The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1902-01-22
CHAPTER KY.
Writers ana Speakers OF the Revo7u-

writer's ana Speakers OF the Revoiu-
ton.
Everyone knows that war does not i'm
meolateiy promote the growth Of Iitera-
lure. The MUSES. never did get on well
With Mars while he was busy. Only
When his work is done and can be con-
tefnplated at safe distance can an I'M
disturbed view of it or of anything else
pc taken. Homer could not have written
the Had in Achilles tent The only litera-
lure that was produced there and by the
black ships along the Dardanian shore
was spoken. The record of it fills half Of
the great Epic. Oratory is prominently
the literature Of warning periods.
All writing did not cease, to be sure
with the climax of pre-revolution letters
the Declaration of independence, but the
resources of argument, persuasion and
appeal in political and state papers had
been well nigh exhausted. Addresses to
the throne and petitions to parliament
had ended in sending taxed tea and four
regiments to collect damages incident to
landing it in the water of the Boston
harbor. Then Pitcairn's pistol gave the
signal to drop pens and to fix bayonets.
What was written after that was inspired
by violent emotion of one kind and an
other. High words sprung from high tenn
per, itself raised by high-handed injus-
tice. It's natural and ready expression is
r1d1cule and irony, sarcasm and satire
With these moods revolution writings be-
gin to TEEN. Angry words bubble up like
froth from the boiling. Satirical pamphlets
are thrown back and forth by Wing ard
Tory like the taunts of soldiers from op-
posing lines. They are often weighed
with solid reason and sometimes heavy
J11,%+
steel. Often their impact causes an ex-
plosion of laughter on one side, of wrath
on the other followed by violence and
this by retaliation. Thus the wordy war
went on by the side Of an armed con-
f11ct, as the shouts Of battle accompany
death-dealing missiles.
If these ephemeral and spirited pro-
ductiors are to be rated for their literary
value, allowance must be made for the
disturbed conditions In which they were
turned out. Even where they are as
signed to their secondary class of satiri-
cal composition, it is not always that
they can take the firS6 rank 1t is only
as the patriot writer or as the IoyaIist
who was sometimes patriotic too, kept in
the region Of the first principles that he
made the literature of this stormy time
first class.
The essayist who did this most credita-
bly, was Thomas Paine. His cloudy de-
cline in the afternoon of life has done
much to obscure his early fame for those
who do not know how great shis services
for the cause Of freedom were. Com
ing from England with a letter of in
PRODUCTION from Franklin, he cast in his,
lot with Americans at a critical time
and with the fullest sympathy with its
most advanced sentiment. OF this he
became the Interpreter and advocate. Up
to the battle of Lexington and even lat
er, the idea of independence had been
repudiated by all but a few radicals. 1t
was equivalent to destroying the unity
Of the British empire. If a globe of glass
is struck where will the frGaure end?
But Payne was not concerned about the
unity Of the globe so much as about
the welfare Of the people who lived on
the western side Of it. Accordingly he
wrote Common Sense a pamphlet
whose motto might have been 'How long
halt We between two opinions?" 1t was
an out and out call to withdraw from
British citizenship, AND to set up a new
government. It's circulation and it's sue
cess were immense. Hundreds Of thou~
sands read it. The fabric of loyalty
which the people haSl been sincerely and
fondly cherishing tumbled to the fall
when this missile crushed against IT. No
doubt the fair edifce was honeyeombed
with revolt beyond mems open admis-
sion, but the shell was still standing
in apparent good order in January, 1776,
this pamphlet laid open before them their
unspoken thoughts and their suppressed
fears or their secret hopes, as the case
might be.
Of course it was received with CORE
spending delight or dismay, but in either
event it was an appeal to abandon the
position of remonstrants and suppliants
and to demand the freedom Of an in
dependent people. Six months after the
response came in the declaration
Of independence. It Is too much
to say that the climacteric pamphlet
evolved the crowning state paper Of the
colonial age. 1t is enough to say that
this prince of pamphleteers happened to
be the man in whose hands the pointed
stick drew flames that flashed far and
wide in the atmosphere surcharged with
st. Elmo's fire. His spirited monograph
and his Crisis that followed IL may not
belong to the literature of knowledge,
according to De Quincey's distinction,
but they evidently pretained to the lit
erature Of power. One manifestation of
this was the inspiring quality in them
which called out many others in SYM
pathy or hostility Then war came flood
ing along the coast and above its seetE-
ing crests a spindrift of bitter words
new MISSING, TO Ia1 pack INTO OBLIVION.
Out of this it is not needful to drag what
had a momentary interest which can
never be revived except for the historian.
But then those tracts for troubled times
stood in the shadow of mighty names
like Franklin and Jefferson and Wither-
spoon and OdeIl, William Smith, John
son, Seabury, Chauncey, Stiles, Bufield,
Cooper, Hopkinson and Breckenridge,
who with their respective following on
"a -
storm Of pamphlets and sermons, bal
lads and broadsides. These did effective
work in strengthening the convictions,
in firing the hearts and in cheering the
spirits of civilians and soldiers; but when
their work was done their life was over
and they must be classed among the
ephemera of literature.
So busy were the writer's of the war
decade with it's immediate issues and so
distracted by it's turmoil that little else
was produced.
To this statement there is one notable
exception, which has already been men
tfoned-namely, the literature which was
spoken in deliberative or other assem-
bles. If there is any objection to call
ing oratory a branch of literature a long
discussion may be cut short by remark
ing that the literary wealth of the an
cient and modern world would shrink
amazingly if the recorded discourse of
speaking men, were eliminated Pens
and papers are not indispensable to the
expression of thoughts that appeal to