Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1884-02-21

THE Literary World has this striking
article on the death of Wendell Phillips:
THE first eminent name to place upon
The death-roll OF 1884 is that of Wendell
Phillips. Mr.. Phillips died on Saturday
evening last, of angina DectOris, after a
painful illness Of only few days dura-
Jion. He was in his seventy-third year,
having been born On the 10th of Noven,-
Der, 1911. His birthplace was Boston,
and he was always Bostonian. He
graduated at Harvard College in 1881.
MIR. Phillips name belongs in bril-
liant list. Educated for the bar, but
never a lawyer; attracted to politics, but
rising above them; less than a states
man, but more than An orator; voice;
great heart; 4 tire-brand: a silver
trumpet; an intellectual Ishmaelite;
man who stood apart from men in order
that he might be free to strike them if
he thought they deserved blows; foe
TO his friends and a friend to his foes;
Mr.. Phillips was at once the most con-
sistent and the most contradictory of
Americans. He was an exclamation
point, finger of scorn, a standing pro-
test, a public appeal, a factious minority,
| thorn in the flesh he was-Wendell
Phillips; and as there was none like
him before him, so will there be none
| like him after him. The mold in which
| he was cast is broken. He was forged
in fiery times. He belonged to an era.
No mans place in the history of the
| Republic was more designate.
at is the custom to rank Mr.. Phillips
with the great orators of all time. The
greatness of his oratory was not on the
surface of it, though his art was con-
| summate. In power of sustained, severe,
| fluent, precise, lucid expression no
speaker in modern times certainly was
his master. Edward Everett's oratory
was the glitter of an iceberg; Wendell
| Phillips that of the sunshine. 1t is idle
for US who nave heard Phillips only to
attempt to compare him with other
great orators whom we have not heard
burke, Pitt, Demosthenes. The true
power of oratory is to be felt only in
| the presence of it, and it was not hard
in the presence of Mr.. Phillips oratOry
to think that no other oratory could
have compared with it. 1t was enough
"MT. Phillips, the man, was one of the
gentlest, tenderest, most considerate,
most generous, most fOrgiving Of men.
His domestic attachments were strong
his devotion to an inv aid wife was a
poem. He had no children. The poor,
the outcast. the oppressed, the friend
less we've his wards. With him cause
desplsed was cause espoused. He cared
nothing for popularity. What he be
lieved he said. He had no patience with
the Christian Church, the good in which
he could not appreciate, and the evil in
which he exaggerated. He lived with
out the camp, asked odds of no one, and
left US as he had lived amongst us, self
contained, self-competent and self-satis-
fed. Franklin, Jefferson, Patrick Hen
ry, Calhoun, Clay, Webster. Everett,
Sumner-certainly to these names is to
be added that of Wendell Phillips.
with less than Franklin's sagacity,
with more than Jefferson's scholarship,
with all of Patrick Henry's courage
with d patriotism which Calhoun never
possessed and disinterestedness which
has never been claimed for Clay, with
all of Webster's dignity, with all of Ev
erett's suavity, and with all of Summers
honesty, he had in himself some of the
best elements of intellectual leadership
weakened always, however, by certain
distortions of vision which led him
sometimes to see things cut Of relation
and proportion, and caused men to hesi
tate before they followed him, even
while they admired him beyond words
, Wendell Phillips illustrated anew the
fact that the path of genius is not al
ways the path of safety"