Summary Of Speech In The Virginia Convention By Patrick Henry

“From speech in the Virginia Convention”
In Patrick Henry’s “The speech in the Virginia Convention,” he uses allusions, metaphors and rhetorical questions to point out what was going on at that time, and to get the President and all others to think, and to understand what was actually going on at that time. For instance from the first couple of paragraphs he wrote to Mr. President, and previous speakers, a metaphor as well as a rhetorical question, “For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery” (10). Earlier Henry was talking about the conflict between them and the British. He compared those two very powerful words, freedom and slavery, to point out that their decisions, and their actions will lead either to them being slaves, or for them to have an a complete freedom from the British. Henry also knew the answer to his own question if whether they wanted freedom or slavery. He exactly knew that they will definitely choose freedom over slavery since they, colonists, …show more content…
Second quote that I choose that aswell relates to allusion, was the part when Henry was talking directly to president about people and the way most of them face problems, “Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and then listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts.” (21). Here in this quote Henry used allusion to show the president that many people will never stand up for their problems but rather just do nothing and hope that something will happen and would save them. In the first sentence, “Mr. President… of hope…“ here Henry is saying that men tend to naturally just sit around and, with great hopes, do nothing, hoping something would solve on it’s own by him saying words like “indulge” which means that someone enjoys doing something; so in that sentence he says that men enjoy just doing nothing, daydreaming,