Excerpt from An Address Delivered Before the Civil Service Literary Society (Dublin): At the Opening Meeting of the Second Session, in the Molesworth Hall, Molesworth-Street, on Tuesday Evening, October 29th, 1867 And should anyone seek to know what advantage the power of oratory confers on a man, or why any trouble should be taken to acquire it, he will find his answer in the lives of men who have by its means risen from the lowest ranks to the greatest eminence, of men who have earned imperishable names in the annals of the civilized world. Nor is it alone by immortalizing his name that the orator gains the reward of his toil and of his talents. Raised sometimes to the highest position to which a states man can attain, or standing at the head of a people contesting their rights, he becomes not only the object of love and homage, but enjoys within him self the happy consciousness that he is rendering his life of service to his countrymen and to his fellow creatures. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.