p. 134 | A Novel Plea

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Sep 20, 1864

A Novel Plea.

A JUDGE relates the following incident that occurred in his practice: He was trying a petty case, in which one of the parties was not able to pay counsel fees, and undertook to plead his own cause. But he found, in the course of the trial, that the keen and adroit attorney who managed the case for the other party was too much for him in legal strategy, evidently making the worse appear the better cause.

The poor man Mr. A., was in a state of mind bordering upon desperation, when the opposing counsel closed his plea, and the case was about to be submitted to the justice for decision.

"May it please your honor," said the man, "may I pray?"

The judge was taken somewhat by surprise, and could only say he saw no objection. Whereupon Mr. A. went down upon his knees, and made a fervent prayer, in which he laid the merits of his case before the Lord in a very clear and methodical statement of all the particulars, pleading that right and justice might prevail. "O Lord, thou knowest that this lawyer has misrepresented the facts, and thou knowest that it is so and so"—to end of the chapter.

Arguments which he could not present in logical array to the understanding of men, he had no difficulty addressing to the Lord, being evidently better versed in praying than pettifogging.

When he rose from his knees, Esquire W., the opposing counsel, very much exasperated by the turn which the case had taken, said:

"Mr. Justice, does not the closing argument belong to me?"

To which the judge replied: "You can close with prayer if you please!"

Esq. W. was in the habit of praying at home, but not seeing the propriety of connecting his prayer with his practice, wisely forbore, leaving poor Mr. A. to win his case, as he did, by his novel mode of presenting it.