Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/38



began his legal studies in June, 1818. He was then in his twenty-fifth year. Experience and observation had enriched his mind. In the national struggle just closed he had gained a hero's name. With the hardships of the school of the soldiers he had become thoroughly conversant. Artificial life had exhibited to him its chill and deceit. From the wild sons of the forest he had received lessons nowhere else imparted. His pay in the army had been inadequate to meet his necessities while wandering to recover his health. He began the study of law burdened by a load of debt, to liquidate which he sold his last piece of property, and paid its avails to meet these debts. The balance of debts still unpaid, amounting to some hundreds of dollars, he soon after discharged. Under such circumstances Sam Houston, the soldier of fortune, the child of destiny, commenced his studies.

When he entered the office of his law preceptor, Hon. James Trimble, at Nashville, he was informed that it would require eighteen months of hard study to secure a license to practice at the bar. He read thoroughly a few of the standard works prescribed in a course of legal studies. The principles of the science were grasped and tenaciously fixed in his mind. His original cast of mind relied on the fundamental principles of truth, not on its details. Axioms not requiring proof, causes clearly effective, effects undoubtedly linked to causes, principles clear as sunlight took possession of his great mind, and were more effective in securing his conclusions and inducing conclusions with others than a full library of precedents and authorities. He was not, therefore, a learned student in the sense of taxing his memory with mere legal opinions, but he was a profound thinker on law principles.

His preceptor had prescribed eighteen months' study. He was recommended to apply for a license to practice in one-third of the time. He passed a searching examination most honorably to himself and the profession of the law, after six months' study. Purchasing a small library on credit, he opened a law office in Lebanon,