Part 9 (2/2)

Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be e are totally disaruard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire thesupinely on our backs, and hugging the delusive phantom of Hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot?

”'Sir, we are not weak, if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power

Three millions of people armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our eneht our battles alone There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and ill raise up friends to fight our battles for us

The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone: it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave Besides, sir, we have no election If ere base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest There is no retreat but in sub may be heard on the plains of Boston The war is inevitable And let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come!

”'It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter Gentlemen may cry peace, peace, but there is no peace The war is actually begun The next gale that sweeps fro arms Our brethren are already in the field Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Alhty God! I know not what course others ive me death!'”

Of this tremendous speech there are in existence two traditional descriptions, neither of which is inconsistent with the testie, seems to have retained the iumentative and unimpassioned: the two other reporters seem to have rees Our first traditional description was obtained by Henry Stephens Randall froyman, who heard the speech itself:--

”Henry rose with an unearthly fire burning in his eye He coan more and more to play upon his features and thrill in the tones of his voice The tendons of his neck stood out white and rigid like whip-cords His voice rose louder and louder, until the walls of the building, and all within them, seemed to shake and rock in its tre eye became terrible to look upon Men leaned forward in their seats, with their heads strained forward, their faces pale, and their eyes glaring like the speaker's His last exclaive me death!' was like the shout of the leader which turns back the rout of battle The old man from whom this tradition was derived added that, 'when the orator sat down, he hiazed entranced on Henry It seemed as if a word from him would have led to any wild explosion of violence Men looked beside themselves'”[157]

The second traditional description of the speech is here given from a manuscript[158] of Edward Fontaine, who obtained it in 1834 from John Roane, who himself heard the speech Roane told Fontaine that the orator's ”voice, countenance, and gestures gave an irresistible force to his words, which no description could ible to one who had never seen him, nor heard him speak;” but, in order to convey some notion of the orator'ssentences of the speech:--

”You remember, sir, the conclusion of the speech, so often declaimed in various ways by school-boys,--'Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Alhty God! I know not what course others ivewhich is not conveyed by the reading or delivery of them in the ordinary way When he said, 'Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?' he stood in the attitude of a conde his doom His form was bowed; his wrists were crossed; his manacles were almost visible as he stood like an eony After a solemn pause, he raised his eyes and chained hands towards heaven, and prayed, in words and tones which thrilled every heart, 'Forbid it, Alhty God!' He then turned towards the ti with terror at the idea of the consequences of participating in proceedings which would be visited with the penalties of treason by the British crown; and he slowly bent his form yet nearer to the earth, and said, 'I know not what course others may take,' and he accompanied the words with his hands still crossed, while he seehed doith additional chains The man appeared transformed into an oppressed, heart-broken, and hopeless felon After reh to iination with the condition of the colony under the iron heel of military despotism, he arose proudly, and exclaih his clenched teeth, while his body was thrown back, and every ainst the fetters which bound hie, he looked for aserpents; then the loud, clear, triumphant notes, 'Give me liberty,' electrified the assembly It was not a prayer, but a stern demand, which would submit to no refusal or delay The sound of his voice, as he spoke these memorable words, was like that of a Spartan paean on the field of Plataea; and, as each syllable of the word 'liberty' echoed through the building, his fetters were shi+vered; his arms were hurled apart; and the links of his chains were scattered to the winds When he spoke the word 'liberty' with an eiven it before, his hands were open, and his arms elevated and extended; his countenance was radiant; he stood erect and defiant; while the sound of his voice and the sublinificent incarnation of Freedom, and expressed all that can be acquired or enjoyed by nations and individuals invincible and free After a h to permit the echo of the word 'liberty' to cease, he let his left hand fall powerless to his side, and clenched his right hand firer with the point ai Caesar, while the unconquerable spirit of Cato of Utica flashed frorand appeal with the soleive me death!' which sounded with the awful cadence of a hero's dirge, fearless of death, and victorious in death; and he suited the action to the word by a blow upon the left breast with the right hand, which seeer to the patriot's heart”[159]

Before passing fro respecting the authenticity of the version of it which has come down to us, and which is now so universally known in Aes substantially as it was given by Wirt in his ”Life of Henry” Wirt himself does not mention whence he obtained his version; and all efforts to discover that version as a whole, in any writing prior to Wirt's book, have thus far been unsuccessful These facts have led even so genial a critic as Grigsby to incline to the opinion that ”much of the speech published by Wirt is apocryphal”[160] It would, indeed, be an odd thing, and a source of no little disturbance to many minds, if such should turn out to be the case, and if we should have to conclude that an apocryphal speech written by Wirt, and attributed by hireat orator's death, had done more to perpetuate the renown of Patrick Henry's oratory than had been done by any and all the words actually spoken by the orator hi his lifetisby hiument” and ”some of its expressions” are undoubtedly ”authentic” That this is so is apparent, likewise, froe Tucker, wherein the substance of the speech is given, besides one entire passage in ale of the version by Wirt Finally, John Roane, in 1834, in his conversation with Edward Fontaine, is said to have ”verified the correctness of the speech as it ritten by Judge Tyler for Mr

Wirt”[161] This, unfortunately, is the only inti Wirt's version to the excellent authority of Judge John Tyler If the statement could be confirh the stateh would still re that Wirt's version of the famous speech by no means deserves to be called ”apocryphal,” in any such sense as that word has when applied, for example, to the speeches in Livy and in Thucydides, or in Botta In the first place, Wirt's version certainly gives the substance of the speech as actually made by Patrick Henry on the occasion naathered testi witnesses, and then, from such sentences or snatches of sentences as these witnesses could remember, as well as from his own conception of the orator's method of expression, to have constructed the version which he has handed down to us Even in that case, it is probably far more accurate and authentic than are most of the famous speeches attributed to public characters before reporters' galleries were opened, and before the art of reporting was brought to its present perfection

Returning, now, fro account of Patrick Henry's e in which it was made, it remains to be mentioned that the resolutions, as offered by Patrick Henry, were carried; and that the committee, called for by those resolutions, to prepare a plan for ”e” the militia,[162] was at once appointed Of this committee Patrick Henry was chairman; and with him were associated Richard Henry Lee, Nicholas, Harrison, Riddick, Washi+ngton, Stephen, Lewis, Christian, Pendleton, Jefferson, and Zane On the following day, Friday, the 24th of March, the coht in its report, which was laid over for one day, and then, after some amendment, was unanimously adopted

The convention did not close its labors until Monday, the 27th of March The contemporaneous estimate of Patrick Henry, not merely as a leader in debate, but as a constitutional lawyer, and as a athered from the fact of his connection with each of the two other important committees of this convention,--the coht advance the ter lands in this colony,”[163] on which his associates were the great lawyers, Bland, Jefferson, Nicholas, and Pendleton; and the coement of arts and manufactures in this colony,”[164] on which his associates were Nicholas, Bland, Mercer, Pendleton, Cary, Carter of Stafford, Harrison, Richard Henry Lee, Claphaton, Holt, and Newton

FOOTNOTES:

[136] For an example of such overstate comments thereon by Rives, _Life of Madison_, i

63, 64

[137] 4 _Am Arch_ i 928

[138] 4 _Ibid_ i 947

[139] _Ibid_

[140] 4 _Am Arch_ i 949, 950

[141] _Ibid_ i 953

[142] _Ibid_ 858

[143] _Ibid_ i 963

[144] Hildreth, iii 52