Ottumwa weekly courier. (Ottumwa, Wapello County, Iowa) 1872-1899, 1878-07-10
ovators and orntovv.

years anu ThtncE inuTHI Ill Hcdltu,
perhaps he may never reach this
nor his smooth-tongued, vel
7ety eloquence be heard in it again.
Hence we may now begin and say
what we think proper about the great
orator and some of his contemporaries.
Denton, Beecher, Phillips, Carey,
V oorhees, Kossuth and Schurz are
hard to beat; but Cough can startle,
bewilder, electrify and de-
light the whole ocean of mankind.
He can gather an audience together
into wind-rows; impregnate them
with his sensitive, nervous, almost
fiery and sympathetic feel
ings; and make an audience of ten |
thousand boil like an angered and |
tr oubled sea, and start wave in the |
human flood that will never cease
until it surges heavily on the remot-
est shore of mans career or nature.
He can portray and paint with such
pathos scene of pain, sin, sorrow
and suffering as to make your hair,
like the fretful porcupine's quilts,
stand on your heads, and make your
hearts crawl up your throats; filling
your gates of pity wide open; giving
you relief only in flood Of scalding
tears. He can make men, women and
children cry and laugh alternately at
will. He makes old, gray headed
men weep like sinners; middle-aged
manhood and "Young America" cry
like young crocodiles, and all the
women bawl and roar aloud. He can
freeze your feelings with icy horror,
or melt them into flowing grief and
mournful lamentation. He makes
his whole audience swing to and fro
upon the lips of the speaker: this
minute cry, next fill the house with
uproarious laughter, shaking the tab
ernacle to its very foundation. Then
he whirls short upon his foe-his en-
envy. Then woe unto the foe-and
woe unto the enemy. Upon the man
of sin, the wicked, the cruel and the
tyrant he pours forth the main tor
rent Of his fierce power and burning
scorn-his majestic stream of fiery
wrath, with malignant vengeance and
vindictive fury. In word, his sill
ver-tongued eloquence, golden
mouthed defamation and lofty sub
Unity are like the fiery corruscations
and lightnings of heavens, infinitely
beautiful and indescribably charm.
ing. Hence Cough, with the excep-
ton of Ingersol, may be pronounced
the greatest orator, either living or
dead. He is an orator beyond all dis
pute, and in many respects, and with
one exception beyond all comparison.
Ingersoll, we suppose it would be
safe to say, excels in almost avery
thing, all the orators now living, or
that have lived, or perhaps will live
for ten thousand years to come.
The great Daniel Webster we have
seen and heard often. He, like the
philosopher of Malmesbury, Hobbies
and the far-famed Chancellor, Lord
Bacon, had very large three-story
head, being, like each of the others,
a very large man. But Ingersoll, the
fourth, is perhaps larger man than
either Of the former three, and has a
large .four-story head. Hence his i'm.
mense and gigantic power. We will
describe the orator, his characters
tics and his oratory, when we have
heard him speak. Suffice it to say OF
his writings, he writes the best letter
we ever saw or read, and In many OF
his characteristics he exceeds all 9th.
er men as orators. His style, like that
of Hobbies, is the very perfection OF
the English language. Then he shows
more reason, knowledge, wisdom
wit, mirthfulness, learning, shrewd.
ness, sublimity and biting sarcasm he
shows more genius, originality and
human nature; draws the strongest
comparisons and presents the great
est antitheses on record; the shortes,
and clearest automatic sentences OF
any of the public speakers. His
words are sharper than a two-edged
sword shave keener than razor
they strike like thunderbolt from
the sky, killing with a blow, irving
the victim asunder and marking il
for the cemetery. They are as steady
as time, whitening as famine, ineXor.
able as death and unrelenting as the
grave.
None can know what he is until
they read his orations or hear him
speak. There are sentences and para.
graphs in his grafton "On the Gods"
"On Paine," "On Heretics and Here
sizes, for truth, power and sublimity
never excelled-never equaled by any
other orations in the English Ian
guage. And there is, in his speech to
the "Boys in Blue" at indianapolis
pathos, cloquence, sweetness, feeling.
beauty and kindness, never before
uttered. and an elegance of expression
superhuman, eXquisitely pleasing
gloriously immortal and almost infin-
lite and eternal.
| Two extracts from the "Oration on
Paine" will give an idea of the mighty
Archimedes of modern unbelief and
materialism. In telling what science
has done he says: "On every hand
the people advance. The Vicar OF
God has been pushed from the throne
of the Caesars and upon the roofs of
the Eternal City falls once more the
shadow of the Eagle. All has been
accomplished by the heroic few. The
men of science have explored heaven
and earth, and with infinite patience
have furnished the facts. The brave
thinkers have used them. The gloomy
caverns of superstition have been
transformed into temples of thought,
and the demons of the past are the
angels of to-day. Science took a
handful Of sand, constructed tele-
scope, aud with it explored the starry
depths of heaven. Science wrested
from the gods their thunderbolts
and now the electric spark, freighted
with thought and love, flashes under
all the waves of the sea. Science
took tear from the cheek of unpaid
labor, converted it into steam, Great.
ed q giant that turns with tireless arm
the countless wheels of toll"
| In answer to the church that says
that the men of unbelief and science
have accomplished nothing; that we
are simply destroyers; that we tear
down without building again, he
| says:
'Is it nothing to free the mind Is
it nothing to civilize mankind? Is il
nothing to fill the world with light
with discovery, with science! Is il
nothing to dignity man and exalt the
intellect? Is it nothing to grope your
way into the dreary prisons, the damp
and dropping dungeons, the dark
and silent cells, where the souls OF
men are chained to the floors of stone,
to greet them like a ray of light, like
the song OF bird, the murmur Of q
stream, to see the dull eyes open and
grow slowly bright, to feel yourself
grasped by the shrunkcn and unused
hands, and hear yourself thanked by
a strange and hollow voice?
Is it nothing to conduct these souls
gradually into the blessed light OF
day-to let them see again the happy
fields, the sweet green earth, and hear
the everlasting music of the waves
Is it nothing to make men wipe the
dust from their swollen knees, tht
tears from their blanched and fur
rowed cheeks?
Is it a small thing to quench the
flames of hell with the holy tears o.
pity-to unbind the martyr from thu
stake-break all the chains-put on
the fires Of civil war-stay the swort
of the fanatic, and tear the blood!
hands of the church from the whit
throat of science?
Is it a small thing to make mel