To these belong the most intricate and difficult questions in the science of law. In introducing you to the study of these, let me say, in the language of one from whom I am proud to quote, that, "I cannot flatter you with the assurance that 'your yoke is easy and your burden light.' I will not tell you that your path leads over gentle ascents and through flowery meads, where every new object entices us forward, and stimulates to perseverance. By no means! The task you have undertaken is one of the most arduous; the profession you have chosen one of the most laborious; the study you are about to pursue, one of the most difficult that can be conceived. But you have made your election. You have severed yourselves from the common herd of youth, who shrink from every thing that demands exertion and perseverance. You have chosen between the allurements of pleasure and the honors which await the disciples of wisdom. You yield to others to keep the noiseless tenor of their way in inglorious ease. You have elected for yourselves the path that philosophers and moralists represent as leading, up a rugged ascent, to the temple of fame. It may be the lot of some of you to elevate yourselves by talents and unabating zeal, in the pursuit you have selected. But these distinguished honors are not to be borne away by the slothful and inert. _Nulla palma sine pulvere_. He who would win the laurel, must encounter the sweat and toil of the _arena_. Nor will it suffice that he _occasionally_ presses on to the goal. If he slackens in his efforts he must lose ground. We roll a Sisyphean stone to an exalted eminence. He who gives back loses what his strength had gained; and sinking under the toil his own indolence increases, will at length give up his unsteady efforts in despair."--1. T. C. Introduction, p. vi.