DE BENE ESSE, practice. A technical phrase applied to certain proceedings which are deemed to be well done for the present, or until an exception or other avoidance, that is, conditionally, and in that meaning the phrase is usually accepted. For example, a declaration is filed or delivered, special bail put in, witness examined, &c. de bene esse, or conditionally; good for the present.
2. When a judge has a doubt as to the propriety of finding a verdict, h(, may direct the jury to find one de bene esse; which verdict, if the court shall afterwards be of opinion it ought to have been found, shall stand. Bac. Ab. Verdict, A. Vide 11 S. & R. 84.