The weekly intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1891-1901, 1897-07-03

answer in an hour. Blessed is that at
torney between whose office and the
throne of God there is perpetual ever
entail and prayerful communication.
That attorney will never make an ir-
reparable mistake. True to the habits
of your profession, you say, Cite us
some authority on the subject" Well,
/ quote to you the decision of the Su-
preme Court of Heaven: 'If any lack
wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth
to all men literally, and upbraideth
not, and it shall be given him."
What a scene is the office of a busy
attorney! In addition to the men who
come to you from right motives, bad
men will come to you. They will offer
you q large fee for counsel in the wrong
direction. They want to know from
you how they can escape from solemn
marital obligation. They come to you
wanting to know how they can fail
advantageously for themselves They
come to you wanting to know how
they can make the insurance company
pay for a destroyed house which they
burned down with their own hands.
Or they come to you on the simple err
rand of wanting to escape payment of
their honest debts. Now, it is no easy
thing to advise settlement, when by
urging litigation you could strike a
mine Of remuneration. 1t is not a
very easy thing to dampen the ardor
of an infiamed contestant, when you
know through prolonged lawsuit you
could get from him whatever you
asked. tits no easy thing to attempt to
discourage the suit for the breaking of
a will in the surrogate's court because
you know the testator was of sound
mind and body when he signed the
document. 1t requires no small hero
ism to do as l once heard an attorney
do in an Office in a western city. l
overheard the conversation, when he
said: John, you can go on with this
lawsuit, and ! will see you through as
well as 1 can; but 1 want to tell you
before you start, that a lawsuit is
equal to a fire." Under the tremen-
dous temptations hat come upon the
legal profession, there are scores of
men who have rome down, and some of
them from being the pride of the high
est tribunal OF the state, have become
a disgrace to the Tombs court room
Every attorney, in addition to the in
nate sense of right. wants the sustain
ing power of the old~-fashiOned religion
VI jesus ShTlob- DIiuB LchuS LHe
lawyer"
There are two or three forms of
temptation to which the legal profess
sion is especially subject. The first of
all is skepticism. Controversy is the
lifetime business of that occupation.
Controversy may be incidental or acct
dental with us; but with you it is per-
petual. You get SO used to pushing
the sharp question "Why?" and making
unaided a superior to the emotions
that the religion of Jesus Christ, which
Is a simple matter of faith and above
human reason, although not contrary
TO it, has but little chance with some
of you. A brilliant orator wrote Il
book, on the first page of which he an
nOunced this sentiment: IAN honest
god is the noblest work of man. Skep-
ticism is the mightiest temptation of
h legal profession, and that man who
a stand in that profession, resisting
all solicitations to infidelity, and can
be as brave as George Briggs, of Mas
sachusetts, who stepped from the gu
bernatorial chair to the missionary
convention to plead the cause of a
dying race; then on his way home from
the convention, on a cold day, tool off
his warm cloak and threw it over the
shoulders of a thinly-clad missionary,
saying: Take that and wear it, it
will do YOU more good than ii. will