That Lincoln was a skilled lawyer is well known. It is not, however,
generally known that he learned law himself, never having studied
with anyone, or having attended any law school. He was preëminently
a self-educated man. He borrowed law books of his friend Stuart, of
Springfield, Ill., took them home (twenty miles away) and studied them
hard. He walked all the way to Springfield and back, and usually read
while walking. He often read aloud during these trips. Twenty years
afterward, while he was a great lawyer and statesman, he gave this advice
to a young man who asked him “how he could become a great lawyer.” “Get
books, and read and study them carefully. Begin with Blackstone’s
‘Commentaries,’ and after reading carefully through, say twice, take up
Chitty’s ‘Pleadings,’ Greenleaf’s ‘Evidence,’ and Story’s ‘Equity,’ in
succession. Work, work, work is the main thing.”