t with destruction, is due in a
considerable degree to the circumstance that it found in Daniel Webster
its poet as well as its "expounder."

In conclusion it may be said that the style of Webster is pre-eminently
distinguished by manliness. Nothing little, weak, whining, or
sentimental can be detected in any page of the six volumes of his works.
A certain strength and grandeur of personality is prominent in all his
speeches. When he says "I," or "my," he never appears to indulge in the
bravado of self-assertion, because the words are felt to express a
positive, stalwart, almost colossal manhood, which had already been
implied in the close-knit sentences in which he embodied his statements
and arguments. He is an eminent instance of the power which character
communicates to style. Though evidently proud, self-respecting, and
high-spirited, he is ever above mere vanity and egotism. Whenever he
gives emphasis to the personal pronoun the reader feels that he had as
much earned the right to make his opinion an authority, as he had earned
the right to use the words he employs to express his ideas and
sentiments. Thus, in the celebrated _Smith Will_ trial, his antagonist,
Mr. Choate, quoted a decision of Lord Chancellor Camden. In his reply,
Webster argued against its validity as though it were merely a
proposition laid down by Mr. Choate. "But it is not mine, it is Lord
Camden's" was the instant retort. Webster paused for half a minute, and
then, with his eye fixed on the presiding judge, he replied: "Lord
Camden was a great judge; he is respected by every American, for he was
on our side in the Revolution; but, may it please your honor, _I_ differ
from my Lord Camden." There was hardly a lawyer in the United States who
could have made such a statement without exposing himself to ridicule;
but it did not seem at all ridiculous, when the "I" stood for Daniel
Webster. In his early career as a lawyer, his mode of reasoning was such
as to make him practically a thirteenth juror in the panel; when his
fame was fully established, he contrived, in some mysterious way, to
seat himself by the side of the judges on the bench, and appear to be
consulting with them as a jurist, rather than addressing them as an
advocate. The personality of the man was always suppressed until there
seemed to be need of asserting it; and then it was proudly pushed into
prominence, though rarely passing beyond the limits which his
acknowledged eminence as