Hello, English learners. Welcome back to another advanced lesson with us here at EnglishPod.
My name is Marco. And my name is Erica. So today we're bringing you another advanced lesson, and this time it's kind of historical.
Like the name suggests. We are listening in as a president says goodbye to the nation before he steps down from his role as president. very much based on President Eisenhower's farewell speech.
Okay, so pretty famous. Now we have to tell you that we did change the speech a little bit, right? just a little bit to make it a little bit more understandable, but it's basically what he said to the nation back in 1969.
All right. Now, um, I will as well tell you that this is a pretty hard dialogue.
It is very hard because the structures are a little bit complicated and even to a certain point, a little bit poetic, right?
So why are we taking this speech as our dialogue?
What are we going to learn from this? Well, we're going to learn some structures and some...
Words that you can use maybe on a resignation letter or maybe in a celebration you want to thank Pete for coming.
Okay, so we're going to learn some pretty difficult vocabulary, but also learn some really useful structures like you said you could use in a resignation letter or even in a formal speech of your own.
Exactly. Now, this presidential farewell speech is divided into two parts.
So today we're going to do part one. And then next time we'll finish the speech with part two.
So let's listen to President Eisenhower as he says goodbye to the nation.
And we'll come back just in a little bit.
Good evening, my fellow Americans. Three days from now, after a century of service to our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office. as, in a traditional and solemn ceremony, the authority of the presidency is vested in my successor.
This evening I come to you with a message of leave-taking and farewell, and to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen.
Like every other citizen, I wish the new president and all who will labor with him, Godspeed.
I pray that the coming years will be blessed with peace and prosperity for all.
Our people expect their president and the Congress to find essential agreement on questions of great importance, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of our great nation.
My own relations with Congress began on a remote and tenuous basis when, long ago, a member of the Senate appointed me to West Point.
I then had the pleasure of building more intimate relationships with Congress during the war and the immediate post-war period.
Finally, we have progressed to the mutually interdependent relationship we've had during these past eight years.
Wow, so Eisenhower is a pretty good speaker, isn't he?
A good speaker, and well, he said a lot of really nice things when he was saying goodbye.
Yeah, pretty inspiring, I thought. Really inspiring.
And as we said, there were a couple of different and difficult words and phrases.
So why don't we start right now with Language Takeaway.
Language takeaway. Well, Eisenhower said that in three days he shall lay down the responsibilities. to lay down the responsibilities.
All right, lay down something. Basically, we understand the verb to lay down.
Yeah, to put it down, to put it on the ground.
Right. Now, he's using it with responsibilities, which is a little bit strange, but it's kind of like a metaphor by saying lay down arms to lay down your weapons.
Right. And you know what? This is a really common phrase that we would hear, especially when we're talking about the end of a war or something like that.
To lay down your arms, lay down your weapons.
Yeah, so here I think Eisenhower is kind of referencing this and giving us a little bit of...
Bit of poetry in his speech. Right. So it's not that he's quitting.
It's not that he's being fired. Yeah. He's just like finishing what he started.
Yes, so he's laying down his responsibilities.
Now, I think this would be quite an interesting phrase to use, for example, in a resignation letter.
Right. So I would say a month from now, I will lay down my responsibilities as manager.
Yep. All right, so that sounds pretty good.
Now, he said he's going to be laying down the responsibilities in a traditional and solemn ceremony.
All right, solemn ceremony. solemn now solemn what is what does that mean what is a solemn ceremony Well, a solemn ceremony would be a serious, respectful and a little bit sad ceremony.
Okay. So it's a serious matter, and it's very respectful, right?
Yeah. So you might say, for example... On the 11th of November, when you're remembering the war, you might say something like this is a very solemn day.
Very good. Okay, and the authority of the presidency is vested in my successor.
Okay, so interesting verb. No wait. So interesting word, vested.
Vested. The authority vested in my successor.
Very good. So this word basically means power that I have by law.
Right. So this power, this important power you have is given to you by the law, by the president, by the country.
This is a very common word you will hear in a wedding when the priest or the person that's leading the wedding will say, by the power vested in me by... the state of California.
Yeah, I now pronounce you husband and wife.
I now pronounce you husband and wife. So you're saying the power that I have given to me by the state of California, I can now make you be married.
So here Eisenhower is saying the authority of the presidency is vested in my successor.
So the power of the presidency will be given to his successor. given to the next president by law.
Exactly. And he also wished the new president and everyone with him He said Godspeed.
All right, Godspeed. Godspeed. I wish you Godspeed.
Now, Godspeed, what does that mean? Well, it's kind of a blessing.
It basically means good luck and good fortune.
All right. And especially in a journey. Yeah, I think you'd almost only use this when someone's going off on a big trip or a journey.
So. Here, they're going on the journey of the presidency.
Right. So I wish you Godspeed. Godspeed.
Very good. And now let's take a look at our last set of words.
When he was talking about Congress, He said that his relation with Congress began on a remote and tenuous basis.
All right. So two interesting words here, remote and tenuous.
Now, remote, we understand as being far away or distant.
