Standard Selections: A Collection and Adaptation of Superior Productions from Best Authors for Use in Class Room and on the Platform
General
Standard Selections: A Collection and Adaptation of Superior Productions from Best Authors for Use in Class Room and on the Platform
Recitations
earthly king, yet serve the king of heaven."
Serve then that immortal and ever merciful King, who will value a sigh
or a cup of cold water, given in His name, more than all others will
value the shedding of your blood. And begin to reckon the time of your
useful services from the day on which you gave yourselves to so
beneficent a Master. Will not ye too come, ye whom he honored by making
you his friends? To whatever extent you enjoyed his confidence, come
all of you, and surround his tomb. Mingle your prayers with your tears;
and while admiring, in so great a prince, a friendship so excellent, an
intercourse so sweet, preserve the remembrance of a hero whose goodness
equaled his courage. Thus may he ever prove your cherished instructor;
thus may you profit by his virtues; and may his death, which you
deplore, serve you at once for consolation and example.
For myself, if permitted, after all others, to render the last offices
at his tomb, O Prince, the worthy subject of our praises and regrets,
thou wilt live forever in my memory. There will thy image be traced, but
not with that bold aspect which promises victory. No, I would see in you
nothing which death can efface. You will have in that image only
immortal traits. I shall behold you such as you were in your last hours
under the hand of God, when His glory began to dawn upon you. There
shall I see you more triumphant than at Fribourg and at Rocroy; and
ravished by so glorious a triumph, I shall give thanks in the beautiful
words of the well-beloved disciple, "This is the victory that overcometh
the world, even our faith." Enjoy, O Prince, this victory, enjoy it
forever, through the everlasting efficacy of that sacrifice.
V. WILLIAM PITT, EARL OF CHATHAM
I. WAR WITH AMERICA[28]
I will not join in congratulation on misfortune and disgrace. I cannot
concur in a blind and servile address, which approves and endeavors to
sanctify the monstrous measures which have heaped disgrace and
misfortune upon us. This, my lords, is a perilous and tremendous moment!
It is not a time for adulation. The smoothness of flattery cannot now
avail; cannot save us in this rugged and awful crisis. It is now
necessary to instruct the throne in the language of truth. We must
dispel the illusion and the darkness which envelop it, and display, in
its full danger and true colors, the ruin that is brought to our doors.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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