It did not impress lawyers quite so favorably, and we find Judge Story writing to Chancellor Kent that "Webster did his best for the other side, but it seems to me altogether an address to the prejudices of the clergy." The subject, in certain ways, had a deep attraction for Mr.
Webster.

His imagination was excited by the splendid history of the Church, and his conservatism was deeply stirred by a system which, whether in the guise of the Romish hierarchy, as the Church of England, or in the form of powerful dissenting sects, was, as a whole, imposing by its age, its influence, and its moral grandeur.

Moreover, it was one of the great established bulwarks of well-ordered and civilized society.

All this appealed strongly to Mr.Webster, and he made the most of his opportunity and of his shrewdly-chosen ground.

Yet the speech on the Girard will is not one of his best efforts.