provement, with which the youth goes to college, and the chance of his meeting society calculated to keep his good resolutions in countenance, are the chief points to be desired ; compared with these, the difference between one college and another is of less importance than is usually imagined. It often happens that young men, who have formed friendships at school, are anxious to continue these connexions at the university, and are urgently desirous to go to the same college, to which their favourite school-fellows are sent. Here a parent's prudence may be exercised with advantage. It will not be difficult for him to inform himself concerning the dispositions of his son's school friends; if they are of honourable characters, and disposed to industry and application, a father will do wisely to comply with his son's desire, even if it do not suit his own convenience in other respects: for the single circumstance of his son's having a well-disposed, well-informed friend early in life, may decide a young man's fortune and charactèr. If, on the contrary, a father should upon inquiry discover, that his son's favourite companions at school have not been well chosen, here will be a fit occasion for a parent to interpose his authority, and, by refusing to send his son to a university where he will meet these companions, he may break off connexions, which would hazard his son's happiness, and perhaps shackle him through life.

At whatever university he may be placed, it should be a student's object to lay a foundation for all literature and science: to acquire a general knowledge of the principles of jurisprudence, and to distinguish himself by his public exercises. The distinguishing himself by his public exercises will

not be a mere matter of momentary triumph, but of lasting advantage; because by this means he will acquire, among competitors of his own age, the reputation of having abilities and application: and this fame will spread before him at the bar, and prepare the way for him in his profession. But it is of far more consequence, that he should enlarge his real knowledge, than that he should display what he may have acquired; and it is of yet more importance, that he should strengthen the powers of his mind, the instruments by which his future fame and fortune are to be obtained. If he do not intend merely to be a chamber-counsel or a specialpleader, if he do not confine his ambition merely to shining on paper-days, he must cultivate literature as the means of acquiring eloquence. In treating of the education of gentlemen and statesmen, general observations on the means of forming orators have been thrown together. Those remarks are applicable to the present purpose; and prevent the necessity of digressing from what should be peculiarly a lawyer's education at the university.

After his professional studies commence, it will be impossible for a lawyer to spare much time for the cultivation of literature; and still less after he is called to the Bar, and when he comes into practice. Perhaps he may find means to add to what literature he has acquired, but he will never have leisure or patience to give that continuity of attention, which is requisite in learning the first rudiments of any species of

Chapter "On the Education of Country Gentlemen," and the ensuing Chapter, "On the Education of Men intended for Public Life."

knowledge which he has neglected to acquire in his youth. He will deplore such negligence during the active part of his life, when he finds himself inferior to his cultivated competitors in every cause, where general information and oratory are to be displayed; he will deplore his youthful negligence even in advanced age; when compelled to retire from the public bustle of the Bar, he will feel yet more the want of literature to amuse him in the stillness of private life, and to supply the cessation of that violent external excitement, to which he has been accustomed. For these reasons it must be urged with anxious, perhaps it may be thought tiresome pertinacity, that there is a peculiar necessity for a young lawyer's employing the college years of life in preparations for future success and happiness. This time once lost can never be recovered.

Nobody doubts, that there are parts of most college courses, which are useless in the business of the world, and ridiculous in the present state of society, but which gothic custom has retained. The common sense of mankind now duly appreciates the logic of the schools; and young men at college are now fully aware, that they need pay only that degree of attention to its pompous terms, and vain distinctions, which may enable them to answer examinations according to established forms. But we must separate the cumbersome and useless apparatus of scholastic logic from its serviceable rules and principles. It is peculiarly necessary for a lawyer to be expert at logic: he must know both its use and abuse, that he may reason accurately himself, and may expose the

See a letter of Sir William Jones on this subject.

sophistry of his opponents. He should know how to brandish his weapons as well as how to use them in actual combat. The disputes of lawyers frequently depend upon verbal distinctions, and upon the various and inaccurate significations annexed to general terms. Logic deals in subtle distinctions and technical niceties; and by its very artifices and paradoxes, it compels disputants to define their terms accurately, and to abide by their definitions. According to the different spirit, in which it is used, logic may either enable men to argue sophistically for victory, or instruct them to reason strictly and to discover truth. Wherever logical arguments bring people to absurd conclusions in words, it is certain, that the ideas annexed to these words are not used constantly in the same sense, or that the definitions acceded to are not exact or sufficient. This detection of errour or ignorance is the point, which lawyers must continually aim at in their debates.

All studies and exercises, which strengthen and quicken the powers of reasoning, must be advantageous to lawyers. For this purpose mathematics have been generally and judiciously recommended. Blackstone was particularly attentive to mathematical studies when he was at college, and he applied mathematics to architecture, in which he was skilled. This application of the abstract science to immediate practical use was additionally advantageous to his understanding. Mathematical studies, even when they are not applied to any other purpose, certainly discipline the attention, and give the habit of looking for accurate demonstration; but more must not be expected from them than they can bestow. As Lord Verulam observes, the mathematical part in some men's minds

is good, and the logical bad. Some can reason well of numbers and quantities, that cannot reason well in words; they cannot define the meaning of the terms, which they use in argument; and though they can judge and demonstrate accurately about lines and angles, they cannot estimate or compare moral or physical probabilities. This is quite a different art, and one to which mathematicians are in general averse; for having been accustomed to the strictness of demonstration, and the accuracy of mathematical definition, all other modes of argumentation appear weak, fallacious, and absurd. Hence Hence many great mathematicians have been utterly incapable of managing common worldly business. The strength of the passions of others, the caprice of the imagination, and the chances of regular or irregular associations of ideas, cannot all be reduced to exact calculations, or expressed in numbers, lines, and figures. Besides, mathematicians are used constantly to rely upon axioms or undeniable premises; but in human affairs, the great difficulty is, to ascertain the data; and mathematicians, from their scientific habits, are less accustomed than other men to examine the foundation of their knowledge. The observations hitherto made on the human mind, and on the course of moral events, have not been sufficient to afford many axioms, upon which we may reason as securely in moral and legal cases as we do in geometry. Yet the conduct of all human affairs depends much upon the power of estimating and balancing probabilities; and however imperfect our conclusions may, and, with our limited knowledge, must be, yet to such modes of arguing we are obliged to submit. To a lawyer, the art of reasoning in words is absolutely essential; and therefore the alternate or united exercises of logical and