Such a character necessarily confers authority among men, and that Mr. Chase was ready, on all occasions arising, to assert his high principles by comporting action was never left in doubt. Whether by interposing his strong arm to save Mr. Birney from the fury of a mob of Cincinnati gentlemen, incensed at the freedom of his press in its defiance of slavery; or by his bold and constant maintenance in the courts of the cause of fugitive slaves in the face of the resentments of the public opinion of the day; or by his fearless desertion of all reigning politics to lead a feeble band of protestants through the wilderness of anti-slavery wanderings, its pillar of cloud by day, its pillar of fire by night; or as Governor of Ohio facing the intimidations of the slave States, backed by Federal power and a storm of popular passion; or in consolidating the triumphant politics on the urgent issue which was to flame out into rebellion and revolt; or in his serene predominance, during the trial of the President, over the rage of party hate which brought into peril the cooerdination of the great departments of Government, and threatened its whole frame--in all these marked instances of public duty, as in the simple routine of his ordinary conduct, Mr. Chase asked but one question to determine his course of action, "Is it right?" If it were, he had strength, and will, and courage to carry him through with it. In the ten years of professional life which followed his admission to the bar, Mr. Chase established a repute for ability, integrity, elevation of purpose and capacity for labor, which would have surely brought him the highest rewards of forensic prosperity and distinction, and in due course, of eminent judicial station. In this quieter part of his life, as in his public career, it is noticeable that his employments were never common-place, but savored of a public zest and interest. His compilation of the Ohio Statutes was a _magnum opus_, indeed, for the leisure hours of a young lawyer, and possesses a permanent value, justifying the assurance Chancellor Kent gave him, that this surprising labor would find its "reward in the good he had done, in the talents he had shown, and in the gratitude of his profession." But this quiet was soon broken, never to be resumed, and though the great office of Chief-Justice was in store for him, it was to be reached by the path of statesmanship and not of jurisprudence.