As lawyers’ place in society, and their status vis-à-vis their clients, have dropped, they have been driven to acquire more property
People claimed to aim to change the world, to exert some influence outside of the academy, when it was perfectly clear that their highest ambition was tenure
Mr Lester, don’t be embarrassed. You tell me why you and Mr Pannick are the only counsel in England who could adequately represent your clients at the hearing
a good 50% or more of admissions from the [public] school to Oxbridge were (a) either not very clever at all, and simply moulded by an expensive education into something half-way presentable
non poenae nocentium cupidus, sed emendandi vitia corrigendique mores
you … end up regurgitating technical terms because you don’t have the confidence to put them into plain language
Invective is rare today, not that people are kinder, far from it, but that they are indifferent; possibly also, being less robust than our ancestors, we do not take invective in good part
neque vero pudor obstet, quo minus susceptam, cum melior videretur, litem cognita inter discendum iniquitate dimittat, cum prius litigatori dixerit verum
deals aren’t usually blown by principals; they’re blown by lawyers and accountants trying to prove how valuable they are
The educational system depended, for the serious, primarily on private reading, and what you read was not snippets, but whole cases, and whole books, and a small number of whole articles