The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1897-07-02
PRAISE FOR The BAR,
A SERMON OF SPECIAL INTEREST
TO YOUNG LAWYERS.
Rev. DR.. Talmage Says If He Were on Trial
For His Life He Would rrefer |. Jury Of
Lawyers to One of ClerRymen.

DR.. Talmage's sermon today has a SPEC
il interest for lawyers. and all who ex-
pect to be lawyers, and all who are the
friends Of lawyers. His text is Titus Iii.
-, Bring Zenas the lawyer
The profession of the law is here intro
| duced. and within two days in the Cap
ital city 33 young men Joined it. and at
this season in various parts Of the land
other hundreds are taking their diplomas
for that illustrious profession. and is it
not appropriate that / address such
young men from a moral and religious
standpoint. as upon them are now rolling
the responsibilities of that calling repre-
scented in the text by Zenas the LAWYER?
We all admire the heroic and rigorous
side Of PauIs nature, as when he stands
coolly deliberate on the deck of the corn
ship while the jack tars Of the Mediter-
ranean are covering in the cyclone: as
when he stands undaunted amid the
marbles of the palace before this thick
necked Nero, surrounded with his u cruel
lictors: as when we find him earning his
livelihood with his own needle. sewing
haircloth and preaching the gospel in the
interStices: as when we find him able to
take 50 lashes, every stroke OF which
fetched the blood, yet continuing in his
missionary work: as when We find him,
regardless of the consequence to himself,
delivering a temperance lecture to Felix,
the government inebriate. But sometimes
We catch a glimpse of the mild and genial
side of Paul's nature. 1t seems that he
had a friend who was a barrister by pro-
feSsiOn. His name was Zenas, and he
wanted to see him. Perhaps he had
formed the acquaintance of this lawyer
in the courtroom. Perhaps sometimes.
when he wanted to ask some question in
regard to Roman law, he went to this
Zenas the lawyer. At any rate he had a
warm attachment for the man, and he
provides for his comfortable escort and
entertainment as he writes to Titus,
Bring Zenas the lawyer"
This man of my text belonged 10 a
profession in which are many ardent
supporters of Christ and the gospel,
among them Blackstone. the great COM
mentator on English law, and Wilber-
force, the emancipation, and the late Ben
jamin F. Butler, attorney general of
New York. and the late Charles
Chauncey, the leader of the Phil
adelphia bar. and Chief Justices Marshall
and Tenterden and Campbell and Sir
Thomas More, who died for the truth on
the scaffold, saying TO his aghast execu-
toner: PLUCK up courage. man. and do
your duty. My neck is very short. Be
careful. therefore,, and do not strike
aWry.'
TRIAL OF HASTINGS.
Among the mightiest pleas that ever
have been made by tongue of barrister
have been pleas in behalf of the Bible
and Christianity, as when Daniel Web
ster stood in the supreme court at WASH
ington pleading in the~famous Girard will
case, denouncing any attempt to educate
the people without giving them at the
same time moral sentiment as low. ri
bald and vulgar deism and infidelity;" as
when Samuel l.. SOuthard of New Jersey.
the leader of the forum in his day. stood
on the platform at Princeton college COM
mencament advocating the literary excel
lency of the Scriptures: as when Edmund
Burke, ir~the famous trial of Warren
Hastings, not only in behalf of the Eng
lish government, but in behalf of elevated
morals, closed his speech in the midst of
the most gus ~assemblaee ever gather
ed in Westminster hall by saying: Il im>
peach Warren Hastings in the name of
the house of mmo whose national
character he has dishonored: L innpeach
him in the name of the people of India,
whose rights and liberties he mas subver-
ted; [ impeach him in the name of human
nature, which he has disgraced. In the
name of both sexes, and of every rank.
and Of every station. and of every sit
uation in the world, L impeach Warren
Hastings.'
Yet, Notwithstanding al! the pleas
which that profession has made in behalf
of God and the church and the gospel
and the rights of man, there has come
down through the generations among
udice 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 Zeruiah." The learned
DR.. Johnson wrote an epitaph for one Of
them in these words:
God works wonders now and then.
Here lies a lawyer, an honest man.
Two hundred years ago a treatise was
issued with the title. "Doonsday APP
preaching With Thunder and Lightning
for Lawyers" A prominent clergyman
of the last century wrote in regard to
that profession cheese words. There is a
society of men among us bred up from
their youth in the art Of proving. accord
ing as they are paid, by words multiplied
for tho r11rnnSa that U-hita jc block and
black is white. For m If my
%neighbOr has a mind to my cow, he hires
a lawyer to prove that he ought to have
my COW from me. l must hire anOtherlaw-
| yer 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 circumstances foreign thereto. For
instance, they do not take the shortest
method to know what title my adversary
has to my COW, but whether the COW be
red or black, her horns long or short or
the like. After that they adjourn the cause
from time to time, and in twenty years
wise has a peculiar cant or jargon of
their own, in which all their laws are
written, and these they axe especial care
to multiply, whereby they have so con-
founded truth and falsehood that it Will
take twelve years to decide whether the
field left to me by my ancestors for SIX
generations belongs to me or to one 800
miles Off"
I say these things to show you that
there has been a prejudice going on down
against that profession from generation
to generation. I account for it on the
ground that they compel men to pay
debts that they do not want to pay, and
that they arraign criminals who want to
escape the consequences of their crime,
and as long as that is so. and 1t always
will be so. just so long there will be class
es Of men who will affect at any rate to
despise the legal profession. l know not
how it is in other countries. but l have
had long and wide acquaintance with men
of that profession. / have found them in
all my parishes. 1 tarried in one of their
offices for three years. where there came
real estate lawyers. insurance lawyers.
criminal lawyers, and l have yet to find
q class of men more genial or more
straightforward. There are in that &C
Cupation, as in all our occupations. men
utterly obnoxious to God and man. but If
1 were on trial for my integrity or my life
and | wanted even handed justice admin-
iStered to me I would rather have my
case submitted to q jury of twelve law
yerS than TO a jury of twelve cIergymen.
TT - - H. - 10