reatest qualities of advocacy--and beheld it
triumphing over every imaginable kind end degree of obstacle end
difficulty. He showed them how to maintain the bearing of gentlemen, in
the moments of hottest exasperation and provocation which can arise in
forensic warfare. He taught them how to look on success undazzled--to
bear it with modesty of demeanour, and subordination of spirit. He
exhibited to them the inestimable value of early acquiring accurate and
extensive local knowledge--of being thoroughly imbued with the
_principles_ of jurisprudence, and habituating the mind to close and
correct reasoning. The traces of his surpassing excellence in these
matters, are now to be found nowhere but in the volumes of Law Reports,
where the essence of his innumerable masterly arguments will be found
collected and preserved by gentlemen of patient attention and learning
competent for the task, and on whose modest but valuable labours will
hereafter depend all that posterity will know of Sir William Follett.
These are the legitimate records of his intellectual triumph; as are the
prosperous circumstances in which he has left his family, _to them_ a
solid and noble testimonial of his affectionate devotion to their
interests. Their fortune was the purchase of his life's blood. The
acquisition of that fortune absorbed the whole of his time, and of his
energies; it deprived him of thousands of opportunities for relaxation
and enjoyment, and also--it must be added--for the exercise of virtues
which probably he possessed, but gave himself little or no time for
calling into action--of those virtues which elevate and adorn the
individual, while they benefit our fellow-creatures and society--for
performing the duties which God Almighty has imposed upon his creatures,
proportionately to their endowments and opportunities, himself telling
us, that _to whom much is given, of him shall much be required_. To the
young, eager, and ambitious lawyer, the contemplation of Sir William
Follett's career is fraught with instruction. It will teach him the
necessity of _moderation_, in the pursuit of the distinctions and
emoluments of his profession. By grasping at too much often every thing
is lost. Was not Sir William Follett's life one uninterrupted scene of
splendid slavery, the pressure of which at length broke him down in the
meridian of his days? Had he been able to resist the very strong
temptations by which he was assailed--temptations, too, app