Modern Eloquence.

Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z.

by Various.

THE TORCH OF CIVILIZATION

[Speech of Thomas Nelson Page at the twentieth annual dinner of the New England Society in the City of Brooklyn, December 21, 1899. The President, Frederic A. Ward, said: "In these days of blessed amity, when there is no longer a united South or a disunited North, when the boundary of the North is the St. Lawrence and the boundary of the South the Rio Grande, and Mason and Dixon's Line is forever blotted from the map of our beloved country, and the nation has grown color-blind to blue and gray, it is with peculiar pleasure that we welcome here to-night a distinguished and typical representative of that n.o.ble people who live in that part of the present North that used to be called Dixie, of whom he has himself so beautifully and so truly said, 'If they bore themselves haughtily in their hour of triumph, they bore defeat with splendid fort.i.tude. Their entire system crumbled and fell around them in ruins; they remained unmoved; they suffered the greatest humiliation of modern times; their slaves were put over them; they reconquered their section and preserved the civilization of the Anglo-Saxon.' It is not necessary, ladies and gentlemen, that I should introduce the next speaker to you, for I doubt not that you all belong to the mult.i.tude of mourners, who have wept real tears with black Sam and Miss Annie beside the coffin of Ma.r.s.e Chan; but I will call upon our friend, Thomas Nelson Page, to respond to the next toast, 'The Debt Each Part of the Country Owes the Other.'"]

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:--I did not remember that I had written anything as good as that which my friend has just quoted. It sounded to me, as he quoted it, very good indeed. At any rate, it is very true, and, perhaps, that it is true is the reason that you have done me the honor to invite me here to-night. I have been sitting for an hour in such a state of tremulousness and fright, facing this audience I was to address, that the ideas I had carefully gathered together have, I fear, rather taken flight; but I shall give them to you as they come, though they may not be in quite as good order as I should like them. The gift of after-dinner speaking is one I heard ill.u.s.trated the other day very well at a dinner at which my friend, Judge Bartlett and I were present.

A gentleman told a story of an English bishop travelling in a third-cla.s.s railway carriage with an individual who was swearing most tremendously, originally, and picturesquely, till finally the bishop said to him: "My dear sir, where in the world did you learn to swear in that extraordinary manner?" And he said, "It can't be learned, it is a gift." After-dinner speaking is a gift I have often envied, ladies and gentlemen, and as I have not it I can only promise to tell you what I really think on the subject which I am here to speak about to-night.

I feel that in inviting me here as the representative of the South to speak on this occasion, I could not do you any better honor than to tell you precisely what I do think and what those, I in a manner represent, think; and I do not know that our views would differ very materially from yours. I could not, if I would, undertake merely to be entertaining to you. I am very much in that respect like an old darky I knew of down in Virginia, who on one occasion was given by his mistress some syllabub. It was spiced a little with--perhaps--New England rum, or something quite as strong that came from the other side of Mason and Dixon's Line, but still was not very strong. When he got through she said, "How did you like that?" He said, "If you gwine to gimme foam, gimme foam; but if you gwine to gimme dram, gimme dram." You do not want from me syllabub I am sure.

When I came here I had no idea that I was to address so imposing an a.s.semblage as this. I had heard about forefathers and knew that there were foremothers also, but did not know that they were going to grace this a.s.sembly with their presence as they do to-night. When a youngster, I was told by an old gentleman, before the day of the unhappy stenographer, "You can go out in the world all right if you have four speeches. If you have one for the Fourth of July, one for a tournament address, one to answer the toast to 'Woman,' and the fourth 'to sweep all creation.'" I thought of bringing with me my Fourth of July speech.

If I had known I was going to address this audience I would have brought along the one that answered the toast to "Woman."

But I do not know any man in the world better prepared to address you on the subject of my toast, "The Debt Each Part of the Country Owes the Other," than myself, for I married a lady from the North. She represented in her person the blood both of Virginia and of New England.

Her mother was a Virginian and her father a gentleman from New Hampshire; consequently, as I have two young daughters, who always declare themselves Yankees, I am here to speak with due grat.i.tude to both sections, and with strong feeling for both sections to-night.

It seems to me that the two sections which we have all heard talked about so much in the past, have been gradually merging into one, and Heaven knows I hope there may never be but one again. In the nature of things it was impossible at first that there could be only one, but of late the one great wall that divided them has pa.s.sed away, and, standing here facing you to-night, I feel precisely as I should if I were standing facing an audience of my own dear Virginians. There is no longer division among us. They say that the South became reconciled and showed its loyalty to the Union first at the time of the war with Spain.

