It is not always necessary, however, that there must be an immediate benefit to the party promising or a loss to the party to whom the promise was made. What is known as a moral obligation is sufficient to satisfy this requirement for a consideration. Lord Mansfield in one of his decisions stated this doctrine as follows: "Where a man is under a legal or equitable obligation to pay, the law implies a promise, though none was ever actually made. A fortiori a legal or equitable duty is a sufficient consideration for an actual promise. Where a man is under a moral obligation, which no court of law or equity can enforce, and promises, the honesty and rectitude of the thing is a consideration; as if a man promise to pay a just debt, the recovery of which is barred by the Statute of Limitations; or if a man after he comes of age promises to pay a meritorious debt contracted during his minority, but not for necessaries; or if a bankrupt, in affluent circumstances after his certificate, promises to pay the whole of his debts; or if a man promise to perform a secret trust, or a trust void for want of writing by the Statute of Frauds.

"In such and many other instances, though the promise gives a compulsory remedy where there was none before either in law or equity, yet as the promise is only to do what an honest man ought to do, the ties of conscience upon an upright mind are a sufficient consideration." 13

11 Meek vs. Frants, 117 Oa., 632; 3 Atl. 413.

12 Tumison vs. Bradford, 49 N. J., Egu. 210; Keffer vs. Grayson 76 Va., 517.

The most frequent applications of this rule at the present time, are found in the cases of promises to pay debts barred by the statute of limitations, or debts contracted before the promisor becomes of age, or debts barred by a discharge in bankruptcy.14 There has been some diversity of judicial opinion on the last case as to whether the new promise is the real cause of action and the discharged debt the consideration which supports it, or whether the new promise operates as a waiver by the bankrupt of the defense which the discharge gives him against the original demand. The question, however, is merely one of practice affecting the form of the action, and the right of recovery under such circumstances is undoubted.