‘What a hypocrite I am!’ he exclaimed;—‘following a profession in which I must often, if I have any practice at all, defend what I know to be wrong, and seek to turn justice from its natural course.’
‘But you can’t always know that your judgment is right, even if it should be against your client. I heard an eminent barrister say once that he had come out of the court convinced by the arguments of the opposite counsel.’
‘And having gained the case?’
‘That I don’t know.’
‘He went in believing his own side anyhow, and that made it all right for him.’
‘I don’t know that either. His private judgment was altered, but whether it was for or against his client, I do not remember. The fact, however, shows that one might do a great wrong by refusing a client whom he judged in the wrong.’
‘On the contrary, to refuse a brief on such grounds would be best for all concerned. Not believing in it, you could not do your best, and might be preventing one who would believe in it from taking it up.’
‘The man might not get anybody to take it up.’
‘Then there would be little reason to expect that a jury charged under ordinary circumstances would give a verdict in his favour.’
‘But it would be for the barristers to constitute themselves the judges.’