"But, sir, I feel that the object of this delightful festival is not to reward the brilliant achievements of a performer: proud as we may be, as Philadelphians, of his success, we have a higher motive; we feel, and would by these ceremonies express, that our townsman has successfully trod a path dangerous to all, and that
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green as is the chaplet which he has acquired as an actor, its beauty and redolence are derived from his virtues as a man. The credit of high professional excellence is awarded, and the man admired,—that in the case of our honored guest it has served to give exercise to the virtues of the citizen, the friend, and the relative.
"On another, a former occasion, I united with many citizens now here in a festival to a gentleman of eminence as an actor and of high credit as a dramatic author. I allude to Mr. Knowles. The hospitalities of the evening were acknowledged by the recipient, and were made most gratifying to those who extended them. But how different were they from those of this occasion! They lacked the interest of early associations, the sympathy of common citizenship: the fame we celebrated was great, but it was not our own. The occasion then was not like this; we come here not to be hospitable, nor to extend courtesy to a stranger. We come to express an appreciation of talent, our respects for faculties nobly but meekly borne, our gratitude for true Americanism exhibited abroad, and our appreciation of the gentleman at home,—to say to the world that even as a stranger they may applaud the actor in proportion to his deservings, because here at home, where he is fully known, the man is loved.
"Sir, alone and unaided has Forrest gained his present eminence, by the ascending power of talents and perseverance alone; the press has found time only to record his conquests of fame, and this festival is the spontaneous offering of admiring citizens to one of their number, who, in doing so much for himself, has reflected honor on them.
"The Philadelphia press, however, sir, will ever feel it a duty to find it a pleasure to encourage talents of a high order, and to promote their appreciation and reward. I speak the more confidently, as I stand among those of its directors who are concerned themselves in such a course, and who feel their responsibility in this respect to society."
Richard Penn Smith responded to a toast with much felicity. He said "he recalled with pleasure his intercourse with Mr. Forrest, for whom he wrote his tragedy entitled Caius Marius, but regretted that even the transcendent talents of his friend could not save his hero from perishing among the ruins of Carthage."
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Mr. Smith said that "on such an occasion it would be unpardonable to overlook one who stood foremost in the ranks of our dramatic writers,—a gentleman who had distinguished himself by his various talents as an artist and an author, and whose dramatic works would ultimately secure him an enviable fame." He referred to Wm. Dunlap, of New York, and read the following letter:
"New York, December 11th, 1837.
"Gentlemen,—I received, on the evening of the 9th instant, your polite letter, doing me the honor of requesting my presence at a public dinner to be given to Edwin Forrest on the 15th instant. Nothing but the progress of winter, which I see around me, and feel within, could prevent my testifying in person how highly I appreciate the invitation of the committee and the gentleman to whom the public mark of esteem is to be given. Permit me to offer a toast:
"The American Actor, who, both in public and private life, upholds the honor of his country,—Edwin Forrest.
"William Dunlap."
"Mr. President," said Mr. Smith, "I will offer you a toast, which I have no doubt will be cordially responded to,—
"William Dunlap—The Nestor of the American Drama. May he live to see the edifice become what his foundation promised!"
