PREFACE. THE following work is an attempt to present the oratorical features of the American Revolution. The political history of the country has been ably written. Vivid delineations of our early martial heroes are also before the public. All the great leaders in the various departments of statesmanship, literature, science and art, have received the meed of skillful scrutiny and discriminated praise. In view of this general appreciation of our illustrious fathers, it is the more remarkable that so little attention has been paid to the particular merits of the great leaders of the American forum. True, a good deal has been said of them in biographical sketches, legislative history, and traditionary annals; but we are not aware that any work has heretofore been devoted to a critical and comprehensive examination of our great orators as Many pointed allusions and partial descriptions lie such. about in books of various kinds, facts, anecdotes, and frag mentary sentiments, which are to a full analysis of specif traits and the judicious estimate of individual worth, what confused mass of indefinite outlines are to a gallery of elabo rate full-lengths, each distinctly drawn, rounded into sym metrical shape and colored with appropriate tone. Our leading speakers, in Colonial and Revolutionary times, were distinguished not more for their general ability, than for the wonderful originality of talent with which each in particular was characterized. To indicate this individuality of oratorical excellence, and the results which by a mighty unity in diversity were produced, is the object of the present publication. Each one of the following portraitures briefly comprehends the earthly career of its subject; but, in accordance with the above avowal, the reader may expect to meet with historical details, only so far as they are requisite to explain the preliminary training and elucidate the peculiar eloquence of the master under consideration. The dates and circumstances employed for this purpose the author has gathered from all the resources within his reach. It will be observed that several of the personages herein portrayed do not strictly belong to the Revolutionary period of our history. But, like the great patriots who preceded them in the battles of life and solemnities of death, their merits are worthy of profound study and perpetual emulation. |