Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1859-10-10
EXTRACTS FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS.

|
Wendell Phillips, one of the most eloquent
men that has ever lived in Massachusetts,, new
er speaks on any topic of public interest with
out causing a sensation. And those who feel
his terrible criticisms most keenly, cannot
wholly stife admiration of the earnestness,
and the affluence of intellectual power, with
which they are delivered. And they who feel
more agreement than disagreement with his
| general positions and estimates of character,
are more apt to yield quietly to the magnetic
charm of his eloquence, than to criticise and
protest against anything that might in cooler
moments seem like overstatement or too great
severity. Too much severity, however, is usu.
ally much more wholesome than extravagant
and undeserved laudation.
On the evening of Oct 4th, Mr.. Phillips de-
livered the introductory letter of the Fraterni-
ty course of lectures in Boston. The vast
hall was thronged with brilliant and intelli-
| gent audience and the discourse on that occa-
sion was one of his most effective productions.
a very intelligent man who heard it says =
CHS voice seemed more musical and his man
ner more graceful and his presence more mag
zeal than ever" This speech was mainly
| devoted to the various recent eulogies on
Webster and Choate, and as several portions of
his speech show the finest powers of the man,
and as it has been greatly admired, and also
criticised more or less, our readers may like a
few extracts from it. We give them the fol-
lowing
HIS SKETCH OF MR.. CHoATE.
The honors we grant mark how high we
stand, and educate the future. The men we
honor and the maxms We lay down in meas
uring our favorites show the level and morals
Of the time. Two names have been in every
ones mouth of late, and men have exhausted
language in trying to express their admiration
and their respect The courts have covered
the grave of Mr.. Choate with eulogy. Let us
see what is their idea of a great lawyer. We
are told that che worked hard"-"he never
neglected his client''-''he flung over the dis
cussions of the forum the grace of rare
scholarship" pressure or emergency ever
stirred him to an unkind word" A ripe schol-
ara profound lawyer-a faithful servant of
his cient-a gentleman. This is good re-
cord, surely. May he sleep i'll peace What
he earned, God grant he may have! But the
bar that seeks to claim for such an one Il place
this is only to make him out the one-eyed
monarch of the blind. Not one high moral
trait claimed; not one patriotic act even men
toned not one patriotic service. even claimed.
Look at Mr.. Webster's idea of what lawyer
should be in order to be great, in the sketch he
drew of Jeremiah Mason and notice what
stress he lays on the religious and moral eleva-
ton, and the glorious and high purposes which
crowned his life Nothing OF this now l
forget Mr.. Hallett did testify for Mr.. Choate's
religion daughter and applause) but the law
maxim is, that a witness should be trusted
only in matters he understands, and that evil
dence, therefore, amounts to nothing. Re
newed merriment) Incessant eulogy; but
not one effort to lit the yoke of cruel or I'M
equal legislation upOu the neck of its victim
not one attempt to make the code of his coun-
try wiser, purer, better; not one effort to bless
the times or breathe higher moral purpose
into the community; not one blow struck for
right or tor liberty while the Battle of the Gil
ants was going on about him not one patriot
ic act to stir the hearts of his idolators not
one public act of any kind whatever about
whose merit friend or foe could even quarrel
unless when he secuted our great charter as
'glittering generality" or jeered at the phi
lanthropy which tried to practice the Sermon
on the Mount When Cordus, the Roman
Senator whom Tiberius murdered, was adj
dressing his fellows, he began Fathers
they accuse me of illegal words plain proof
that there are no illegal deeds which which to
charge me-" So with these eulogies-words,
nothing but words plain proof that there were
no deeds to praise.
The divine can tell us nothing but that lie
handed chair or dish as nobody else could
Daughter; in politics, we are assured, he did
not wish to sail outside OF Daniel Webster
and the Cambridge professor adds to his pu-
pills, for their special instruction, that he did
not dare to think in religion, for fear he should
differ from Southside Adams Loud laugh
ter and applause. The professor strains his
ethics to prove that good man may defend
bad man. Useless waste of labor In
Egypt, travellers tell us that the woman, who'll
ly naked, are very careful to veil their faces
So the professor strains his ethics to cover this
one fault. Useless, sir, while the whole per-
son is nude!
Yet this is the model that Massachusetts Of
fers to the Pantheon of the great iurists of
the world. am Boston boy, and l should
like TO criticise it.
Suppose we stood in the lofty temple of iu-
risdiction-on either side of us the statues of
the great lawyers of every age and clime-and
let us see what part New Ems land-Puritan,
educated, free New England-would bear in
that pageant. Rome points to a colossal fig
ure and says:-"That is Papinian, who, when
the Emperor Caracalla murdered his own
brother, and order the lawyer to defend the
deed, went cheerfully to death rather sully his
lips with the atrocious plea, and that is Ulpian
who, aiding his prince to put the army below
the law, was massacred at the foot of weak
but virtuous throne"
And France stretches forth her admiring
hands, crying, "rhat is D'Aguesseau, worthy,
when he went to face an enraged king, of the
farewell his wife addressed to him-'Go! for
get that you have wife and children to ruin.
and remember only that you have France to
save"
Then England takes up the legend "That
is Coke, who flung the laurels of eighty years
in the face of the first Stuart in defence of the
people. This is Selden on every book of
whose library you saw written the motto of
which he lived worthy-'Before everything
LIBERTY" That is Mansfield, silver-tongued,
who proclaimed,
'Slayes cannot breathe in England, if their lungs
Receive our air, that moment they are free.n
This is Romelly, who spent life in trying to
make law synonymous with justice, and sue
ceeded in making life and property safer in
every city of the empire. And that is Frs
kline, whose eloquence, spite of Lord Ellon and
George the Third, made it safe to speak and to
print.
Then New England takes up the record, say
ing, "That is Choate, who made it safe to
murder; and Of whose health thieves asked
before they began to steal"