THE

BOOK OF ORATORY:

A NEW COLLECTION OF EXTRACTS IN

PROSE, POETRY, AND DIALOGUE,

CONTAINING SELECTIONS FROM

DISTINGUISHED AMERICAN AND ENGLISH ORATORS,
DIVINES, AND POETS;

OF WHICH

MANY ARE SPECIMENS OF THE ELOQUENCE OF STATESMEN OF THE
PRESENT DAY.

FOR THE USE OF COLLEGES, ACADEMIES, AND SCHOOLS.

BY EDWARD C. MARSHALL, M. A.

LATE INSTRUCTOR IN A MILITARY SCHOOL AT WEST POINT, IN GENEVA COLLEGE,
AND IN THE NEW YORK UNIVERSITY.

Nemo est orator, qui se Demosthenis similem esse nolit.

CICERO, de Optimo genere Oratorum.

NEW YORK.

D. APPLETON & COMPANY,

90, 92 & 94 GRAND STREET.

EDUCATION DEPT.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1851,

By D. APPLETON & COMPANY

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern
District of New York,

M367
во

Eve
Dest

ΤΟ

HORACE WEBSTER, LL. D..

THE ABLE HEAD OF

THE NEW YORK FREE ACADEMY,

WHO HAS BEEN, FOR MORE THAN

A QUARTER OF A CENTURY

IDENTIFIED

WITH SOUND COLLEGIATE EDUCATION

IN THE STATE OF NEW YORK,

This Volume

IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED.

M209498

PREFACE.

Ax experience of eight years as an instructor of elocution, as well as of other branches, in a military school at West Point, in Geneva College, and in the discharge of duties, among which is the teaching of oratory in the department of History and BellesLettres of the New York Free Academy, having induced the belief that the selections in the leading books upon this subject are mostly too hackneyed to be used with great benefit in our colleges and schools, the determination was formed to prepare a collection of newer material, and the present volume is offered as the result of that undertaking. A great part of the selections which are here submitted to the public, appear for the first time in a book of this character; and an important feature of the work is to present specimens of the eloquence of the more recent living as well as deceased statesmen from all parts of the Union, which has not been attempted, it is believed, in any other similar collection.

The compiler's experience in the use of other works has been, also, that most of the articles are too long for the wants of students, and he has endeavored to digest the material here presented with great care, omitting all parts of the extracts which are unnecessary to the development of their leading ideas, or which would render them too prolix. Many of the best specimens of our literature will therefore be found so abridged, with special reference to their convenient length as exercises in oratory in colleges and schools, and, it is believed, without essentially marring their beauty. He trusts that his labor in select