All the while, amid so many distractions, Lincoln was seeking a livelihood at the bar.  On April 14, 1841, a good step was taken by dissolving the partnership with Stuart and the establishment of a new partnership with Stephen T. Logan, lately judge of the Circuit Court of the United States, and whom Arnold calls “the head of the bar at the capital.”  This gentleman, though not averse to politics, was a close student, assiduous in his attention to business, and very accurate and methodical in his ways.  Thus he furnished a shining example of precisely the qualities which Lincoln had most need to cultivate, and his influence upon Lincoln was marked and beneficial.  They continued together until September 20, 1843, when they separated, and on the same day Lincoln, heretofore a junior, became the senior in a new partnership with William H. Herndon.  This firm was never formally dissolved up to the day of Lincoln’s death.

When Lincoln was admitted to the bar the practice of the law was in a very crude condition in Illinois.  General principles gathered from a few text-books formed the simple basis upon which lawyers tried cases and framed arguments in improvised court-rooms.  But the advance was rapid and carried Lincoln forward with it.  The raw material, if the phrase may be pardoned, was excellent; there were many men in the State who united a natural aptitude for the profession with high ability, ambition, and a progressive spirit.  Lincoln was brought in contact with them all, whether they rode his circuit or not, because the federal courts were held only in Springfield.  Among them were Stephen A. Douglas, Lyman Trumbull, afterward for a long while chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the national Senate, David Davis, afterward a senator, and an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States; O.H.  Browning, Ninian W. Edwards, Edward D. Baker, Justin Butterfield, Judge Logan, and more.  Precisely what position Lincoln occupied among these men it is difficult to say with accuracy, because it is impossible to know just how much of the praise which has been bestowed upon him is the language of eulogy or of the brotherly courtesy of the bar, and how much is a discriminating valuation of his qualities.  That in the foregoing list there were better and greater lawyers than he is unquestionable; that he was primarily a politician and only secondarily a lawyer is equally beyond denial.  He has been described also as “a case lawyer,” that is to say, a lawyer who studies each case as it comes to him simply by and for itself, a method which makes the practitioner rather than the jurist.  That Lincoln was ever learned in the science is hardly pretended.  In fact it was not possible that the divided allegiance which he gave to his profession for a score of years could have achieved such a result.[50] But it is said, and the well-known manner of his mental operations makes it easy to believe, that his arguments had a marvelous simplicity and clearness, alike in