Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell eBook

Hugh Blair Grigsby
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 182 pages of information about Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell.

Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell eBook

Hugh Blair Grigsby
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 182 pages of information about Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell.
how, at a later day, when, on the eve of the conclusion of the war in Europe, it was resolved to commence hostilities with England, he sought to postpone the struggle for a season, convinced that a short delay would render it unnecessary, and how signally his foresight was justified by the result; thus recommending, in opposition to the pervading sentiment of the State, a policy which would have saved thousands of valuable lives, and a hundred millions of money, expended in our contest with England; how, at a still later day, when the Senate of the United States, unconsciously and needlessly, were about to involve us in a war with Spain, his eloquence rescued the country from the impending danger; yet, when war was declared against his will, ever ready to unite with his countrymen in prosecuting hostilities with the greatest vigor; how, alone among all the departed statesmen of Virginia, he managed, with the industry and attention of an ordinary citizen, his private affairs, into which he introduced a system which the planter and the merchant might wisely imitate, and which enabled him to compete with his most skilful contemporaries in the success which followed all his exertions; how, unseduced by a love of gold in an age of speculation, he never committed a dollar to the caprices of fortune, or lost an investment; how, though affluent with wealth, won mainly by downright industry, and waxing greater every hour by the force of that wondrous element in the accumulation of money, a lengthened lapse of years, he constantly and steadily turned his back upon the extravagance and social follies of the day, and exhibited in his household and in his life those stern and sterling virtues of prudence, economy, and thrift, which were the characteristics of the early fathers of the republic; displaying before the eyes of the people a model wherein the loftiest genius, the most varied and profound learning, the most fervid patriotism ever sinking self in country, the severe simplicity and frugality which should ever shine along the track of a true republican statesman, and an escutcheon undebased by a solitary vice, were united in all their fair and grand proportions; how, in his happy home, he dispensed, freely and without price, the marvellous stores of learning and experience which he had amassed during his long and eventful career, turning his modest study into a chamber of philosophy, and the well-spring of oracles more practical, more prudent, more profound, and penetrating further into the abyss of the dark and illimitable future than were ever uttered at the Pythian fane; and last, though not least, how, in the lingering twilight of his years as in their earliest dawn, he loved Virginia, not with that cold feeling which looks to latitude and longitude, to East or to West, as the limits of affection, but, first, in that tender and household light, as the home of his ancestry, the sepulchre of his sires, his own birth and burial-place, and the birth and burial-place of those who were dear to him,
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Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.