Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 556 pages of information about Modern Eloquence.

Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 556 pages of information about Modern Eloquence.

  “Mortals, who would follow me,
  Love Virtue; she alone is free;
  She can teach ye how to climb
  Higher than the sphery chime. 
  Or if Virtue feeble were,
  Heaven itself would stoop to her.”

[At the conclusion of Senator Sumner’s speech the audience arose and gave cheer upon cheer.]

THOMAS DEWITT TALMAGE

BEHOLD THE AMERICAN!

[Speech of Rev. Dr. T. DeWitt Talmage at the eighty-first annual dinner of the New England Society in the City of New York, December 22, 1886.  The President of the Society, Judge Horace Russell, introduced Dr. Talmage to speak to the toast, “Forefathers’ Day.”]

MR. PRESIDENT, AND ALL YOU GOOD NEW ENGLANDERS:  If we leave to the evolutionists to guess where we came from and to the theologians to prophesy where we are going to, we still have left for consideration the fact that we are here; and we are here at an interesting time.  Of all the centuries this is the best century, and of all the decades of the century this is the best decade, and of all the years of the decade this is the best year, and of all the months of the year this is the best month, and of all the nights of the month this is the best night. [Applause and laughter.] Many of these advantages we trace straight back to Forefathers’ Day, about which I am to speak.

But I must not introduce a new habit into these New England dinners and confine myself to the one theme.  For eighty-one years your speakers have been accustomed to make the toast announced the point from which they start, but to which they never return. [Laughter.] So I shall not stick to my text, but only be particular to have all I say my own, and not make the mistake of a minister whose sermon was a patchwork from a variety of authors, to whom he gave no credit.  There was an intoxicated wag in the audience who had read about everything, and he announced the authors as the minister went on.  The clergyman gave an extract without any credit to the author, and the man in the audience cried out:  “That’s Jeremy Taylor.”  The speaker went on and gave an extract from another author without credit for it, and the man in the audience said:  “That is John Wesley.”  The minister gave an extract from another author without credit for it, and the man in the audience said:  “That is George Whitefield.”  When the minister lost his patience and cried out, “Shut up, you old fool!” the man in the audience replied:  “That is your own.” [Laughter.]

Well, what about this Forefathers’ Day?  In Brooklyn they say the Landing of the Pilgrims was December the 21st; in New York you say it was December the 22d.  You are both right.  Not through the specious and artful reasoning you have sometimes indulged in, but by a little historical incident that seems to have escaped your attention.  You see, the Forefathers landed in the morning of December the

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Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.