I was admitted to the bar in the fall of 1850. Under the laws of Michigan at that time, admission to the bar was not necessary to practice law in that State, but it was the usual and dignified course. The class seeking admission was quite a large one; most of them, in fact all of them save myself, were old lawyers seeking admission in the regular and time-sanctified order. An afternoon was given by Judge Wing, who presided, for the hearing of the petition of the applicants. The Judge and the Bar were the examiners. They all took a free hand. I thought I could discover a disposition on the part of the Judge and the Bar to put the old practitioners, whose knowledge of elementary principles had been somewhat dimmed by the lapse of years, at a disadvantage as compared with the accuracy of a young man fresh from the books. Hence, many questions were rushed to me for a full and accurate statement of the text-books, which in most cases I was able to give, to the manifest pleasure of the examiners. We were all admitted. In anticipation of so propitious a result, we had provided a banquet for Bench and Bar. At its conclusion the Judge said, "a motion for a new trial would be in order, and if such motion was made he would take it under advisement till the next term of the court, when he had but little doubt that it would be granted." After my admission to the Bar I diligently continued my legal studies, confining myself, however, almost exclusively to American Reports and authors, such as Kent's Commentaries; Story on the Constitution, on Equity Jurisprudence and Pleadings; Greenlief on Evidence; Gould on the Form and the Logic of Pleadings; Bishop on Criminal Law; and many others. I have continued this extensive reading during all of my professional career when books were at hand. Looking back from a standpoint of eighty years' time, I am satisfied that I have read too much, and reflected, reasoned, analyzed, generalized and thoroughly digested too little. I often think of the saying of Locke, the philosopher, that if he had read as much as other men he would have known as little as they. There is much truth in this statement. To read without thought, without reflection, without analysis and a thorough digest of what one reads, is a waste of time. More, it weakens the memory, does not accumulate knowledge, and incapacitates the mind for serious work. While I have no admiration for a correctly-styled "case lawyer," yet, were I to live my professional career over again, I would get my legal principles from a small but well-selected library of authors of established repute; and then I would consult leading cases on each topic or subject, as a help for their proper and logical application. The practice of law consists in the application of a well-defined legal principle to a certain combination of facts. Whether the principle applies is a question for the courts; whether the facts that enter into the definition exist is a question for the jury. But, as