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AN UNPUBLISHED LETTER OF CHANCELLOR JAMES KENT.1 This letter was recently found in the Old Capitol at Jackson, Miss. There is no record showing how it got there. The Thomas Wash ington to whom it is addressed was a lawyer of some note who lived at Nashville, Tenn.—ED.
NEW YORK, October 6th, 1828. DEAR SIR: Your very kind & friendly letter of the 1 5th ult. was duly received, and also your argument in the Case of Ivey vs. Pinson. I have read the Pamphlet with much interest & pleasure. It is composed with masterly ability, of this there can be no doubt, & without presuming to give any opinion on a great case, still Sub Judice, & only argued before me on one side, I beg leave to ex press my highest respect for the law reason ing & doctrine of the argument, & my admiration of the spirit, & eloquence which animate it. My attention was very much fixed on the perusal, & if there be any law yer in this State who can write a better argument in any point of view I have not the honor of his acquaintance. As to the rest of your letter concerning my life & studies, I hardly know what to say, or to do. Your letter & argument, & character & name have impressed me so favorably, that I feel every disposition to oblige you, if it be not too much at my own expense. My attainments are of too ordi nary a character, & far too limited, justly to provoke such curiosity. I have had nothing more to aid me in all my life than plain method, prudence, temperance & steady persevering diligence. My diligence was more remarkable for being steady & uniform, than for the degree of it, which never was excessive, so as to impair my health or eyes, or prevent all kinds of innocent & lively recreation. I would now venture to state briefly but very frankly & at your special desire, somewhat of the course & progress of my studious life. I know you cannot but smile at times at my simplicity, but I commit myself to your indulgence & honor. 1 Copyright, 1897, by George Edward Kent. All rights reserved.
I was educated at Yale College & gradu ated in 1781. I stood as well as any in my class, but the test of scholarship at that day was contemptible. I was only a very in ferior classical scholar, & we were not re quired, & to this day I have never looked into a Greek book but the New Testament. My favorite studies were Geography, History, Poetry, bellesletter, &c. When the College was broken up & dispersed in July 1779 by the British, I retired to a country village & finding Blackstone's com. I read the 4th volume, parts of the work struck my taste, & the work inspired me at the age of 16 with awe, and I fondly determined to be a lawyer. In November 1781 I was placed by my father with Mr. (now called Judge) Benson, who was then attorney general at Poughkeepsie on the banks of the Hudson, & in my native County of Dutchess. There I entered on law, & was the most modest, steady, industrious student that such a place ever saw. I read the following winter Grotius 6" Puffcndorf in huge folios, & made copious extracts. My fellow students who were more gay and gallant, thought me very odd and dull in my taste, but out of five of them four died in middle life drunkards. I was free from all dissipation, and chaste as pure virgin snow. I had never danced, or played cards, or sported with a gun, or drank anything but water. In 1782 I read Smollcts history of England, & procured at a farmers house where I boarded, Rapins History (a huge folio) and read it through; and I found during the course of the last summer among my papers, my M. S. abridgment on Rapins dissertation on the laws and customs of the Anglo Saxons. I abridged Hales history of the common law, and the old books of prac tice, and read parts of Blackstone again & again. The same year I procured Humes
