HENRY WARD BEECHER
The influence of Henry Ward Beecher upon his time was marked. And now the stream of his life is lost amid the ocean of our being. As a single drop of aniline in a barrel of water will tint the whole mass, so has the entire American mind been colored through the existence of this one glowing personality. He placed a new interpretation on religion, and we are different people because he lived.
He was not constructive, not administrative—he wrote much, but as literature his work has small claim on immortality. He was an orator, and the business of the orator is to inspire other men to think and act for themselves.
Orators live but in memory. Their destiny is to be the sweet, elusive fragrance of oblivion—the thyme and mignonette of things that were.
The limitations in the all-around man are by-products which are used by destiny in the making of orators. The welling emotions, the vivid imagination, the forgetfulness of self, the abandon to feeling—all these things in Wall Street are spurious coin. No prudent man was ever an orator—no cautious man ever made a multitude change its mind, when it had vowed it would not.
Oratory is indiscretion set to music.
The great orator is great on account of his weaknesses as well as on account of his strength. So why should we expect the orator to be the impeccable man of perfect parts?