A LOSS TO THE WHOLE COUNTRY.
From the “New York Tribune.”
The death of Henry Grady is a loss to the whole country, but there is some consolation in the general recognition of this fact. During his brief career as a public man he has said many things that it was profitable for both North and South to hear, and he has said them in such a way as to enhance their significance. As editor of one of the few widely influential papers of the South, he possessed an opportunity, which he had also in great measure created, of impressing his opinions upon Southern society, but it was to a few occasional addresses in Northern cities that he chiefly owed his national reputation. His rhetorical gifts were not of the highest order, but he had command of a style of speaking which was most effective for his purposes. It was marked by the Celtic characteristic of exuberance, but it was so agreeable and inspiring that he was able to command at will audiences at home and abroad. When so endowed he has also a significant message to deliver, and is, moreover, animated by a sincere desire to serve his generation to the full measure of his ability, the loss which his death inflicts is not easily repaired. The whole country will unite in deploring the sudden extinction of a faithful life. Mr. Grady’s zeal, activity and patriotism were fully recognized in the North, as we have said, but yet it was pre-eminently to his own people that he was an example and inspiration. His loyalty to the cause in which his father fell was untinged with bitterness, and he never permitted himself to imagine that vain regrets were more sacred than present obligations. He was an admirable illustration of that sagacious and progressive spirit which is gradually, but surely, renewing the South, and which, though it still lacks something of being altogether equal to its opportunities, does nevertheless recognize the fact that “new occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good uncouth.”