The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1880-08-26
miscellaneous.
REV. 7. DEWITT TALMAGE.
LAWYERs.-AN EARNEST PLEA
FOR THE CLOTH.
Popular Prejudlces and Fallacies About the Pro
FessiOn-Some Of the Temptations to Which
They are Subjected.
suRJEcT--"THE LAWYERS"

w u dll duLulIO JlO hOAOlb uhA AASNAN~N" |
side of Paul's nature, as when he stands
coolly and deliberately on the deck of the
Cornship while the jaCk.tars of the Med |
iterranean are covering in the cyclone;
as when he stands undaunted amid the
marvels of the palace, bef re thickneck'
ed Nero, surrounded with his twelve
lictors; as when we find him earning his
own livelihood with his own needle,sew'
ing haircloth, and preaching the Gospel
in the interstices; as when we fad him
able to take the twenty. y.nine lashes, ey-
ery stroke of which drawed the blood,
vet continuing in mis- missionary work;
as when we find bim, regardless of the
consequences to himself, delivering a
temperance lecture to Felix, the govern
ment inebriate, But sometimes we get
a glimpse of the mild and genial side of
Paul's nature. 1t seems he had friend
who was barrister by profession. His
name was Zsnas, aud he wanted to see
him. Perhaps he had made the acquain'
tanCe of this lawyer in the courtroom.
Perhaps, sometimes, when he wanted
to ask some question in regard to Roman
law, he went to this Zanas, the lawyer.
At any rate he had warm attachment
for the man, and he provides for his
comfortable escort and entertainment as
he writes to Titus: Bring Z4nas, the
lawyer" This man of my text belong
ed to a profession which has often had
ardent supporters of Christ and the Cos
pei among them. Blackstone, the great
commentator on English law; and Will.
berforce, the emancipator and Chancel'
lor Frelinghuysen, and the late Benz F,
Butler, Attorney-G neral of New York.
Among the mightiest pleas ever made
by tongue of barristers, have been in be-
half of the Bible and Christianity, as
when Daniel Webster stood in the Su-
preme Court at Washington, pleading in
the famous Girard will case, denounCing
any attempt to educate the people with.
out giving them at the same time moral
sentiment, as Glow, ribald, and vulgar
dei.m and infdelity;" as when Edmund
Burke, in the famous Warren Hastings's
trial, not only in behalf Of the English
Government, but in behalf of elevated
morals, closed his speech in the midst of
the most august assemblage ever gather
ed in Westminster Hall, by saying: VI
impeaCh Warren Hastings in the name
of the House of Commons, whose ma
tional character he has dishonored; |
impeach him in the name of the people
of India, whose rights and liberties
he has subverted; l impeach him in the
name of human nature, which he has
disgraced in the name of both sexes,
of every rank and every nation, and ev.
cry situation in the world, Iimpeach
Warren Hastings" Yet, notwithstand-
ing all this effort in behalf of God and
the church, and the rights of man, there
has come down through the generations
a style against it, So long ago as in the
time of Oliver Cromwell, it was decided
that lawyers might not enter the Parlia-
ment House as members, and they were
called "Sons of Z4rniah."
Two hundred years ago treatise was
issued with the title, "Doomsday Com.
iRg with Thunder and Lightning for
Lawyers" A prominent clergyman of
the last century wrote in regard to that
profession these words; "There is a 80.
Ciety of men among us, bred up from
their youth in the art of proving, acCor.
ding as they are paid, by words multi
piled for the purpose, that black is white
and white is black. For example: if my
neighbor has a mind to my COW, he hires
lawyer to prove that he ought to have
my COW from me. l must hire another
lawyer to defend my right; it being
against all rules of law that a man should
speak for himself In pleading, they do
not dwell upon the merits of the cause,
but upon rcumstances foreign thereto.
They do not take the shortest method to
know what title my adversary has to my
COW, but whether the COW be black or
red, or her horns long or short, or the
like. After that they adjourn the cause
from time to time, and in twenty years
they come to an iseue. This society has
likewise a peculiar cant or jargon of their
own, in which all their laws are written,
and these they take especial care to null |
tiply, whereby they have 80 confounded |
truth and falsehood, that it will take |
twenty years to decide whether the field
left to me by my ancestors for six gen.
erations belongs to me or to one three
miles off,"
/ say these things to show that there
has been a prejudice going on down
against that profession, from generation
to generation. l account for it on the
single fact that they compel men to pay
debts they don't want to pay, and they
arraign criminals who wantt escape the
consequences of their crime; and as long
as that is so, and it always will be 80,
just so long will there be classes of men
who will affect, at any rate, to despise
the legal profession. know not how it |
was in other countries, but l have had
long and wide acquaintance with men of
that professional have found them in
all my parishes-I tarried in one of their
Offices three years, where there came
real estate lawyers, insurance lawyers,
criminal lawyers, marine lawyers, and |
have yet to find class of men more ge-
nial or more straightforward. There are
in that onnt1notiOp ou in oil othan oaa,