It is not true; the South became reconciled and showed its loyalty to the Union after Appomattox. When Lee laid down his arms and accepted the terms of the magnanimous Grant, the South rallied behind him, and he went to teach peace and amity and union to his scholars at Lexington, to the sons of his old soldiers. It is my pride that I was one of the pupils at that university, which bears the doubly-honored names of Washington and Lee. He taught us only fealty to the Union and to the flag of the Union. He taught us also that we should never forget the flag under which our fathers fought during the Civil War. With it are embalmed the tears, the holy memories that cl.u.s.ter thick around our hearts, and I should be unworthy to stand and talk to you to-night as an honorable man if I did not hold in deepest reverence that flag that represented the spirit that actuated our fathers. It stood for the principles of liberty, and, strange as it may seem, both sides, though fighting under different banners, fought for the same principles seen from different sides. It has not interfered with our loyalty to the Union since that flag was furled.

I do not, however, mean to drift into that line of thought. I do not think that it is really in place here to-night, but I want you to know how we feel at the South. Mason and Dixon's Line is laid down on no map and no longer laid down in the memory of either side. The Mason and Dixon's Line of to-day is that which circ.u.mscribes this great Union, with all its advantages, all its hopes, and all its aspirations. This is the Mason and Dixon's Line for us to-day, and as a representative of the South, I am here to speak to you on that account. We do owe--these two sections do owe--each other a great deal. But I will tell you what we owe each other more, perhaps, than anything else. When this country was settled for us it was with spa.r.s.ely scattered settlements, ranging along the Atlantic coast. When the first outside danger threatened it, the two sections immediately drew together. New England had formed her own confederation, and at the South the Carolinas and Virginia had a confederation of their own, though not so compact; but the first thing formed when danger threatened this country was a committee of safety, which immediately began correspondence among the several colonies, and it was the fact that these very colonies stood together in the face of danger, shoulder to shoulder, and back to back, that enabled us to achieve what we did achieve.

Standing here, on this great anniversary at the very end of the century, facing the new century, it is impossible that one should not look back, and equally impossible that one should not look forward. We are just at the close of what we call, and call rightly, a century of great achievements. We pride ourselves upon the work this country has accomplished. We point to a government based upon the consent of the governed, such as the world has never seen; wealth which has been piled up such as no country has ever attained within that time, or double or quadruple that time. It is such a condition of life as never existed in any other country. From Mount Desert to the Golden Gate, yes, from the islands which Columbus saw, thinking he had found the East Indies, to the East Indies themselves, where, even as I speak, the American flag is being planted, our possessions and our wealth extend. We have, though following the arts of peace, an army ready to rise at the sound of the bugle greater than Rome was ever able to summon behind her golden eagles. We are right to call it a century of achievement. We pride ourselves upon it. Now, who achieved that? Not we, personally; our fathers achieved it; your fathers and my fathers; your fathers, when they left England and set their prows westward and landed upon the rock-bound coast; when they drew up their compact of civil government, which was a new thing in the history of the world. We did our part in the South, and when the time came they staked all that they had upon the principle of a government based only upon the consent of the governed.

We pride ourselves upon the fact that we can worship G.o.d according to the dictates of our own conscience. We speak easily of G.o.d, "whose service is perfect freedom," but it was not we, but our fathers who achieved that. Our fathers "left us an heritage, and it has brought forth abundantly."

I say this to draw clearly the line between mere material wealth and that which is the real wealth and welfare of a people. We are rich, but our fathers were poor. How did they achieve it? Not by their wealth, but by their character--by their devotion to principle. When I was thinking of the speech I was to make here to-night, I asked the descendant of a New Englander what he would say was the best thing that the fathers had left to the country. He thought for a second and made me a wise answer.

He said, "I think it was their character." That is indeed the heritage they left us; they left us their character. Wealth will not preserve that which they left us; not wealth, not power, not "dalliance nor wit"

will preserve it; nothing but that which is of the spirit will preserve it, nothing but character.

The whole story of civilization speaks this truth with trumpet voice.

One nation rises upon the ruins of another nation. It is when Samson lies in the lap of Delilah that the enemy steals upon him and ensnares him and binds him. It was when the great a.s.syrian king walked through his palace, and looking around him said in his pride, "Is not this great Babylon that I have built for the honor of the kingdom and for the honor of my majesty?" that the voice came to him, even while the words were in the king's mouth (saith the chronicle), "Thy kingdom is departed from thee." It was when Belshazzar sat feasting in his Babylonian palace, with his lords and ladies, eating and drinking out of the golden vessels that had been sacred to the Lord, that the writing came upon the wall, "Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting." Not only in the palace, but all through the great city there was feasting and dancing.

