An Essay on the Law of Patents for New Inventions

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1822. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... An essay on the law of patents for new inventions Thomas Green Fessenden INTRODUCTION. The investigations which led to the following essay, were commenced in consequence of the author's having occasion to turn his attention to the subject, without any design of publication. He was, however, induced to place the result of his inquiries before the public, in consequence of his having ascertained that the Law of Patents for New Inventions had received but little attention--much less, in his opinion, than was due to so important a branch of jurisprudence. It was, therefore, hoped that an essay on this topic, though but imperfectly executed, might be recommended as well by its novelty as by its utility. The course of the author's inquiries, requisite to complete this essay, led him to observe that those persons to whom mankind have been indebted for the most useful discoveries, inventions, and improvements, in the arts, have but rarely met with that reward, either of fame or profit, which their ingenuity has merited. Yet to men of this description must be attributed the origin not only of the comforts, ornaments, and luxuries of life, but even of those necessaries, the want of which would convert the human race into hordes of wandering, naked, and houseless savages, much more miserable and defenceless than the brute inhabitants of the wilderness. The writer has seen, with regret, not only that the lower orders in society, for the most part, entertain absurd and unreasonable prejudices against the person who invents, patronises, or adopts, a useful improvement in the arts, but, in some instances, legal men, of great and deserved eminence, have shown dispositions hostile to patentees of new and useful inventions, cl...