author
Elias Lyman Magoon
1810–1886
A 19th-century Baptist minister and popular lecturer, he wrote with the energy of a speaker and the confidence of a public moralist. His books range from sermons and patriotic oratory to reflections on religion, culture, and the idea of American progress.
1 Audiobook
Westward empire : or, the great drama of human progress
by Elias Lyman Magoon
About the author
Born in Lebanon, New Hampshire, in 1810, Elias Lyman Magoon became an American clergyman, religious writer, and lecturer whose career moved between the pulpit and the lecture platform. He studied at Waterville College and Newton Theological Seminary, then served Baptist congregations before becoming widely known for his public speaking and literary work.
Magoon wrote on religion, eloquence, and national history, and he had a gift for turning speeches into lively reading. Among the works linked to his name are The Eloquence of the Colonial and Revolutionary Times, Orators of the American Revolution, Living Orators in America, and Westward Empire, books that show his fascination with rhetoric, public character, and the story Americans told about themselves in the 19th century.
He later retired from regular preaching, but his reputation as an orator and man of letters remained. He died in Philadelphia in 1886, remembered as a writer who brought sermon-making, historical reflection, and platform speaking together in a distinctly 19th-century voice.