The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-06-11

! argument in the case of Akroyd VS.
Smithson, and defy you, or any mar
| in England, to answer it. 1 won't
| hear you
This is an apotheosis during life. and
should fill the hearts of men conse-
| Grated to the law with fruitful aspira-
| tons. Many splendid qualities have
| adorned the Bar in all ages. A sound
lawyer, for example, never encourages,
strife. Cicero objected to law suitTR
when they could be avoided. Horas
Greeley went further and proteste<
against lawyers. The wise and tenn
| perate Lincoln advised a class of
graduates never to stir up litigation. -
Great counsellors and advocates in all
ages have enforced the same rule. In.
Gilbert Abbott A Beckett's synopsis
of Blackstone, this passage occurs:
Man, as We are all aware is
creature endowed with reason and free
will; but, when he goes to law as
plaintiff, his reason seems to have de-
serted him; while, if he stands in the
position of defendant, it is generally
against his will" The same author,
in somewhat intimate connection with
this extract, observes that judges
make the law by saying what it
means; which, as it scarcely ever
means what it says, opens the door to-
much variety" There is more than
a half truth in the witticism. for de-
cisions, text books and encyclopedias,
have multiplied until there is scarcely
a legal proposition in existence that,
as applied to varying facts. cannot be
either proved or disproved. and the
time is not remote when cases will be
settled by trained judges, without the
off Of ncfv nd
precedents.
Lord Camden who, after eight or
nine unsuccessful years. was FORUM
ately though accidentally frustrated in
his intention to quit the Bar, framed
this advice, as a parting salute to his
contemporaries. whom he afterwards
easily surpassed:
Lawyer attend to me. and I'll un--
fold
How brass and silver shall make
sterling gold; =
My nostrum shall all alchemy sur
pass
If your tongues silver and your fore
head brass"
In the Twentieth Century, there are
silvery tongues and a few brazen fore
heads, but that form of alchemy will
not bear intelligent public scrutiny. A
lawyer must now be versed in funda-
mental principles, in substantial tech
nical rules, and in the exact doctrines,
comparatively few in number which
are susceptible of prompt and accu-
rate application. He must also re-
aiize that his professional success de-
ponds no longer upon isolation and
abstract meditation, but upon contact
with and knowledge of the great de-
partments of business. He must fur
Their possess the faculty of mediation,
the diplomatic tact that leads to set
Elements. The Bar has ever stood for
the enforcement of rights, for the re-
dress of wrongs for the assertion and
the supremacy of liberty. 1t has held
a great, perhaps the greatest. position
in history, for it has been the arena
from which have sprung the immortal
judicial minds, guided by instructed
consciences, which have restrained the
aggressions of barbarism and have
moulded the law, constitutional. sat
utory and customary, to the necessi-
ties and the progress of civilization.
in all it's aspects, material, intelectual
and moral But the system. to some
extent the functions, of the Bar had
changed with the times, and, though
rooted in antiquity and held within
the grasp of eternal truth, it is passing
through the process of adaptation. The
days of bucolic oratory are over. The
resounding tones of the local repre-
sentatives of village sentiment, as they
endlessly repeated the swelling plati-
tudes, once so necessary to human
protection, have ceased to possess even
a transitory interest. The KEEN
shrewd, vigilant. terse. broad and
trained lawyer of the epoch is, per-
haps less attractive, but far more ef-
fective than his prototype, and the
Bar, composed of such men, exerts q
wider and a more commanding infu-
ence in human affairs.
The day of great combinations, OF
vast systems of co-ordinated but sep
arate departments, has arrived and is
TO endure. There is no leisure for the
petty feuds, the strife over the scrap
ings Of bones, the neighborhoOd per-
sonalities, in which many celebrates
lawsuits have originated. Mankind is
approaching cosmopolitanism. Life is
an affair of compromise and develop
ment. The heaviest law firms try few
cases. The grandest and most far
reaching products of legal skill come
from labor in the office and manage
ment among men. Contracts are more
frequent than declarations and trusts
more complete than Chancery plead
ings. The need of learning has not
abated, but the legal faculty has De-
come the cementing element in organl-
cation. It will not be long before LORD
Hardwicke's definition Of fee in lana
will be multiplied in a series of brief
texts that will express the ultimate
outcome of the law.
He that holdeth his lands in fee
CONTINUED on page 3D.