Why should they not feast and why should they not dance? They were secure, with walls that were 350 feet high, eighty-five feet thick, with a hundred brazen gates, the city filled with greater wealth than had ever been brought before within walls. But out in the country a few hardy mountaineers had been digging ditches for some time. n.o.body took much account of them, yet even that night, in the midst of Belshazzar's luxury and feasting, the veteran troops of Cyrus were marching silently under the dripping walls, down the bed of the lowered Euphrates, so that that which had been the very pa.s.sageway of Babylon's wealth became the pathway of her ruin.

Unless we preserve the character and the inst.i.tutions our fathers gave us we will go down as other nations have gone. We may talk and theorize as much as we please, but this is the law of nature--the stronger pushes the weaker to the wall and takes its place.

In the history of civilization first one nation rises and becomes the torch-bearer, and then another takes the torch as it becomes stronger, the stronger always pushing the weaker aside and becoming in its turn the leader. So it has been with the a.s.syrian, and Babylonian, and Median, and, coming on down, with the Greek, the Roman, the Frank, and then came that great race, the Anglo-Saxon-Teutonic race, which seems to me to-day to be the great torch-bearer for this and for the next coming time. Each nation that has borne the torch of civilization has followed some path peculiarly its own. Egyptian, Syrian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Frank, all had their ideal of power--order and progress directed under Supreme authority, maintained by armed organization. We bear the torch of civilization because we possess the principles of civil liberty, and we have the character, or should have the character, which our fathers have transmitted to us with which to uphold it. If we have it not, then be sure that with the certainty of a law of nature some nation--it may be one or it may be another--it may be Grecian or it may be Slav, already knocking at our doors, will push us from the way, and take the torch and bear it onward, and we shall go down.

But I have no fear of the future. I think, looking around upon the country at present, that even if it would seem to us at times that there are gravest perils which confront us, that even though there may be evidence of weakening in our character, notwithstanding this I say, I believe the great Anglo-Saxon race, not only on the other side of the water, but on this side of the water--and when I say the Anglo-Saxon race I mean the great white, English-speaking race--I use the other term because there is none more satisfactory to me--contains elements which alone can continue to be the leaders of civilization, the elements of fundamental power, abiding virtue, public and private. Wealth will not preserve a state; it must be the aggregation of individual integrity in its members, in its citizens, that shall preserve it. That integrity, I believe, exists, deep-rooted among our people. Sometimes when I read accounts of vice here and there eating into the heart of the people, I feel inclined to be pessimistic; but when I come face to face with the American and see him in his life, as he truly is; when I reflect on the great body of our people that stretch from one side of this country to the other, their homes perched on every hill and nestled in every valley, and recognize the sterling virtue and the kind of character that sustains it, built on the rock of those principles that our fathers transmitted to us, my pessimism disappears and I know that not only for this immediate time but for many long generations to come, with that reservoir of virtue to draw from, we shall sustain and carry both ourselves and the whole human race forward.

There are many problems that confront us which we can only solve by the exercise of our utmost courage and wisdom. I do not want anything I say here this evening to have in the least degree the complexion of a political talk. I am like a friend of mine down in Virginia who told me that he never could talk politics with a man, "Because," he says, "I am that sort of a blanked fool that thinks if a man disagrees with him in politics he has insulted him." Consequently, I am not discussing this matter in any political sense whatever. But I feel quite sure, though I see many men whose opinion I respect who disagree with me, that yet this great people of ours is strong enough to carry through any obligations whatever which they may take up. I have no fear, however it may cause trouble, or may create difference and complication, of our extending our flag in the way we have done of late. I know that I differ with a very considerable section of the people of the South from whom I come, but I have no question whatever that we possess the strength to maintain any obligation that we a.s.sume, and I feel sure that in the coming years this great race of ours will have shown strength and resolution enough not only to preserve itself, to preserve the great heritage our fathers have given us of civil liberty here, but also to carry it to the isles of the sea, and, if necessary, to the nations beyond the sea. Of one thing I am very sure, that had our fathers been called on to solve this problem they would have solved it, not in the light of a hundred years ago, but in that of the present.

Among the problems that confront us we have one great problem, already alluded to indirectly to-night. You do not have it here in the North as we have it with us in the South, and yet, I think, it is a problem that vitally concerns you too. There is no problem that can greatly affect one section of this country that does not affect the other. As I came into your city to-night I saw your great structure across the river here, binding the two great cities together and making them one, and I remember that as I came the last time into your beautiful bay down yonder, I saw what seemed to be a mere web of gossamer, a bare hand's breadth along the horizon. It seemed as if I might have swept it away with my hand if I could have reached it, so airy and light it was in the distance, but when I came close to it to-night I found that it was one of the greatest structures that human intellect has ever devised. I saw it thrilling and vibrating with every energy of our pulsating, modern life. At a distance it looked as if the vessels nearest would strike it, full head, and carry it away. When I reached it I saw that it was so high, so vast, that the traffic of your great stream pa.s.sed easily backward and forward under it. So it is with some of these problems.

