Mr. Chairman and Fellow-Citizens: The news of Henry Grady’s
death reached me at a quiet country retreat in a distant section
of the State. The grief of that rural community, as deep and
sincere as the shock produced by his death was great and
unexpected, told more feelingly and eloquently than any words of
mine possibly can, the universality of the love and admiration
of all her people for Georgia’s peerless son.
It is no exaggeration to say that the humblest and the highest,
the poorest and richest—all classes, colors and creeds, with an
unspeakable sorrow, mourn his death as a public calamity. It is
no exaggeration to say that no man lives who can take his place.
It is no extravagant eulogy to declare that scarcely any
half-dozen men, by their combined efforts, can fill in all
departments the places which he filled in his laborious and
glorious life.
His wonderful intellect, enabling him, without apparent effort,
to master the most difficult and obtuse public questions, and to
treat them with matchless grace and power; his versatile genius,
which made him at once the leader in great social reforms, as
well as in gigantic industrial movements—that genius which made
him at once the eloquent advocate, the logical expounder, the
wise organizer, the vigorous executive—all these rich and
unrivaled endowments, justify in claiming for him a place among
the greatest and most gifted of this or any age.
But splendid as were his intellectual abilities, it is the
boundless generosity of his nature, his sweet and loving spirit,
his considerate and tender charity, exhaustless as a fountain of
living waters, refreshing and making happy all hearts around
him, these are the characteristics on which I love most to
dwell. It is no wonder that his splendid genius attracted the
gaze and challenged the homage of the continent. It is perhaps
even a less wonder that a man with such boundless sympathies for
his fellow men and so prodigal with his own time and talent and
money in the service of the public, should be so universally and
tenderly loved.
The career of Henry Grady is more than unique. It constitutes a
new chapter in human experience. No private citizen in the whole
eventful history of this Republic ever wore a chaplet so
fadeless or linked his name so surely with deathless
immortality. His name as a journalist and orator, his brilliant
and useful life, his final crowning triumph, especially the
circumstances of martyrdom surrounding his death, making it like
that of the giant of holy writ, as we trust, more potential than
ever in intellectual prowess of magic of the living man—all
these will conspire not more surely to carry his fame to
posterity, than will his deeds of charity and ready responses to
those who needed his effective help, serve to endear to our
hearts and memories, as long as life shall last, the memory of
Henry W. Grady.
* * * * *
Governor Gordon’s tribute was the last of the sad occasion.
At its conclusion Dr. H. C. Morrison pronounced the benediction, and the
curtain was drawn on the final public exercises of the most memorable
funeral service the South has ever known.
But the memory of the loved and illustrious dead will linger long with
his bereaved people.
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