that his sister-in-law, Mrs. Joseph Knapp, was the niece of Captain
White, that by removing and destroying the will of Captain White the
defendant and his brother Joseph supposed that they had made sure that
she would inherit from him a large sum of money, that Richard
Crowninshield, the actual perpetrator of the murder, had killed himself
in prison. To convince the jury of the guilt of the prisoner, Webster
had to carry them with him on the following seven main issues:

Gentlemen, I have gone through with the evidence in this case, and
have endeavored to state it plainly and fairly before you. I think
there are conclusions to be drawn from it, the accuracy of which you
cannot doubt.

I think you cannot doubt that there was a conspiracy formed fur the
purpose of committing this murder, and who the conspirators were:

That you cannot doubt that the Crowninshields and the Knapps were
the parties in this conspiracy:

That you cannot doubt that the prisoner at the bar knew that the
murder was to be done on the night of the 6th of April:

That you cannot doubt that the murderers of Captain White were the
suspicious persons seen in and about Brown Street on that night:

That you cannot doubt that Richard Crowninshield was the perpetrator
of that crime:

That you cannot doubt that the prisoner at the bar was in Brown
Street on that night.

If there, then it must be by agreement, to countenance, to aid the
perpetrator. And if so, then he is guilty as "Principal."

Similarly, in most arguments of policy there are a number of
considerations that converge in favor of or against the proposed policy.
If you were writing an argument in favor of keeping the study of Latin
in the commercial course of a high school, you would probably urge that
Latin is essential for an effective knowledge of English, that it is the
foundation of Spanish and French, languages which will be of constantly
increasing importance to American business men in the future, and that
young men and women who go into business have an even stronger right to
studies which will enlarge their horizons and open their minds to purely
cultivating influences than those who go on to college. Indeed, in very
few questions of policy which are doubtful enough to need argument is
there any single consideration on which the whole case will turn. Human
affairs are much complicated by cross interests