Is a vendor entitled to enforce a portion of the purchase money?

This view can be traced to the case of Cameron v. Bradbury (1862), 9 G.R. 67. In that case, the vendor elected to treat the purchaser’s breach of a contract for a sale of land as discharging the contract, and afterwards sought to enforce a judgment for a portion of the purchase money. At page 68 Spragge, V.C., dealt with the vendor’s claim as follows: If there had been no judgment recovered, the point, I apprehend, could admit of no question. The vendor could not uno flatu cancel the agreement, and require payment of arrears; because the payment of arrears would reinstate the agreement, the purchaser being then no longer in default. So again, if judgment has been recovered for the whole of the arrears, the effect must necessarily have been the same. The vendor’s position by this bill is, that he is entitled to enforce his judgment in this court. But his judgment, or the amount recovered, is still unpaid purchase money; and I cannot see that the circumstances of judgment having been recovered for it alters its character, or the rights of the parties in respect to it. The vendor takes back the land; he cannot do that and at the same time ask for purchase money; the very essence of such a transaction is, that the vendor keeps the land, and the purchase money.