James Dabney McCabe

“ Beecher is now fifty-seven years old, but is still in the flush of his intellectual vigor. His eye is as bright, his step as firm and elastic, and his voice as clear and ringing as when he preached his first sermon. His powers have grown with his work, and every year he seems to rise higher in his intellectual supremacy. As a pulpit orator, he has no superior, and certainly there is no man in all this round earth whose eloquence has been productive of greater good to the cause he serves. He is a stout, stocky man in appearance, with a large square face and heavy features. ”

“ This welcome, so genuine and heartfelt, was due, however, to the genius of the man, and not to his nationality.
He had overstepped the bounds of country, and had made himself the poet of the English-speaking race. A man of vast learning and varied acquirements, thoroughly versed in the ways of the world, he is still as simple and unaffected in thought and ways as when he listened to and wondered at the dashing of the wild waves on the shore in his boyhood's home. A most gifted and accomplished artist, he has been faithful to nature in all things. ”

“ I have sought to tell simply and truthfully the story of the trials and triumphs of our self-made men, to show how they overcame where others failed, and to offer the record of their lives as models worthy of the imitation of the young men of our country. No one can hope to succeed in life merely by the force of his own genius, any more than he can hope to live without exerting some degree of influence for good or evil upon the community in which his lot is cast. ”

“ He knows human nature thoroughly, and he talks to his people of what they have been thinking of during the week, of trials that have perplexed them, and of joys which have blessed them. He takes the clerk and the merchant to task for their conduct in the walks of business, and warns them of the snares and pitfalls which lie along their paths. He strips the thin guise of honesty from the questionable transactions of Wall Street, and holds them up to public scorn. He startles many a one by his sudden penetration and denunciation of what that one supposes to be the secrets of his heart. ”

“ These simple people, the majority of whom had heard nothing of Fulton's experiments, beheld what they supposed to be a huge monster, vomiting fire and smoke from its throat, lashing the water with its fins, and shaking the river with its roar, approaching rapidly in the very face of both wind and tide. Some threw themselves flat on the deck of their vessels, where they remained in an agony of terror until the monster had passed, while others took to their boats and made for the shore in dismay, leaving their vessels to drift helplessly down the stream. ”

“ Fifty years have now passed away since the young school-teacher landed in New York, and he stands to-day at the head of the mercantile interests of the New World. In the half-century which has elapsed since then, he has won a fortune which is variously estimated at from twenty-five to forty millions of dollars. He has gained all this wealth fairly, not by trickery and deceit, or even by a questionable honesty, but by a series of mercantile transactions the minutest of which bears the impress of his sterling integrity, and by a patience, energy, tact, and genius of which few men are possessed. ”

“ It is the most complete newspaper establishment in existence. It has two cellars, in which are placed the two steam-engines that drive the huge presses which strike off the various editions of "The Herald." Every thing is in perfect order, and the machinery shines like polished gold and silver. The proprietor's eye is upon the whole establishment, and he is quick to notice and reprimand a fault. The street floor contains the business office of the journal, a magnificent room, gorgeous with marble, plate-glass, black walnut, and frescoes. ”

“ When the Constitution was adopted, the chief source of apprehension for its permanence with men like Patrick Henry, and other wise statesmen, was the extent of our territory. The Alleghanies, it was thought, had put asunder communities whom no paper constitution could unite. But at that early day, when Ohio was the far West, and no steamboat had yet gone up the Mississippi, Astor looked beyond the Ohio, beyond the Mississippi, and the Rocky Mountains, and saw the whole American territory, from ocean to ocean, the domain of one united nation, the seat of trade and industry. ”

“ During all this frightful time I have constantly remained in the city, and, without neglecting any public duties, I have played a part which will make you smile. Would you believe it, my friend, that I have visited as many as fifteen sick people in a day, and what will surprise you still more, I have lost only one patient, an Irishman, who would drink a little. I do not flatter myself that I have cured one single person, but you will think with me that in my quality of Philadelphia physician I have been very moderate, and that not one of my confreres have killed fewer than myself. ”

“ Booth has steadily risen in power and finish as an actor, for his labors have been unceasing. Great as his triumphs have been, he does not regard himself as freed from the necessity of study. His studies have become more intelligent than in former years, but not the less faithful. He has the true artist's aspiration after the rarest perfection in his art, though to those of us without the charmed circle it is difficult to see how he can excel his present excellence. ”

