Posse

Lat. To be able. Posse comitatus: the force of a county, the entire population above the age of fifteen, except peers and clergymen. In posse: in possibility, not in esse. Possessio fratris facit sororem esse haeredem: the possession of the brother makes the sister heir. If a man die, and leave two sons by different wives, and the one brother be seised in possession of the father's estate and die, the estate shall not pass to his brother, but to his sister of the whole blood in preference. A maxim when descent was traced from the person last seised, not, as now, from the purchaser.