The President called upon Mr. Charles Ingersoll, chairman of the Committee of Invitation, for a sentiment, to which Mr. Ingersoll responded:
"Mr. Chairman,—I have been desired by the committee to propose the health of a gentleman who is among us,—a friend of our immediate guest,—who has left his business in a sister city to comply with their invitation to give us his presence to-day,—a gentleman well known in the department of letters, as our guest upon your right is in that of the drama, as peculiarly and characteristically American. We are met to congratulate upon his successes a man radically American. The occasion is, therefore, appropriate to the cultivation of nationality,—a virtue which, though it is said to have grown into a weed in our political and individual relations, we have never been accused of fostering overmuch in literature and the arts; and he who cultivates it
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there deserves our signal approbation. Short of that illiberality which impedes the march of improvement, let us cherish a partiality, an honest, homely prejudice, for what is our own. To know ourselves is not the whole circle of wisdom; we must love ourselves too. Who sees an American audience crowd to an American play and turn from Shakspeare to call for Metamora and the Gladiator, and does not acknowledge in this fond prejudice the germ of excellence? Patriotism itself is a blind preference of our own earth; and shall there be no patriotism in letters? Take from Walter Scott his local prepossessions,—his Scotch kings, Scotch hills, Scotchmen, and the round of characters that he carries with him to all times and all places wherever his scene be laid,—deprive him, in a word, of his nationality, and what is he? Cut from his harp his own strings, and where is his music? There is no virtue without excess; such is human imperfection. Give us, then, nationality, which is but a phase of patriotic feeling; give us excess of it. Let us love the yet barren hills of our own literature, and we shall learn to make them wave and smile with harvests. Let our authors, like the gentleman we are about to drink to, strike their roots into their native soil and spread themselves to their native sun, and, like him, they will flourish. I propose
"A health and a hearty welcome to Mr. Leggett, whose pen, pointed by a genius that is his own, is directed by a heart that is all his country's."
Mr. Leggett said, that "to be complimented on such an occasion, and by such an assemblage, with a particular notice, was an honor to which he knew not how to reply. The courteous hospitality which made him a partaker with them in their festal ovation to his distinguished friend was an honor so far beyond his deserts as to call for his warmest acknowledgments. But 'the exchequer of the poor,' thanks alone, contained no coin which he dared offer in requital of the obligation they had conferred.
"It is often lamented" (Mr. L. remarked) "that the actor's art, though more impressive in its instant effects than painting or sculpture, stamps no enduring memorial of its excellence, and that its highest achievements soon fade from recollection, or survive only in its vague and traditionary report. This complaint did not seem to him altogether just. We best know how to esti
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mate causes from the effects they produce. The consequences of actions are their most lasting and authentic chroniclers. What portrait, or what statue, could have conveyed to us so exalted a notion of the loveliness of Helen of Troy as the ten years' war provoked by her fatal charms? What 'storied urn or animated bust' could have perpetuated the memory of Roscius like the honors bestowed on him by the Roman Senate, the eulogium of Cicero, and the tears—more eloquent than words—shed by that immortal orator upon his grave?
"When I look around me, and behold this capacious hall thronged with men eminent for station, admired for talent, and valued for various private worth, and when I reflect on the object which convenes them here, I cannot admit the peculiar perishableness of the actor's fame, I cannot admit that he merely 'struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more.' You have reared a monument to one actor, at least, gentlemen, which will long commemorate his greatness, and convey to your children, and your children's children, a lively impression of the genius and virtues which elicited so proud and enviable a tribute!"
Mr. Leggett returned his sincere thanks for the honor of inscribing his name on so enduring a record, and said he was proud to have it associated with the proceedings of that day.
In conclusion, he asked the company to fill their glasses to the following sentiment:
"Philadelphia—The Rome of the new world in this, that she has given a second Roscius to mankind, while another of her sons bids fair to win for her Athenian distinction by rivalling the fame of Æschylus."
Passing over the other speeches as of little interest now, it may be well to state that among the letters of excuse read was one from Washington Irving, regretting that it was not in his "power to join in this well-merited tribute to theatrical genius and private worth;" one from William Cullen Bryant, saying that it would give him "the greatest pleasure to unite in any testimony to the professional merit and personal worth of Mr. Forrest;" one from John P. Kennedy, who "would rejoice in such an opportunity to acknowledge his share of the indebtedness which the country at large owes to a gentleman whose fame in his profession has become common property;" and one from the celebrated
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player W. E. Burton, enclosing this happy toast: "The Stage of Life,—although cast into inferior parts at the commencement, industry and perseverance may eventually place us in the principal characters. May we be found perfect at the conclusion of the play!"
Songs and music were interspersed among the addresses, the famous vocalist Henry Russell singing several of his most exquisite ballads with unrivalled effect; and the occasion, altogether, was one of unclouded enjoyment in the passage and of lasting satisfaction in the retrospect.
