Response to Patrick Henry Post

This passage starts with alliteration. "...it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions..." When you're talking about vowels, you're talking assonance. The alliteration helps us remember that we are only human and "indulge in illusions". Smart observation. Notice, though, that the real emphasis is on "illusions." The illusory nature of a hopeful solution is one of his central claims in this speech. At the end of this sentence Henry uses the word hope. Because of the alliteration in the sentence, the word hope really sticks out to the reader, or listener. I see. Interesting point. Perfect opportunity to connect this. Why does he want hope to stick out? What is he saying about hope? If anything, he wants to get rid of hopes. The next two sentences Henry uses rhetorical questions. These questions are also posed as parallel structure. They both start out with clauses, then a comma, then they finish with another clause. This is meant to inhance the rhetorical questions. The questions will make the listener think, and by adding parallel structure it makes you think even more. It's hard to follow your line of thinking here. How does the clause structure benefit him? You need to clarify tha tpoint. It makes us think even more because it links the two questions closer and in turn makes us compare the answers together. The langauge of ears hearing not and eyes seeing not is also Biblical. He suggests that men must focus not on eternity but on their time on earth ("temporal salvation"). This is a very smart tactic in a persuasive speech. The prior sentence is a general truth. No need to state the general. Keep it specific. Why does a specific tactic advance his spcific purpose? The first sentence and the last sentence in my passage also share a parallel structure. They both start out with a subject of sorts, and then finish with a statement of truth. This, like the questions, has our minds compare the two statements. I'm not following what you mean here. You'll have to cite specifics to be sure all that's going on in your fine brain is coming out clearly. Always be sure to take us from what you see to "so what," why it's important.
Another fascinating aspect of your passage is the allusion to the sirens. Throughout this speech, Henry portrays the king as someone duplicitious, ensnaring, and devious. This is in stark contrast to Henry himself, who is "willing to know the whole truth," as he tells us (ethos).