lecture. In this way the advantages of the lecture system may be preserved, while to them are added the aids derived from the use of the text-books.
It must be admitted that a serious drawback to instruction by means of text-books, is the nature of the books themselves. As usually prepared for practitioners they give slight, if any, attention to elementary principles, and elaborate with painful minuteness the various questions of fact which have been the subject of reference or adjudication in particular cases. The writer was told some years ago by an eminent law teacher, who had, in response to a question, made careful investigation, that nowhere in Kent's Commentaries is the distinction between Real Property and Personalty,—that in the absence of will the one descends to heirs while the other passes to an administrator,—clearly pointed out. As the text-book aims mainly to present the result of cases, it may easily happen that principles which are among the fundamentals of the law shall be but slightly noticed because too elementary to be elaborated in judicial opinions.
But it would be ungracious to find fault with the modern text-book. Considering the task before him, the writer of a reputable treatise does wonders and confers a blessing, the extent of which can hardly be appreciated, upon those for whom he labors; and even though he does not furnish an adequate guide to students in mastering the science of law, yet in the hands of a teacher who will make it an assistance and not a guide, such a book can be of great advantage. One of the things important for the student to learn is, how to use such treatises and how not to be misled by them. A familiarity acquired in school with a book, which will afterwards be kept on the office table as the best and most exhaustive modern work on the subject, will be found of great practical value.
The study of cases as a method of acquiring knowledge of law is not new, nor is it peculiar to any system. It is the theory of the common law that in this method, and this method only, are its principles to be ascertained. And this theory is recognized fully in all plans of instruction. The lecturer gives references to leading cases; the text-writer supports almost every sentence by citations of authorities. The teacher would be deemed remiss, according to either method, if he did not encourage the reading of some of the cases thus referred to. But the peculiarity of what may perhaps be called the new method of teaching law by the study of cases, consists in making the cases themselves, the vehicle of instruction. In other words, the student reads the cases without having previous information as to the doctrine or rule to which they relate, and deduces for himself such doctrine or rule, and thus makes an original investigation, following theoretically the methods pursued by early students of the common law before there were lecturers or commentators, and which lecturers, text-writers, lawyers, and judges are still presumed to pursue in ascertaining what is the law.
In this method the student not only needs access to the authorities, but facilities must be provided by which all the students pursuing a particular topic may study within a very short period the same cases. The work of the instructor is, first, to prepare this list of cases, so selected and arranged that the student may draw from them the desired information; and secondly, to so conduct a discussion of them by the students as to leave a correct impression on the mind as a result of this reading and discussion. It is to be noticed that it is essential to the system that the student shall read the cases before he is told in any way what the principle is which is to be derived from them, and that the principle is to be derived by himself, with the aid of the discussion in the class. If the principle is formulated by the teacher beforehand, or even afterward as his own authoritative statement, the system has nothing peculiar or distinctive to entitle it to separate consideration.
That there are advantages in this method
