He might and probably would have discovered it for himself, but his instinct was to get it from some one else.
It is one of the familiar attributes of great intellectual power to be able to select subordinates wisely; to use other people and other people's labor and thought to the best advantage, and to have as much as possible done for one by others.

This power of assimilation Mr.Webster had to a marked degree.

There is no depreciation in saying that he took much from others, for it is a capacity characteristic of the strongest minds, and so long as the debt is acknowledged, such a faculty is a subject for praise, not criticism.

But when the recipient becomes unwilling to admit the obligation which is no detraction to himself, and without which the giver is poor indeed, the case is altered.

In his earliest days Mr.Webster used to draw on one Parker Noyes, a mousing, learned New Hampshire lawyer, and freely acknowledged the debt.