This letter from Chief Justice John Marshall to Judge James Gould is in reference to Gould's 1832 book, "A Treatise on the Principles of Pleading in Civil Actions." Marshall wrote, "I have now read it through with advantage to my self, and with some surprise at finding that a subject which has employed so many pens should still admit of being presented in a form that may make the book an acquisition certainly to the law student, and indeed to the profession. You have well arranged the matter belonging to the subject; and have succeeded in your desire of presenting it as a system of consistent and rational principles, adopted with the utmost precision to the administration of justice, according to uniform rules."