The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1896-07-11

4
JENNINGS BRYAN OF Nebraska should
be President OF the United States.
1t is not to be believed that such
man can be chosen TO the highest Office
| In the gift OF an electorate comprising
| thirteen millions OF American citizens
and TO represent this great country and
| its seventy millions OF free people.
WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN is a man
not only without record OF note in poll
| tics or craftsmanship, but II his incon-
sequential public career has shown any
thing it 10 an absolute impoverishment
OF attributes beyond those required for
the proper equipment of stump orator
| at bacKwoods political mass meeting.
BRYAN, in the easy parlance OF our day
and generation, has been called an orator.
He has some of the more superficial
qualifications that go TO make the orator.
and he fills the dictionary definition that
declares that an orator Is ga public
speaker" lie has what is understood by
magnetism" OF the sort-well, OF the sort
composed the majority in the Chicago
convention to the "highest pitch OF en-
husiasm''-thougbtless men, meaningless
enthusiasm. He utters resonant phrases
that are capable OF tlngling a thousana
ears at once, OF awakening the echoes in
the biggest hall-and that, resolved into
cold and unsentimental type, are voiceless
and but pale shadows. He is not an
orator except within the scope OF the
most limited definition, and what he
speaks is no more oratory than were the
sand lot shrieks OF KEARNEY or the
periods of GEORGE FRANCIS TRAIN. He
Is astump artist whose vocal and phraseo-
logical mslishmenis serve to con-
struct oratorical mirages. He exercises
the spooks OF insubstantlal thought and
sense and calls it speech.
We dwell upon the oratory Of the "Boy
Orator OF the Platte" for that and that
alone, such as II is, 10 all ttat distin-
guishes him from the common run OF
men. 1t was the BRYAN oratory.that made
the Bryan nomination possible. Nothing
was further removed from the probabil-
tiles of the Chicago convention, extrava-
CANT almost beyond conception as those
probabilities were, than that this ranting
Populist from Nebraska should have been
selected for its chieftain. But the ag-
gressiveness OF the silver majority ex-
pressed with unparalleled venom from
the very outbreak-we use the word ad-
visedly-of the convention proceedings,
was met, taken up and carried to even
loftier extravaganza, and more fanciful
attitudes by the oratory OF BRYAN. And
the calm, conscientious, earnest BLAND
and the limp and wabbling BoIEs were
hiihe nNunpeu US tuo WIN tue Oh the
convention rolled up with the wilder man
from Nebraska on its top crest.
The name OF the candidate is hardly
known In the East. OF fame he has none
anywhere in this broad land except such
as his own mouth has made for him. He
Is an unimportant with the one gift OF
profuse public speech to make him of
seeming consequence among his fellow
men. He is weak in everything political
but hallucinations. His con, ,ictions are
strong, but they violate sense and resson.
He Is as shallow as mill stream, but he
can roar like Niagara. His nomination
for the Presidency OF the United States is
one of the most amazing examples that
history affords of the elevation OF the
commonplace, the distinction OF non-
entity. the creation OF something from
nothing, the msgnification OF mediocrity,
the exaltation OF the absurd, the triumph
OF demagoguery and the prehonsile power
OF loud and turbulent mouth.