They may appear very small to you, ladies and gentlemen, or to us, when seen at a distance--as though merely a hand-sweep would get rid of them; but I tell you they are too vast to be moved easily.

There is one that with us overshadows all the rest. The great Anglo-Saxon race in the section of this country containing the inhabitants of the South understands better than you do the gravity of that great problem which confronts them. It is "like the pestilence that walketh in darkness, the destruction that wasteth at noonday." It confronts us all the day; it is the spectre that ever sits beside our bed. No doubt we make mistakes about it; no doubt there are outbreaks growing out of some phases of it that astound, and shock, and stun you, as they do ourselves. But believe me, the Anglo-Saxon race has set itself, with all its power, to face it and to overcome it; to solve it in some way, and in the wisest way. Have patience and it will be solved.

Time is the great solver, and time alone. If you knew the problem as I do, my words would have more weight with you than they have. I cannot, perhaps, expect you even to understand entirely what I am saying to you, but when I tell you that it is the greatest problem that at present faces the South, as it has done for the last thirty years, I am saying it to you as an American--one of yourselves, who wants to get at the right, and get at the truth, and who will get on his knees and thank G.o.d for anyone who will tell him how to solve the problem and meet the dangers that are therein.

Those dangers are not only for us, they are for you. The key to it, in our opinion, is that to which I alluded but just now; that for the present, at least, the white race is the torch-bearer of civilization, not only for itself, but for the world. There is only one thing that I can say a.s.suredly, and that is that never again will that element of the white race, the white people of the South, any more than you of the North, consent to be dominated by any weaker race whatsoever. And on this depends your salvation, no less than ours. Some of you may remember that once, during that great siege of Petersburg, which resulted, in the beginning of April, 1865, in the capture of the city and the overthrow of the Confederacy, there was an attempt made to mine the hitherto impregnable lines of General Lee. Finally, one cold morning, the mine was sprung, and a s.p.a.ce perhaps double the length of one of your squares was blown up, carrying everything adjacent into the air and making a breach in the lines. Beside a little stream under the hill in the Union lines was ma.s.sed a large force, a section of which, in front, was composed of negroes. They were hurried forward to rush the breach that had been created. They were wild with the ardor of battle. As it happened, a part of the gray line which had held the adjacent trenches, knowing the peril, had thrown themselves, in the dim dawn of the morning, across the newly made breach, and when they found the colored troops rushing in they nerved themselves anew to the contest. I may say to you calmly, after thirty odd years of experience with the negro race, that it was well for the town of Petersburg that morning that that attempt to carry the lines failed. That thin gray line there in the gray dawn set themselves to meet the on-rushing columns and hold them till knowledge of the attack spread and succor arrived. You may not agree with me that what happened at that time is happening now; but I tell you as one who has stood on the line, that we are not only holding it for ourselves, but for you. It is the white people of the South that are standing to-day between you and the dread problem that now confronts us.

They are the thin line of Anglo-Saxons who are holding the broken breach with all their might till succor comes. And I believe the light will come, the day will break and you yourselves stand shoulder to shoulder with us, and then with this united, great American people we can face not only the colored race at the South, but we can face all other races of the world. That is what I look for and pray for, and there are many millions of people who are doing the same to-night.

Ladies and gentlemen, I am not speaking in any spirit which I think will challenge your serious criticism. We are ready to do all we can to accord full justice to that people. I have many, many friends among them. I know well what we owe to that race in the past. I am their sincere well-wisher in the present and for the future. They are more unfortunate than to blame; they have been misdirected, deceived. Not only the welfare of the white people of the South and the welfare of the white people of the North, but the salvation of the negro himself depends upon the carrying out, in a wise way, the things which I have outlined, very imperfectly, I know. When that shall be done we will find the African race in America, instead of devoting its energies to the uncomprehended and futile political efforts which have been its curse in the past, devoting them to the better arts of peace, and then from that race will come intellects and intellectual achievements which may challenge and demand the recognition of the world. Then those intellects will come up and take their places and be accorded their places, not only willingly, but gladly. This is already the new line along which they are advancing, and their best friends can do them no greater service than to encourage and a.s.sist them in it; their worst enemy could do them no greater injury than to deflect them from it.

