Henry Clay Quotes

A good orator is pointed and impassioned.

In oratory the will must predominate.

… a style of oratory that I never heard equaled in this or any other country

Great speech is impassioned; small speech cantankerous.

I must say I'm not very fond of oratory that's so full of energy it hasn't any room for facts.

The receipt to make a speaker, and an applauded one too, is short and easy. Take common sense quantum sufficit; add a little application to the rules and orders of the House [of Commons], throw obvious thoughts in a new light, and make up the whole with a large quantity of purity, correctness and elegancy of style. Take it for granted that by far the greatest part of mankind neither analyze nor search to the bottom; they are incapable of penetrating deeper than the surface.

In oratory the greatest art is to hide art.

ORATORY, n. A conspiracy between speech and action to cheat the understanding. A tyranny tempered by stenography.

An orator is a good man who is skilled in speaking.

Of all the talents bestowed upon men, none is so precious as the gift of oratory. He who enjoys it wields a power more durable than that of a great king. He is an independent force in the world.

Eloquence wins its great and enduring fame quite as much from the benches of our opponents as from those of our friends.

The air of the New World seems favorable to the art of declamation.

I know that one is able to win people far more by the spoken that by the written word, and that every great movement on this globe owes its rise to the great speakers and not to the great writers.

There is nothing like oratory, it is a skill that can turn a commoner into a king.

Eloquence, at its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection, but addresses itself entirely to the desires and affections, captivating the willing hearers, and subduing their understanding.

He who wants to persuade should put his trust not in the right argument, but in the right word. The power of sound has always been greater than the power of sense.

I passionately believe that's it's not just what you say that counts, it's also how you say it - that the success of your argument critically depends on your manner of presenting it.

... They depended far more on their physical power of oratory than upon any semblance of argument ... with small regard for modesty, truth or time.

Eloquence may set fire to reason.

The gifts of nature are necessary; but they are not sufficient to make a complete orator without art and study.

There happened in my time one noble speaker [Sir Francis Bacon] who was full of gravity in his speaking. His language (where he could spare or pass by a jest) was nobly censorious. No man ever spake more neatly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. His hearers could not cough, or look aside from him, without loss. The fear of every man that heard him was, lest he should make an end.

Henry Clay's eloquence did not consist, as many fine specimens of eloquence do, of types and figures, of antitheses and elegant arrangements of words and sentences, but rather of that deeply earnest and impassioned tone and manner which can proceed only through conviction in the speaker of the justice and importance of his cause. This it is that truly touches the chords of sympathy; and those who heard Mr. Clay never failed to be moved by it, or ever after forgot the impression. All his [oratorical] efforts were made for practical effect. He never spoke merely to be heard.

Don't talk to me of your Archimedes' lever. He was an absentminded person with a mathematical imagination. Mathematics commands all my respect, but I have no use for engines. Give me the right word and the right accent and I will move the world.

I could sway people with words—words that welled up within me.

This fellow has a silver tongue