The Empire County argus. [volume] (Coloma, El Dorado County, Cal.) 1853-1857, 1853-12-24
WEBSTER AND CLAY.

The following parallel between these two eminent
statesmen is copied from a sermon the death of
Mr.. Webster, delivered at Wheeling Va, by the
Rev. George W. Webster. This contrastcd sketch
of the two great characters WILL we think strike the
reader as equally just in the conception and fec-
itous in the expression:
1t is doing Justice to others, and ample justice
to Mr.. Clay, to say that he was next to Mr.. Web
stcr He is the only man among his compcers with
whom we can compare Mr. Webster. They were
the two greatest statesmen and orators of their time
And how does Mr.. Webster compare with the next
greatest man of America during the last half centu
ry; wish to do justice to them both. At least
am not conscious of any desire to exalt one by the
depreciation of the other. Both were great enough
and their spheres of greatness will be better appre
hended by Legitimate comparison of them. These
two great men lived together, and died together
All that is mortal of them (and it is not much is
now more. How little is there of the great and
good which die u
On all ordinary occasions Mr.. Clay was the grea-
ter orator of the two He had more ready resources
was more easily kindled and called out had more
versatility; was more engaging and influential on
the instant had the better command of words, the
more fluent eloquence, and the more musical voice
But when the great crisis had come, when tremen-
dous issues pended, when others were used up with
excitement and overcome with the exigency of the
moment, then Mr. Websters Oratory rose above
that of Mr. Clays. Mr.. Clay was so ardent and
ready, that he sometimes spoke at random, wasted
words and weakened his influence, but MIR. Webster
never. He was remarkable on the other hand for
his GOODNESS and deliberation throughout the most
stormy debates which he witnessed and in which he
participated. He would sit and sit, for days and
days. as mute as stone. No most personal and in
sulting allusion could provoke him to his feet no
challenge tempt him to stir. Fe sat and heard the
wr.nge through and through, until the nation was
astonshed at his patience, or vexed with his tardi-
ness. He waits till he is needed till he can g see
the end from the beginning and speak to some
purpose till others are exhausted, bafled, humbled,
and willing to be instructed till the waves of strife
run so high, that one else can command his
thoughts, or keep his temper. Then it was that he
would rise truly like god serene and sepossessed,
and make one of those mastery statements OF tie
question at issue which brought light out OF dark
ness, and harmony from confusion, and go on with
one of those thrilling appeals and stupendous argu-
Inents which both triumphed at the time and Will
live as enduring literary monuments.
Here Mr. Clay failed. His speeches do not read
so well, do not stand so proudly on the literary
page, are not so compacted and solidifed with
sterling thought, chaste and classic ornament, the
oreticacal accuracy proportion and finish, and log
ical precision arrangement and construction as are
Mr.. Webster's, whose choice of words rhetorical
method, and general style have become the ac-
knowledge models of our language. He has done
for the English language to bring out its pow
er fix its idoms and make it neat precise and grace
full, as we'll stately, massive and sonorous than
any other man, with, perhaps, the exception OF
Burke, aince the days of Milton and Shakespeare
His orations are to the prosaic what their writings