SIR WILFRID LAURIER (1841-) one IR WILFRID LAURIER, Premier of Canada, is perhaps the most notable orator the Dominion has produced. The Toronto Globe said when he entered the Canadian House of Commons that he "produced a sensation, not more by the finished grace of his oratory than by the boldness and authority with which he handled the deepest political problems." In politics, he has described himself as a "Liberal of the English school, a pupil of Charles James Fox, Daniel O'Connell, and greatest of them all - William Ewart Gladstone!» His admiration for Gladstone inspired the well-known oration of May 26th, 1898, in the Canadian House of Commons of the best of all the recorded characterizations of Gladstone. Born November 20th, 1841, at St. Lin, he was educated at L'Assomption College and at the Law School of McGill University. He was called to the bar in 1864, and after practicing for several years went to L'Avenir for his health, editing while there a reform newspaper, Le Defricheur, and identifying himself with the "advanced Liberals" of that period. Recovering his health, he resumed the practice of the law, settling at St. Cristophe, now Arthabaskaville. In 1871 he entered public life as a member of the Quebec Assembly, and in 1874 was elected to the Canadian House of Commons. Under the McKenzie administration in 1876, he became Minister of Internal Revenue, and when the Liberals were forced into opposition, where they remained eighteen years, he became one of their acknowledged leaders. When they regained power in 1896, he became Premier, and in 1899 attracted international attention by the vigor of his speech on the Alaska boundary treaty. When he visited England to be present at the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, his reception is described as "almost regal." He was made a knight of the Grand Cross of St. Michael and St. George, received degrees from Oxford and Cambridge, and was voted a gold medal by the Cobden Club. On visiting France he was made a grand officer of the Legion of Honor, and in Italy the Pope showed him special honor. A volume of his speeches was published in 1890. THE CHARACTER AND WORK OF GLADSTONE Mr. Speaker: E VERYBODY in this House will, I think, agree that it is eminently fitting and proper that in the universal expression of regret which ascends towards heaven from all parts of the civilized world we also should join our voice and testify to the very high sense and respect, admiration, and veneration which the entire people of Canada, irrespective of creed, or race, or party, entertain for the memory of the great man who has just closed his earthly career. England has lost the most illustrious of her sons; but the loss is not England's alone, nor is it confined to the great empire which acknowledges England's suzerainty, nor even to the proud race which can claim kinship with the people of England. The loss is the loss of mankind. Mr. Gladstone gave his whole life to his country; but the work which he did for his country was conceived and carried out on principles of such high elevation, for purposes so noble and aims so lofty, that not his country alone, but the whole of mankind, benefited by his work. It is no exaggeration to say that he has raised the standard of civilization, and the world to-day is undoubtedly better for both the precept and the example of his life. His death is mourned, not only by England, the land of his birth, not only by Scotland, the land of his ancestors, not only by Ireland, for whom he did so much, and attempted to do so much more; but also by the people of the two Sicilies, for whose outraged rights he once aroused the conscience of Europe; by the people of the Ionian Islands, whose independence he secured; by the people of Bulgaria and the Danubian provinces, in whose cause he enlisted the sympathy of his own native country. Indeed, since the days of Napoleon, no man has lived whose name has traveled so far and so wide over the surface of the earth; no man has lived whose name alone so deeply moved the hearts of so many millions of Whereas, Napoleon impressed his tremendous personality upon peoples far and near by the strange fascination which the genius of war has always exercised over the imagination of men in all lands and in all ages, the name of Gladstone had come to men. |