"Have Men of Action Been More Beneficial
to the World Than Men of Thought?" Debate Speech of
William M. Coleman
for the
Dialectic Society, June 2, 1857
1
Coleman, William Macon, 1838-ca. 1916
Cover page
Page 3
felt the influences of
Christianity." My opponent should have shone his
proofs
2
for such startling assertions: as it is, I deny
it in toto the facts in
toto, and leave you gentlemen to decide between
us.
Scarsely less exceptionable is his view of the
Chinese. The
argument, their great antiquity and early civilization, was used by
Voltaire against the
Christian
religion, and has been fully answered by
Tytler. And I think the hall will hardly expect me to take
charge of the long-tailed, puppy-eating, man-poisoning people and defend them
as being men of thought
Unfortunately for himself has the gentleman alluded to the
battle of
Tours. Suppose the result had been different would it not have been
equally the result of
attributed to action. But the genius of
Charles
Martel and the superior skill of his troops,
enabled gained him the victory over the
more active, but but less intelligent hordes that opposed him.
But to
Germany he
goes for his stronghold. Here it is. The
Germans are
thinkers,
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and therefore do not enjoy civil liberty!
Why not say with equal propriety that
Russia,
Spain,
South
American and the Eastern world are in bondage and are therefore
distinguished for men of thought?
Germany has
struggled, but other causes have kept her down.
Before I leave the gentleman's arguments, let me thank him for the
new light he has thrown upon the nature of thought, when he says or certainly
intimates, that it brings on repose and luxury which latter evil has destroyed
the mightiest states.
In comparing men of thought with men of action, let us look for a
moment into the nature of their respective departments, and on which is the
more powerful agent to influence and affect the human race.
The soul of man is the breath of
Jehovah, and
in the exercise of Reason, man as a living mortal being approaches nearest his
Creator.
Mind, or soul if you will, is the distinguishing feature of our race, its own
earnest of immortality. Will it then be rational to suppose that its workings
are
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disproportioned to its glorious origin? No.
Mankind have always held the powers of mind reverence. In the days of
Hesiod and
Homer, men of
thought were ranked among the
immor
Celestials.
Pallas
leaping from the brain of
Jupiter, the
eloquence of
Hermes and
the melody of
Apollo's lyre
are significant emblems. And this not in an age when mind had stretched far and
wide her empire, but when
action had its
widest field and fairest prospects for supremacy. Wild beast were to be
destroyed and more savage men to be subdued. Constant feuds gave little time
for else than most vigorous action. Exploits of daring and strength were indeed
highly appreciated, yet here the power of mind is found to be superior. True
Hercules
was deified for his labours in behalf of man, yet he was ranked but half a god.
Should any one deny the supremacy of mind to action in the barbarous and
semi-barous ages of the world, let him seek an answer from the
Sybil at
Delphi,
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the priests of
Egypt and of
Persia, the
Brahmins of
India and the
Druids of
the
Celts. Who
could play like these upon the human heart, or grasp with stronger hands the
reins to direct its course? But why dwell upon this topic? Why call you to look
on the brilliant atchievements of Oratory, the chastening and happy effects of
Poetry? The history of the past is replete with the power of thought, and the
present shows that it is the great high way to honour and destinction. The
influence of thought rolls on like a mighty river which its tributaries have
swollen to a mightier magnitude. And so it will roll on when men who have
astonished and alarmed the world by their deeds will be forgotten. When the
name of
Alexander shall be lost among men
Plato will
live.
Tasso will be
read with delight when the Crusaders are regarded as myths of the past.
Philosophers will kneel at the shrines of
Newton
and
Bacon, and man do homage to
Shakespeare's genius
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when
Brittannia's bulwarks are swept from the deep; and the
lonely
Thames
sweeps moaning by the ruins of the dismantled city, so rolls the
Simois
3 now, and so the yellow
Tiber,
but their glory has
4
not all de-parted. To-day in many a village school war rages under the
Trojan
5
walls, and the wanderings of
Eneas, and
the woes of unhappy
Dido are again
remembered.
Gentlemen may call this declamation if they like, but it is true.