“ Those who have seen it working in the subterranean press-rooms of the journals of the great metropolis will not soon forget the wonderful sight. The ear is deafened with the incessant clashing of the machinery; the printed sheets issue from the sides of the huge engine in an unceasing stream; the eye is bewildered with the mass of lines and bands; and it seems hard to realize that one single mind could ever have adjusted all the various parts to work harmoniously.
The following is a description of the ten-cylinder steam printing-press now used in the office of the New York World. ”

“ In every household there is drudgery; in every household there is sorrow; in every household there is low-thoughted evil. If you come as a prince, with a cheerful, buoyant nature, in the name of God, do not lay aside those royal robes of yours. Let humor bedew duty; let it flash across care. Let gayety take charge of dullness. So employ these qualities that they shall be to life what carbonic acid is to wine, making it foam and sparkle. ”

“ We shall now relate the story of one who having already won fortune, periled it all upon an enterprise in which his own genius had recognized the path to fame and to still greater success, but which the almost united voice of the people of his country condemned as visionary, and from which they coldly held aloof until its brilliant success compelled them to acknowledge the wisdom and foresight of its projector. ”

“ Without seeking to represent the intensity of passion, he deals with the fresh, simple emotions of the human soul, and in his simplicity lies his power. He touches a chord that finds an echo in every heart, and his poems have a humanity in them that is irresistible. We admire the "grand old masters," but shrink abashed from their sublime measures. Longfellow is so human, he understands us so well, that we turn instinctively to his simple, tender songs for comfort in sorrow, or for the greater perfection of our happiness. ”

“ The merchant and the lawyer, the journalist and the mechanic, reading its pages, found that the stern realities of life had not withered up all the romance of their natures, and under its fascinations they became boys again. Even Horace Greeley, that most practical and unimaginative of men, became rapturous over it. It was a great success, and established the poet's fame beyond all question, and since then its popularity has never waned. ”

“ He had given millions upon millions of dollars to the cotton-growing States, he had opened the way for the establishment of the vast cotton-spinning interests of his own country and Europe, and yet, after fourteen years of hard labor, he was a poor man, the victim of a wealthy, powerful, and, in his case, a dishonest class, who had robbed him of his rights and of the fortune he had so fairly earned. Truly, "wisdom is better than strength, but the poor man's wisdom is despised." ”

“ Although the annual wine product is estimated at nearly three millions of gallons, there can be no doubt that ere many years shall have elapsed America will rank as one of the most important wine countries of the world. California is already extending her vineyards for miles along her smiling valleys, where the clear sky and the balmy air, which are unchangeable at the season of the grape harvest, permit a degree of perfection in the fruit unattainable in any European country. ”

“ Courage and patience have been his watchwords, and although the snows of time have bleached his hair, the same intelligence and enterprising spirit, the same urbane disposition that endeared him to the friends of his youth, still cause all who know him to rejoice in the honorable independence which his great invention has secured to his age. ”

“ Time was of no consequence compared with knowledge, and he was never anxious to hurry through with his work. It soon came to be recognized by his employer and fellow-workmen that he was the best fitted for those portions of the work upon the instrument which required the greatest patience as well as the greatest care, and the most difficult and delicate work was always intrusted to him, his wages being, of course, in proportion. Other men had no thought but to earn a living. This man meant to win fame and fortune, and to enlarge the scope of that art to which he was so passionately devoted. ”

“ There was sure to be some white-capped, silver-haired old lady, whose long years had been counted by the venerable pendulum with unerring precision, ready to defend the cause of the clock, to vouch for its accuracy, and to plead its cause so well and so skillfully, that you were ready to hide your face in shame at the thought of having even suspected the veracity of so venerable and so honored an institution. ”

“ Brady won a remarkable triumph by his management of the case, and the whole city rang with his eloquence. So great was the effect of his speech upon the audience, that many of them who were total strangers to him crowded around him as he left the court-house to congratulate him. Though defeated in the verdict of the jury, this case was a great triumph for Mr. Brady. It established his fame as an advocate, and advanced him at once to a foremost place at the bar. ”