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Gentlemen of the School of Law,
The profession, upon the study of
which you are about to enter, exerts...
so decided an influence upon Society,
as justly, to attract the attentive regard of the
philosophic spectator, not less than that preferences
of the ambitions aspirant.

In all countries where freedom,
or even the forms, prevail, the lawyer is a charact-
ter of weight and importance in the body politic.
His functions intend
ed, not merely to the administration of private justice, but
indirectly embraces, also , the care and protection
of the civil rights of the community. The body
of lawyers in England, and in the States of this
Confederacy, constitute an important barrier as
against the encroachments of power,
[row crossed out]
and firmly and systematically
maintains the ancient land-marks of Constitution--
al liberty. They alone, as a class, are accostumed
to reason of the principles of rational freedom
tempered by those indispensable restraints
upon which depend the peace and good
order of society; and they best comprehend
what is sufficient to control the vicious propensi-
ties of mankind, and what is wanton, useless,
and odious invasion of there rights. Hence it
is that lawyers in America and England have gen-
erally been the most astute to perceive and by no
means the last to resist the aggressions of power
Rendered averse, by professional training, to the inc-
cise of arbitrary authority, and by habit inured to respect
and support a government of laws, they have been
safe guides amid the pitiless storms of