The power of thought is so apparent, that had it not been contrasted with the
power of action, it would be useless to have entered the lists in opposition.
But the power of action is gigantic. Man like the ocean is forever heaving,
struggling, restless. The longing to be something better than what we are is
inherent in all the sons of men, and man toils on. The principle of action
knows no bounds; there is nothing except what the eternal laws of Nature has
forbidden that it will not attempt, nothing at which it will be
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discouraged. The energies of the human bosom are
always in a glow and their fire is extinguished but with life. Go to the queen
cities of the world and see the busy throngs that hurry to and fro. Take refuge
from the smoke and din of towns in the quiet country, see there the same
enterprise and industry, the same incentives to exertion. The same is heard in
the ring of the hammer and the anvil, the clack of the loom, the rattling of
wheels and the
buzz of whiz of the
engine. All is life; all is action.
But although such is the case, where we compare the power of thought
with the power of action, we are surprised as much at the supremacy of the one
as at the plenitude of the other. Action sits georgiously enthroned, and the
glittering jewels of her crown excite the crowd below to struggle on. Thought
quietly and gently from below herself points out the way. Action is powerful by
example, Thought in all the elements that constitute power. Action may sweep
like a tempest over the earth and hurl to the dust all that is venerable and
all that sacred, may tear
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down well established
governments and substitute the wildest theories, but it can not strike one
chord in the human bosom. Thought controlls man himself. It is an emenation
6
from
the
Creator and and is loaned to us for the noblest purposes.
If men of thought, then, are able to exert greater influence on
their fellows than men of action, let us next see what are some of the grand
objects they have respectively accomplished.
It is a dreary prospect to look back over the scenes of past ages.
Though the eye lingers with some pleasure upon the times of
Socrates
and
Aristotle,
of
Virgil and of
Cicero, yet these rise but for a moment above the
surrounding gloom, and relapse into their former barbarism. And what was this
cloud that veiled the ancient in darkness—thick darkness that might be
felt? I answer Ignorance and Superstition. And should the question be asked
when did they begin to emerge, I would reply, towards the close of the
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middl
ages when learning was revived. It may be argued, though that happiness
does not advance equally with civilization, and that the conventionalities and
distinctions of social life bring evils in their train which more than balance
the good; in other words that man in a savage state is in the happier
condition. This may do for an Epicurean, but for one who rightly estimates
man's noble destiny it weighs lightly. To roam the fields and paddle the rivers
in primaeval simplicity, to know no care, to be satisfied with the spontaneous
productions of Nature, and perchance have the ear regalled with the death cry
of a victim or two, must surely be delightful to the admirers of the good old
times, or rather man in a state of nature.
But what roused man from the torpor in which he had been lying, and
inspired him to shake off the chains in which he had been so long confined? Was
it the barons who forced the
Magna
Charta from
John? Alas! no; for it was laughed to scorn by the
Tudors and
trampled under foot by the
Stuarts.
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We look for it in
vain in the heroic ages of the ancient world.
Alexander and
Caesar filled the soul with thirstings after glory, but
hardly embued it with philanthropy. I hold it true that freedom of thought must
precede fredom of action, as the fire must burn before the engine can give its
ponderous strokes. Where then are we to look for this star that has risen in
glory over our globe? In the cells of
Wirtemburg, the cloistered monk
Martin
Luther
. He the patient student who after years of almost hopeless
toil and disappointment at length emerged into a glorious light. He who nailed
his theses to the door, and bade the
Pope and
his myrmidons defiance. Here was the beginning of the new era. Here was the
dawn of the then glorious future we now enjoy. Then men began though astonished
at their own recklessness to ask why man should
toil slave for his brother.
Europe was
beginning to wake from her slumbers. Human rights began to be discussed. The
People now began to feel their strength, and priests and prelates were struck
dumb with astonishment
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and dismay. The Press soon
lent her aid, and the tide rolled on. On it rolled to the
Brittish
Isle and back to the
Netherlands and
France,
until it was lost in the swelling waves of papal opposition. I have dwelt upon
this period because I believe it to be more pregnant with "the seeds of
things," as
Bacon
has it,
7 than any other. Had I time to trace the thread of
history and show the effects of this new doctrine upon the world, its power,
its popularity, its ushering in a better day, its brilliant promises now
reallized, and its lasting and happy
effects influences on mankind, the argument deduced would
amply repay me. This I have said was the age of awakening, and I think it has
been satisfactorily shown that the mighty revolution owed its origin to the
greatest thinker of his times.
