dots-menu
×

Home  »  Respectfully Quoted  »  Benjamin Harvey Hill (1823–82)

Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations. 1989.

 
NUMBER: 820
AUTHOR: Benjamin Harvey Hill (1823–82)
QUOTATION: He was a foe without hate; a friend without treachery; a soldier without cruelty; a victor without oppression, and a victim without murmuring. He was a public officer without vices; a private citizen without wrong; a neighbor without reproach; a Christian without hypocrisy, and a man without guile. He was a Caesar, without his ambition; Frederick, without his tyranny; Napoleon, without his selfishness, and Washington, without his reward.
ATTRIBUTION: BENJAMIN HARVEY HILL, SR., address before the Southern Historical Society, Atlanta, Georgia, February 18, 1874.—Benjamin H. Hill, Jr., Senator Benjamin H. Hill of Georgia; His Life, Speeches and Writings, p. 406 (1893). These words were spoken about Robert E. Lee.

Hill served in Congress 1875–1882.
SUBJECTS: Greatness