Word: mental
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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...Process of Mental Toughening...
Most college men, I suppose, visualize the study of the law either as a matter of memorizing legal forms or of learning the circumlocutions of dry logic. It is neither and far more difficult than both. It is a process of strenuous mental toughening, not unlike the process of toughening one's muscles, and strengthening one's wind and endurance for the supreme test of the "big game" or the "big race" which the college athlete endures. Learning the law is learning a method of attack and training the intellectual muscles until they are tough as whip cord, spring with...
...cases from the law reports. The class room work consists first of a statement of the case by the student and then of an open discussion of the principles involved by the Socratic method of question and answer in which the teacher seeks to put the student through the mental processes by which decisions are come at, rules laid down and principles developed. The test of efficiency comprises a four-hour examination of ten questions for each full year course. These questions are nearly always concrete cases, not infrequently taken from the reports, to which the student is required...
Three years of this and the successful student is equipped with the technical assets requisite to admission to the practice of the law in any state in the Union, and the tough mindedness and mental stamina to enable him to deal successfully with the myriad of intricate questions constantly confronting the practicing attorney...
...lawyers spend their time addressing juries or arguing before appellate tribunals. In fact the most remunerative branches of practice may be conducted without putting foot in court room. In the law as elsewhere the most successful qualities are honesty of thought and purpose and imperviousness to mental and physical fatigue...