Formal; Classical; Emphatic

We'd expect no less from a classically trained rhetorician like Henry (or for that matter, from one like St. George Tucker, who reconstructed the speech for William Wirt's biography of Henry). (Check out our description of the "Classical Structure" for more about the speech's construction, and check out "Key Figures" for Tucker's and Wirt's roles in the construction of the speech.)

Within the classical structure, we've got some massive formality going on. Just check out the length of some of these sentences. Within those sentences, the clauses are piled upon clauses for emphasis.

Check out these bad boys:

We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne. (40-41)

Oof.

Also, anytime somebody says "sir" constantly, we can call it formal. What can we say? It was a formal time, at least in the halls of government. And by "halls of government," we mean anywhere a bunch of rebels could safely meet.