JUDGMENT, amongst logicians, is a faculty or rather an act of the human soul, by which it compares its ideas, and perceives their agreement or disagreement. See Metaphysics and Logic. Judgment, in Law, is the sentence pronounced by the court upon the matter contained in the record. In the law of England, judgments are of four sorts; first, where the facts are confessed by the parties, and the law determined by the court, as in the case of judgment upon demurrer; secondly, where the law is admitted by the parties, and the facts disputed, as in the case of judgment upon verdict; thirdly, where both the fact and the law arising thereon are admitted by the defendant, which is the case of judgments by confession or default; or, lastly, where the plaintiff is convinced that either fact or law, or both, are insufficient to support his action, and therefore abandons or withdraws his prosecution, which is the case in judgments upon a nonsuit or retraxit. Judgment, in criminal cases, is the next stage of prosecution, after trial and conviction, in such crimes and [7:12:626]misdemeanours as are either too high or too low to be included within the benefit of clergy. For when, upon a capital charge, the jury have brought in their verdict guilty in the presence of the prisoner, he is either immediately, or at a convenient time soon afterwards, asked by the court, if he has any thing to offer why judgment should not be awarded against him? And in case the defendant be found guilty of a misdemeanour (the trial of which may, and does usually, happen in his absence, after he has once appeared), a capias is awarded and issued, to bring him up to receive his judgment; and if he absconds, he may be prosecuted even to outlawry. But whenever he appears in person, upon either a capital or inferior conviction, he may at this period, as well as at his arraignment, offer any exceptions to the indictment, in arrest or stay of judgment; as for want of sufficient certainty in setting forth either the person, the time, the place, or the offence. And if the objections be valid, the whole proceedings are set aside; but the party may be indicted again.

A pardon also may be pleaded in arrest of judgment; and it has the same advantage when pleaded here as when pleaded upon arraignment, namely, saving the attainder, and, of course, the corruption of blood; which nothing can restore but parliament, when a pardon is not pleaded till after sentence. Praying the benefit of clergy may also be ranked amongst the motions in arrest of judgment.

If all these resources fail, the court must proceed to pronounce that judgment which the law has annexed to the crime. Of these some are capital, which extend to the life of the offender, and consist generally in being hanged by the neck till dead; though in very atrocious crimes other circumstances of terror, pain, or disgrace, are superadded. Some punishments consist in exile or banishment, by abjuration of the realm, or transportation beyond the seas; others, in loss of liberty, by perpetual or temporary imprisonment. Some extend to confiscation, by forfeiture of lands or moveables, or both, or of the profits of lands for life; others induce a disability of holding offices or employments, of being heirs, executors, and the like. Some, though rarely, occasion a mutilation or dismembering, by cutting off the hand or ears; others fix a lasting stigma on the offender, by slitting the nostrils or branding in the hand or face. Some are merely pecuniary, by stated or discretionary fines; and there are others which consist principally in the ignominy, though most of them are mixed with some degree of corporal pain.