"Under these circumstances I beg leave to say to your hearers as if upon that occasion some part of what I should say if present. "I think there can be no doubt that all the grounds of the discrimination contemplated against Mr. Sage, as compared with the other persons charged with having received more than seven per cent. for the use of money--as those grounds are reported in the public journals--are erroneous in point of fact. "The principal ground is the supposed participation of Mr. Sage in the locking up of greenbacks. This allegation is denied in the most positive and comprehensive manner by an affidavit of Mr. Sage. That denial is corroborated by affidavits of one or more persons most intimately acquainted [with] his affairs. I find no difficulty in giving full credence to these denials from my own knowledge of Mr. Sage, his methods and habits of business, his transactions and investments. They are all incompatible with his being engaged in any such scheme. I have known him well for years. He is about the last man to enter into any combination which would limit the freedom of his individual and personal action. He is not a lender of money as a business or otherwise than of his temporary balances. His interests are all in favor of elevating rather than of depressing stocks, in which the bulk of his property is invested. It would not need the affirmative proof which is offered to make me totally discredit the representation that he was or could be involved in a combination of the character and objects imputed to him. Mr. Sage is a man of rare ability, energy, and enterprise; and his use of these powers is all in the way of building up, constructing, developing. I am satisfied that there is not the slightest ground for imputing to Mr. Sage anything beyond the mere fact of receiving more than seven per cent. for the use of money. I hope that you will consider it consistent with your duty to confine your sentence to the fine which you have applied to the other cases of the same character; and I am sure the judgment of the bar and of the entire community will sanction such a disposition of the case. "It is not necessary, in my view of the matter, to discuss the statute of 1837. It was peculiar in two respects: that it reversed the equity rule which had prevailed always before in this State and in England, that in cases of usury 'he who seeks equity must do equity'; and that it added to the forfeiture at law of the money loaned a criminal penalty. I remember it in its origin, its authorship, and the circumstances under which it came into being. It was then deemed an extravagant and barbarous law. I have never known its criminal feature enforced until now. I presume that nearly all the community, as well as Mr. Sage, were ignorant of the existence of a feature so anomalous in all jurisprudence.