Take
Charles
XII,
Gustavus8
Adolphus,
Fredrick the great or
Napoleon, or any one distinguished for his actions; aye
take them all together, and compare the effects existing now that they have
produced with those of
Luther, and see what a faint glimmer to the blazing pile.
And where it does glimmer it is painful for the patriot to look. Where is
France? Sunk
so low beneath the pressure of despotism
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that were
Louis
Quatorze to rise from the dead and revisit the scenes of his glory, he
would imagine that the iron dynasty of the
Bourbons
still weilded the sceptre and ground the people as of yore. And
Peter the
great whom historians have delighted to honour, do his countrymen glory
in his name? Perhaps they may who have inherited the power established for his
own ambition, but ask one of the fifty thousand peasants who are slaves to a
single noblemen, or of the exiles in
Siberia, or
of the victims of the knave, and you will hear a different tale. Has not the
pathway of men of action been through broken hearts and human blood? Has not
the wail of the wounded and dying gone up from many a battle field as witnesses
against them? But your boasted men of action of the nineteenth century, perhaps
you think them free from such a charge? Alas! no; we have heard the sob of the
wi
ddow whom they have robbed of her
little store, and seen the infant cast a beggar upon the world, and the
fatherless boy they have cheated of his patrimony earning a scanty
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subsistence by the labour of his little hardened
hands. You have seen the poor ground into the earth by him whose wealth made
him the "highly respectable citizen, and you heard the poor man's cry of
anguish, and saw a fawning public uphold the hands of the oppressor, but there
was none to succour the distressed. Gentlemen this is no fancy sketch. You
whose heads are whiter than ours can vouch with sorrow for its truth. Thousands
of such men whom the world calls active, enterprising and honourable, stalk the
streets of our towns and cities. Thus have these men of action amassed their
riches, and while they have unintentionally assisted in rolling on the ball of
civilization, they have outraged the feelings and trampled on the hearts of
their fellows. And such it seems to me should be the case. I think it cannot be
denied, that men of action—of untiring action, work to promote their own
glory, labour to reach the goal of their ambition. I appeal to history and to
your own experience, gentlemen, if such is not the case. Of course there are
exceptions. There has been a
Howard
and a
Washington, and the heralds of the cross
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have sacrificed themselves in propagating the truths
of
Christianity. But alas! they are so few in the great
crowd that is ever toiling up the hill of life, that they are almost lost to
sight. Not so with men of thought, true many have been and are ambitious to
leave a name behind them, but this is inocent if they wish to distinguish
themselves by being useful to their race.
Whitney,
Fulton,
Morse
and
Franklin were not criminal though ambitious. Well might
they be, and well are they repaid by the blessings of their race.
Calm and meditative, studying man, reflecting
on Time and Eternity
But from the nature of the case we expect men of thought to be
lovers of their race. Calm and meditative, studying man, reflecting on Time and
Eternity, they despise the vain pomp and tinsel of earth; and, looking calmly
with the eye of faith to the grand scene that will be enacted when Time is no
more, they love and serve their
God. And their
writings show, that with the enlarged mind of the schollar and
9
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the heart of the
Christian, they have justified the ways of
God to men, and
directed mortals in the only path of happiness. Such men as these are the pride
and glory of our race; to them are the eyes of their countrymen turned in the
hour of of adversity. Before these how must the sceptered monarch and the
leader of victorious arms vanish into air. But they are immortal. When the
mighty men of valour are covered with the veil of oblivion and there are none
to hymn their praises, then will the names of their teachers and benefactors be
freshly engraven on the hearts of the people for whom they laboured.
Such, Mr. President have been some of the comparative
ends respectively attained by men of thought
and men of action, and such in my opinion their respective characters.
Finis.
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