Macaulay says: “At his first appearance in Parliament he showed himself superior to all his contemporaries in command of language. He could pour out a long succession of round and stately periods, without ever pausing for a word, without ever repeating a word, in a voice of silver clearness, and with a pronunciation so articulate that not a letter was slurred over.”
These men, father and son, were never excelled in debate. They were always ready. Every advantage that the occasion allowed was taken at the time, and the favorable moment never went by while they were preparing. They each attained a power they never would have possessed had it been necessary for them to use manuscript or depend on their memory. The time others have wasted in writing special orations, they employed in such wide culture, and in accumulating such vast stores of knowledge, that they were always ready. They were able to come to great intellectual contests with their minds fresh and un-fagged by previous composition.
But it may be said that with all their power they were destitute of polish and beauty. In such fragments of their speeches as have been preserved, it is true that gracefulness is less conspicuous than force, and the opponent of unwritten speech may imagine that this is a necessary consequence of the manner in which they spoke. The advantage they gained was worth the cost, even if this lack of the finer and more elegant qualities of speech was inevitable. But that this does not necessarily result from extempore speech, is abundantly proved by the example of their great rival—
EDMUND BURKE.
This prince of imaginative orators was an Irishman. He was born in 1730, and graduated in Dublin University at the age of twenty. For a short time afterward he studied law, but soon grew weary of it and turned his attention to philosophy and literature. The productions of his pen speedily won an enviable reputation. A “Vindication of Natural Society” was speedily followed by the celebrated “Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful.”
His appearance in Parliament, the great arena of British eloquence, was comparatively late in life, but as soon as elected he gave promise of the great brilliancy he afterward displayed. For more than thirty years he had no superior in that august body, and scarcely an equal. He stood side by side with Pitt in defence of America, and endeared himself to every lover of liberty in both hemispheres. The great impeachment of Warren Hastings was mainly brought about by his influence, and afforded room for all his powers. The war with France was the last great theme upon which his eloquence was employed, and in it his strongly conservative views alienated him from most of his former friends.
During all this time his eloquence was a wonder both to friend and foe, and in its own style was never equalled in the House of Commons, or in the world. His speech on the impeaching of Warren Hastings, made at the bar of the House of Lords, was an unparalleled effort. It extended over a period of four days, and bore everything before it. On the third day of this great speech, he described the cruelties inflicted on some of the natives of India by one of Hastings’s agents, with such vividness that one convulsive shudder ran through the whole assemblage, while the speaker was so much affected by the picture he had penciled, that he dropped his head upon his hands, and was for some moments unable to proceed. Some, who were present, fell into a swoon, while even Hastings himself, who disclaimed all responsibility for these things, was overwhelmed. In speaking of the matter afterwards he says: “For half an hour I looked upon the orator in a revery of wonder, and actually felt myself to be the most culpable man on earth.” Lord Thurlow, who was present, declares that long after, many who were present had not recovered from the shock, and probably never would.
Soon after, the great speech of Sheridan was delivered. Like Burke’s, it was extempore, and no report of it, worthy the name, remains. It was only inferior to the mighty effort that preceded it. A clergyman who came to the house strongly prepossessed in favor of Hastings, said at the close of the first hour, to a friend who sat by him, “This is mere declamation without proof.” When another hour had passed, he remarked, “This is a wonderful oration.” Another hour went by, and again he spoke: “Warren Hastings certainly acted unjustifiably.” At the end of the fourth hour he said: “Hastings is an atrocious criminal.” When the speech closed at the end of the fifth hour, he vehemently declared, “Of all monsters of iniquity, Warren Hastings is certainly the most enormous.”
For seven long years this unprecedented trial went on. More than one-third of those who sat on the judge’s bench when it began were in their graves. When, at last it drew to a close, Burke made to the Lords a closing charge worthy of his genius:
“My Lords,” said he, “I have done! The part of the Commons is concluded! With a trembling hand we consign the product of these long, long labors to your charge. Take it! Take it! It is a sacred trust! Never before was a cause of such magnitude submitted to any human tribunal.... My Lords, it has pleased Providence to place us in such a stage that we appear every moment to be on the verge of some great mutation. There is one thing, and one thing only that defies mutation—that which existed before the world itself. I mean JUSTICE; that justice which, emanating from the Divinity, has a place in the breast of every one of us, given us for our guide with regard to ourselves and with regard to others; and which will stand after this globe is burned to ashes, our advocate or our accuser before our great Judge, when He comes to call upon us for the tenor of a well spent life.”