the patent passes in its progress, to draw most of the instruments there given.
Those books, however, are now nearly, if not quite out of print, having met with a very rapid sale, from the want experienced not only by patentees, but by the profession, of a work which would bring the whole of the law of patents into one point of view; the compiler, therefore, is induced to offer the present collection to the public, not from any confidence in his superior qualifications for such an undertaking, as he is aware that the only merit he can claim is that of diligence in collecting the materials. A great deal of laborious research, nad he hopes due diligence, has been given, in collecting from various sources, what appeared to him to be the most important decisions upon the subject, and he takes this opportunity of expressing his grateful thanks to those gentlemen of the profession who have kindly furnished him with the papers in many of the cases here reported, which he had no means of bringing before the public without their liberal assistance; but still many cases may, and certainly do remain, of which no report is given, and which the parties interested may consider as important as those included in this work. To such he has only to observe, that he has inserted every case he has been able to procure, which contained any new points respecting patents, or which had acquired notoriety by the magnitude and importance of the invention; but if his labours should be so well received as to require a second edition, he respectfully solicits the communication of papers in any causes which may be omitted in this collection; and he will, with thankfulness to the communicator, insert a report of any important or new decision in a future edition, or should he be furnished with sufficient matter, he intends to lay it before the public in a supplemental volume, so that the purchasers of the present edition need not incur any more expense than necessarily arises by the increased bulk of the work, or be under the necessity of purchasing the second edition. Some cases might perhaps be added from the Chancery reports, and it may be thought an error of judgment to have wholly omitted them, but they would have swelled the size of the book beyond his wish, and as most, if not all of them, have been referred to the courts of law, it is hoped that every requisite information upon the subject will be obtained by confining the work to decisions in those courts; besides which, the Court of Chancery never decides upon the validity of a patent, the practice there being nothing more than to grant an injunction, at the prayer of the patentee, and to order an account of profits; but if any question arises upon the validity of the patent, the novelty of the invention, or the sufficiency of the specification, it is uniformly referred to a court of law.
Rolls Chapel Office,
   August, 1816.