Word: nobleman
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Phillips' career testified to the truth of Dostoevsky's remark that "an aristocrat is irresistible when he goes in for democracy." He risked his life repeatedly, faced mobs with the hauteur of a nobleman awaiting the guillotine, and dissipated his fortune in charities. In an age of florid oratory he stirred his listeners with a lean, precise, deadly effective style. When Emerson heard him, he felt as if "the whole air was full of splendors." A Virginia paper called him "an infernal machine set to music...