CHAr. IV.]

OATHS.

193

lence, bad faith, and ignorance, it was indispensable to call in theaid of the senses and the imagination, to make a suitable impres- •sion on the understanding and conscience. The advance ofknowledge, of morals, of religion, and of general cultivation,have rendered the simple forms and ceremonies of modern timesadequate to the attainment of the end designed. The substanceof the meaning of every oath must be, an appeal to AlmightyGod, in which the juror invokes his vengeance or renounceshis favor, if he knowingly declares what is false, willingly fails toperform his promise or contract, or otherwise violates the termsof the oath in their known signification.

In taking the “oath in evidence,” the witness swears “tospeak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,”touching the subject of inquiry. This form is brief, appropriate,and easy to be understood. The designed concealment of anytruth, which relates to the matter in question, is as much aviolation of the oath, as to testify to a positive falsehood ; andthis too, even if the witness is not questioned as to that particu-lar point. The oath requires of the witness, that he give a com-plete and unreserved account of what he knows of the subject ofthe trial, whether or not the questions proposed to him reachthe extent of his knowledge. So that if it be inquired of a wit-ness after the trial, why he did not inform the court on any par-ticular point, the reply that he was not questioned on that point,is not a satisfactory answer.

There is one exception to this rule, and only one, to wit ;when a full disclosure of the truth tends to convict the witnesshimself of some legal crime. Our law constrains no man to be-come his own accuser, and consequently must impose the oathin evidence with this tacit reservation. But the exception mustbe confined to legal crimes. A point of honor, of reputation,or of delicacy, may make a witness disinclined to disclose somecircumstance with which he is acquainted ; but a concealment ofthe truth, for either of these reasons, is in nowise justifiable.When, however, an accomplice is admitted to give evidenceagainst his associates in crime, he may, and must, testify againsthimself, as there is a compact to this effect, between himselfand the State. In criminal prosecutions, tenderness to the25