Would you wrest the wreath of fame
From the hand of fate?
Would you write a deathless name
With the good and great?
Would you bless your fellow-men?
Heart and soul imbue
With the holy task, and then
Paddle your own canoe.
Would you crush the tyrant wrong,
In the world's free fight?
With a spirit brave and strong,
Battle for the right.
And to break the chains that bind
The many to the few—
To enfranchise slavish mind—
Paddle your own canoe.
Nothing great is lightly won,
Nothing won is lost;
Every good deed, nobly done,
Will repay the cost.
Leave to Heaven, in humble trust,
All you will to do;
But if you succeed, you must
Paddle your own canoe.
[JOHN C. BRECKINRIDGE]
John Cabell Breckinridge, the youngest of the American vice-presidents, distinguished as a public speaker, was born near Lexington, Kentucky, January 21, 1821. He was educated at Centre College, Danville, Kentucky, and then studied law at Transylvania University. Breckinridge lived at Burlington, Iowa, for a year, when he returned to Lexington, Kentucky, to practice law. He served in the Mexican War, and was afterwards a member of Congress. In 1856, when he was about thirty-five years of age, he was elected vice-president of the United States, with James Buchanan as president. In 1860 Breckinridge was the candidate of the Southern slaveholders for the presidency, but Abraham Lincoln received 180 electoral votes to his 72, Kentucky failing to support him. He took his seat in the United States Senate in March, 1861, as the successor of John J. Crittenden, and he at once became the champion of the Southern Confederacy in that body. He was expelled from the Senate on December 4, 1861, on which occasion he delivered his farewell address. Breckinridge then went South. He was appointed a major-general, and he saw service at Shiloh, Chickamauga, Cold Harbor, Nashville, and in several other great battles. From January to April, 1865, General Breckinridge was Jefferson Davis's secretary of war. When the Confederacy surrendered, he made his escape to Europe, where he remained for three years, when he returned to Lexington and to his law practice. General Breckinridge died at Lexington, Kentucky, May 17, 1875. Ten years later an imposing statue was erected to his memory on Cheapside, Lexington. He was a man of most attractive personality, an eloquent orator, a capable advocate, a brave soldier, an honest public servant, the greatest member of the house of Breckinridge.
Bibliography. The Library of Oratory (New York, 1902, v. x); J. C. S. Blackburn's oration upon Breckinridge; McClure's Magazine (January, 1901). For many years Col. J. Stoddard Johnston has been engaged upon a life of Breckinridge.
HENRY CLAY
[From Obituary Addresses on the Occasion of the Death of the Hon. Henry Clay (Washington, 1852)]