The Rock Island Argus and daily union. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1920-1923, 1920-12-07

Washington, Dec. S.-A timely act
was the elevation Of the name and
picture Of Patrick Henry the other
day to . place in the American
Hall Of Fame.
Patrick Henry stood for the right
of q man to walk the earth free;
to say and write what he pleased;
to eat and drink what he pleased:
to bear arms and defend himself.
He held that = mans person and
his home were his own and that he
should not be arrested nor his
home nor his belongings searched
or seized without . warrant.
He held that . man should pay
no unjust tribute to any power,
governmental or otherwise. and that
it was the part Of manhood to fight
any attempt to levy such tribute.
Give me liberty or give me
DEATH" meant something to Patrick
Henry. The sentence has so long
been parroted by schoolboys and
parodied by humorists. it has so
little in 1t of the spirit in which we
now live. that to us it is dead verb
iage. 1t sounds empty and rhetori-
cal and even q little absurd. But to
Patrick Henry it was . literal and
passionate statement Of the way he
felt. When he said 1t, we learn
from an old chronicle, the chords Of
his neck swelled and stood out like
ropes. his face flushed, his eyes
burned, and the crash Of his voice
shook the room. The men who had
hesitated to risk what seemed a
hopeless war were ashamed and
silent. The men who felt as he
did we're lifted to their feet by a
wave Of feeling. The resolutions
that meant war with England were
carried without q dissenting vote.
An Age Of Orators.
That was an age of orators-an
age that needed orators. Newspa-
pers do the work now. They form
our principles md make our wars
and our peaces. But in those days
newspapers did not amount to
much. The words of men like Pat
rick Henry, spoken in small gath
erings of intelligent, critical men,
scattered by word of mouth, by let
ter, to some extent by print, were
the real medium Of thought and
feeling. A man like Patrick Henry
who could speak with emotional ef-
feet and yet with precision and sin
certify was the real mouthpiece OF
Colonial America. He took the
place alike Of journalism and of lit.
erature in that pioneering, fighting
freedomloving land Of 5000, 1000
Anglo-Saxops.
The land in which we live is nc
more like it than it is like China
We are dominated, not by spoken
words, but by printed ones. In
fact we are overwhelmed by them
Thought and instinct alike are
drowned in the turgid flood of shall.
low printed prattle for which oul
minds are little more than conduits
No longer can sincere man voice
what thousands feel because they
feel only what they are told to feel
The orator among US has degen.
Grated into the after-dinner speak.
er. spewing platitudes and old
Jokes, boring US, putting US te
sleep. He is no more kin to Pat.
rick Henry than parrot is to ar
eagle.
Patrick Henry had to wait about
a hundred years for the approval
OF the best people as represented BY
this niche which the college profes.
sors and other worthless have giver
him in their hall of fame. Durint
most of his life Patrick was viewed
with alarm by the best people, re-
garded as radical, a loafer, ant
demagogue. He had NO affinitie'
with universities, having gone Il
school only a few years, and he ex
pressed his opinion of erudition b,
making it his motto to study men.
An Unrromising Boy.
! Patrick was born Door and .di,
no good in school. He wore old an,
dirty clothes. He tried store-keep
ing twice, and farming once, tende,
bar in tavern for q while, an,
made a complete but undismaye,
failure in all these capacities, H
then decided to become a lawyer
and after six weeks of study wen
up for a bar examination. He con
vinced the examiners that he kne,
nothing about law. but was a mos
unusual fellow. and they, generous
ly gave him license to practice O.
the strength of his promise that b
would learn a little about his pro
fession first.
Patrick did not spend any gres
amount Of time in court, Just as b
had spent little time in the store
and saloons he was supposed to b
conducting. Patrick spent most {
his time out in the woods huntin
and fishing. That was his passion