This is a very imperfect way, I am aware, ladies and gentlemen, of presenting the matter, but I hope you will accept it and believe that I am sincere in it. Accept my a.s.surance of the great pleasure I have had in coming here this evening.

I remember, when I was a boy, hearing your great fellow-townsman, Mr.

Beecher, in a lecture in Richmond, speak of this great city as "The round-house of New York," in which, he said, the machinery that drove New York and moved the world was cleaned and polished every night. I am glad to be here, where you have that greatest of American achievements, the American home and the American spirit. May it always be kept pure and always at only the right fountains have its strength renewed.

[Prolonged applause.]

GEORGE M. PALMER

THE LAWYER IN POLITICS

[Speech of George M. Palmer at the annual banquet of the New York State Bar a.s.sociation, given in Albany, January 18, 1899. President Walter S. Logan introduced Mr. Palmer in the following words: "The next speaker is the Hon. George M. Palmer, minority leader of the a.s.sembly. [Applause.] He is going to speak on 'The Lawyer in Politics,' and I am very glad to a.s.sure you that his politics are of the right kind."]

MR. PRESIDENT AND MEMBERS OF THE BAR a.s.sOCIATION OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK:--Through the generous impulse of your committee I enjoy the privilege of responding to this toast. I was informed some four weeks ago I would be called upon, the committee thinking I would require that time in preparation, and I have devoted the entire time since in preparing the address for this occasion. "The Lawyer in Politics." The first inquiry of the lawyer and politician is, "What is there in it?"

[Laughter.] I mean by that, the lawyer says in a dignified way, "What principle is involved, and how can I best serve my client, always forgetting myself?" The politician, and not the statesman, says, "What is in it?" Not for himself, oh, never. Not the lawyer in politics; but "What is there in it for the people I represent? How can I best serve them?"

You may inquire what is there in this toast for you. Not very much. You remember the distinguished jurist who once sat down to a course dinner similar to this. He had been waited on by one servant during two courses. He had had the soup. Another servant came to him and said, "Sir, shall I take your order? Will you have some of the chicken soup?"

"No, sir; I have been served with chicken soup, but the chicken proved an alibi." [Laughter.] A distinguished judge in this presence said he was much indebted to the Bar. I am very glad to say that the lawyer in politics formed a resolution on the first day of last January to square himself with the Bar, and he now stands without any debt. [Laughter.] I remember a reference made by the distinguished gentleman to a case that was tried by a young, struggling attorney. I also remember a young judge who appeared in one of the rural counties, who sat and heard a case very similar to the one to which reference was made, and I remember the fight of the giants before him. Points were raised of momentous importance.

They were to affect the policy of the State. One lawyer insisted upon the correctness of an objection and succeeded. He felt so elated over that success he in a short time objected again, and the judge ruled against him, but in his ardor he argued with the court. "Why, I can't conceive why you make this ruling." "Why," the judge says, "I have just ruled with you once, I must rule with the other fellow this time."

[Laughter.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: REPRODUCTIONS OF MURAL DECORATIONS FROM THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, WASHINGTON

_"LAW"_

_Photo-engraving in colors after the original mosaic panel by Frederick Dielman_

The mosaics by Mr. Dielman are remarkable for their wealth of color and detail--properties so elusive as to defy the reproducer's art. But the picture here given preserves the fundamental idea of the artist. "Law"

is typified by the central figure of a woman seated on a marble throne and holding in one hand the sword of punishment, and in the other the palm branch of reward. She wears on her breast the aegis of Minerva. On the steps of the throne are the scales of Justice, the book of Law and the white doves of Mercy. On her right are the emblematic figures of Truth, Peace, and Industry, on her left are Fraud, Discord, and Violence. "Law" is a companion piece to "History."]

"The Lawyer in Politics." It is sometimes a question which way the lawyer will start when he enters politics. I remember reading once of a distinguished lawyer who had a witness upon the stand. He was endeavoring to locate the surroundings of a building in which an accident occurred, and he had put a female witness on the stand. "Now the location of the door: please give it," and she gave it in a timid way. "Will you now kindly give the location of the hall in which the accident occurred?" She gave it. "Now," he says, "we have arrived at the stairs; will you kindly tell me which way the stairs run?" She became a little nervous and she says, "I will tell you the best I can; if you are at the foot of the stairs they run up, and if you are to the top of the stairs they run down." [Laughter.] So sometimes it is pretty important to find out which way the lawyer is going when he enters in politics. He should be tried and tested before being permitted to enter politics, in my judgment, and while the State is taking upon itself the paternal control of all our professions and business industries, it seems to me they should have a civil service examination for the lawyer before he enters the realm of politics.