To ripe scholarship Bossuet added a voice that was deep and sonorous, an imposing personality, and an animated and graceful style of gesture.  Lamartine says he had “a voice which, like that of the thunder in the clouds, or the organ in the cathedral, had never been anything but the medium of power and divine persuasion to the soul; a voice which only spoke to kneeling auditors; a voice which spoke in the name of God, an authority of language unequaled upon earth, and against which the lowest murmur was impious and the smallest opposition blasphemy.”  He died in 1704.

BOSSUET 1627-1704

THE FUNERAL SERMON ON THE DEATH OF THE GRANDE CONDE

In beginning this address, in which I purpose to celebrate the immortal glory of Louis de Bourbon, Prince de Conde, I feel myself overweighted both by the grandeur of the subject and, to be frank, by the fruitlessness of the effort.  What part of the inhabited world has not heard of the victories of the Prince de Conde and the wonders of his life?  They are recounted everywhere; the Frenchman who boasts of them in the presence of the foreigner tells him nothing which the latter does not know; and in no matter how exalted a strain I might sound his praises, I should still feel that in your hearts you were convinced that I deserved the reproach of falling far short of doing him justice.  An orator, feeble as he is, can not do anything for the perpetuation of the glory of extraordinary souls.  Le Sage was right when he said that “their deeds alone can praise them”; no other praise is of any effect where great names are concerned; and it needs but the simple story of his deeds faithfully recorded to sustain the glory of the Prince de Conde.

But, while awaiting the appearance of the history which is to tell the story of his life to coming ages, it is necessary to satisfy as best we may the public recognition of his merit and bow to the order of the greatest of all sovereigns.  What does not the kingdom owe to a prince who has honored the house of France, the French name, his century, and, so to speak, all mankind?  Louis the Great himself shares these sentiments; after having mourned this great man, and by his tears, shed in the presence of his entire court, rather than by words, uttered the most glorious eulogy he could receive, he assembled together in this celebrated temple all that is most august in his realm, in order that the last rites to the memory of this prince might there be celebrated; and he wishes that my feeble voice should animate all this funeral equipage.  Let us try, then, to forget our grief.  Here an object greater and worthier of this pulpit presents itself to my mind:  it is God, who makes warriors and conquerors.  “It is Thou,” said David unto Him, “who hast trained my hand to battle, and my fingers to hold the sword.”  If He inspires courage, no less is He the bestower of other great qualities, both of heart and of mind.