LIEN

(Fr. lien, bond.) In Law, signifies the right which a creditor has to retain the property of his debtor until the debt has been paid; and furnishes one of very few instances in which a party is allowed to take the law, as it were, into his own hands. Liens are either general or par ticular. A general lien is the tight to retain a thing for n general balance of accounts, and not for those demands only which arise in respect of the thing retained. This sort of lien is said not to be favoured by law. A particular lien, which the law is said to favour, is a right to retain a thing when the claim against the owner of it arises out of the thing retained itself; as, where a tailor has made the cloth of his customer into a coat, the tailor is allowed to retain the cloth until he is paid for his labour in making it into a coat. The payment of a simple contract debt cannot be enforced by action after six yea is have elapsed from the time the debt was incurred; but a party who has a lien on property may retain it for an unlimited period, until his claim has been satisfied. [s. 679]