Forrest now purchased a house in New York, and established his home there. He took a pew in the church of the Rev. Orville Dewey, the brilliant Unitarian divine, on whose pulpit ministrations he was for a series of years a regular attendant whenever he was in the city. The attraction of this extremely original and eloquent preacher had drawn together the most intellectual and cultivated congregation in New York; and his influence, silently and in many an unrecognized channel, has been diffusing itself ever since. The bold, rational, poetic, yet profoundly tender and devout style of thought and speech which characterized the sermons of Dewey had a great charm for Forrest, and they were never forgotten by him. He always believed in a God whose will is revealed in the laws of the material universe, and in the rightful order of human life, and he bowed in reverence at the thought of this mysterious Being, though often perplexed with doubts as to particular doctrines, and always a sworn enemy to religious dogmatism.
The next event which interrupted the regular movement of his professional and private life was the delivery of the oration at the celebration, in the city of New York, of the sixty-second anniversary of the Declaration of the Independence of the United States. The celebration was held under the auspices of the Democratic party. Party feeling was intense at the time, and to be the orator of the day on the Fourth of July, in the chief metropolis of the land, was an honor greatly coveted. The choice of Forrest showed the estimation in which he was held, while, on the other hand, his personal celebrity and magnetism lent unusual interest to the occasion. The popular desire to hear him had been fed and fanned to the highest pitch by the opposing newspaper com
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ments, called out by the singular incident of a political party selecting a tragedian as their orator. The services were held in the old Broadway Tabernacle. Five thousand tickets of admission had been given out, but the multitude rushed resistlessly in, regardless of tickets, till the enormous building was stuffed to suffocation. The oration, in its sentiments, its style, its delivery, was extraordinarily successful. It was hailed with the most extravagant admiration and praise. In thought and feeling it was really creditable to its author, but its fervid rhetorical sentences and popular temper were so exactly suited to the tastes of those who heard it, that their estimate of its literary rank and philosophic value was stimulated to a level that must seem amusing to any sober judge of such things. The author's own opinion of it was modest enough, as appeared in the apologetic preface he prefixed to it when published. Yet it expressed his honest convictions and those of his auditors with so much picturesque vigor, and those convictions were so generous and so genuinely American, that the popularity of the oration was no matter of wonder. It was printed in full in numerous journals, and many thousands of copies in pamphlet form were distributed. Two or three extracts from it are appended, to serve as specimens of its quality and indications of the mind and heart of the author.
"Fellow-Citizens,—We are met this day to celebrate the most august event which ever constituted an epoch in the political annals of mankind. The ordinary occasions of public festivals and rejoicings lie at an infinite depth below that which convenes us here. We meet not in honor of a victory achieved on the crimson field of war; not to triumph in the acquisitions of rapine; nor to commemorate the accomplishment of a vain revolution which but substituted one dynasty of tyrants for another. No glittering display of military pomp and pride, no empty pageant of regal grandeur, allures us hither. We come not to daze our eyes with the lustre of a diadem, placed, with all its attributes of tremendous power, on the head of a being as weak, as blind, as mortal as ourselves. We come not to celebrate the birthday of a despot, but the birthday of a nation; not to bow down in senseless homage before a throne founded on the prostrate rights of man, but to stand erect in the conscious dignity of equal freedom and join our voices in the loud acclaim now swelling from
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the grateful hearts of fifteen millions of men in acknowledgment of the glorious charter of liberty our fathers this day proclaimed to the world.
"How simple, how sublime, is the occasion of our meeting! This vast assemblage is drawn together to solemnize the anniversary of an event which appeals not to their senses nor to their passions, but to their reason; to triumph at a victory, not of might, but of right; to rejoice in the establishment, not of physical dominion, but of an abstract proposition. We are met to celebrate the declaration of that inestimable principle which asserts the political equality of mankind. We are met in honor of the promulgation of that charter by which we are recognized as joint sovereigns of an empire of freemen; holding our sovereignty by a right indeed divine,—the immutable, eternal, irresistible right of self-evident truth. We are met, fellow-citizens, to commemorate the laying of the corner-stone of democratic liberty.