Yeah. What about tenuous, though? But tenuous is kind of unimportant or not really relevant.
All right. So actually, this is a pretty high quality, useful incentive. smart sounding word, so I think we should hear a few more examples of how it's used.
Example one. How can you say the Earth is actually getting cooler?
That is a pretty tenuous argument. Example 2.
John believes that Elvis Presley is still alive.
He's got a tenuous hold on reality. You're making yourself seem more important than you are.
The connection between our company's success and your performance is tenuous at best.
All right, so as we said, these are some pretty difficult words that we found in the dialogue.
But now I want to go and look at some really interesting formal... structures that eisenhower used here so let's look at those now in fluency builder fluency builder All right on Fluency Builder today, we have three phrases and well, starting with the first one, I think it's one of the most interesting ones.
He said three days from now, after half a century of service of our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office.
All right, so what's interesting about this?
If you take a look at the structure, he's saying three days from now, which is...
Future. Future. And then he makes a reference to the past.
After a half century of service... Okay, so we've got future, past.
And then, again, future. I shall lay down the responsibilities.
All right, so this actually is quite a good structure if you're giving a farewell speech or even I could imagine using this at a wedding.
How would you use it in a wedding? Well, I might say 12 hours for now after a long and beautiful relationship.
This couple shall marry. Very good. So you're making reference to the future and then a past event or something that's been going on for a while and then future again.
Why don't we do one more example? So, for example, in a resignation letter, I can say one month from now, After 30 years of hard work and dedication to this company, I shall lay down my responsibilities as product manager.
All right. Interesting. So we can use it.
And it sounds good. It sounds very professional.
And very poetic. Very poetic. Yeah. It sounds nice.
Yeah. All right. So that's one interesting structure.
Now, why don't we go on to this next kind of very formal and helpful in a very formal speech?
Well, President Eisenhower said, This evening I come to you with a message of leave taking and farewell.
So this evening I come to you with a message of leave taking and farewell.
So it's a very nice way of saying, I'm talking to you today because I am saying goodbye.
Yes. So what I really like about this phrase is the beginning part.
This evening, I come to you with a message of...
So, again, let's suppose we're at a wedding.
If I'm offering a toast or I'm the best man, I could say, this evening I come to you with a message. of love and trust and respect.
All right. Or maybe if you're the leader of a company, you might say something like, this afternoon I come to you with a message of hope for the future.
Very good. And now the part when he says leave taking and farewell, it's basically saying taking leave or taking like a vacation, right?
Yeah. Yeah. Farewell. Goodbye. Goodbye. And what about our last phrase?
This is actually a bit of a long one, so I'm going to read it now.
Our people expect their president and the Congress to find essential agreement on questions of great importance. the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of our great nation okay great now let's take a look at the first part basically he's saying The people expect the president and the Congress to give them answers, right?
Yeah, to agree on important issues. But in the part when he says, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of our great nation.
Yeah, and this is the part I want to focus on, the wise resolution of which.
Now, this is a really wonderful sort of formal structure.
We can see what he's doing here. He's talking about the first idea, right?
So the president and the Congress need to find agreement on important issues, right?
Now, the wise resolution of which, so he's referring back to that idea.
So the wise resolution of what? Of the essential agreement on questions of great importance.
Right. So really useful structure. Why don't we hear a few more examples of this?
Example one. we now face a great challenge, the overcoming of which lead us all to untold riches and success.
We as a company now face our most difficult months to date, the outcome of which will determine our company's future.
Example 3 The ambitious plan to reduce poverty, the start of which was launched last Tuesday in New York, will require a huge investment of taxpayers' dollars.
Alright, so as you can hear from the examples, we have the main idea and then he passes on but then kind of refers back to it again.
Yeah, and this sounds quite formal but also Quite literary and intelligent, doesn't it?
It makes you sound well-spoken. Very good.
This was quite a difficult dialogue with some really interesting and tricky structures and words.
So why don't we hear it one more time altogether?
Good evening, my fellow Americans. Three days from now, after a century of service to our country, I shall lay down the responsibilities of office as, in a traditional and solemn ceremony, the authority of the presidency is vested in my successor.
This evening I come to you with a message of leave-taking and farewell, and to share a few final thoughts with you, my countrymen.
Like every other citizen, I wish the new president and all who will labor with him, Godspeed.
I pray that the coming years will be blessed with peace and prosperity for all.
Our people expect their President and the Congress to find essential agreement on questions of great importance, the wise resolution of which will better shape the future of our great nation.
My own relations with Congress began on a remote and tenuous basis when, long ago, a member of the Senate appointed me to West Point.
I then had the pleasure of building more intimate relationships with Congress during the war and the immediate post-war period.
Finally, we have progressed to the mutually interdependent relationship we've had during these past eight years.
All right, we're back, and here with us in the studio we have Pete, the actor in the dialogue of President Eisenhower's presidential farewell speech.
He's a pretty convincing actor at that. Not quite.
So Pete is going to give us a little bit of insight about President Eisenhower.
Alright, so what can you tell us about President Eisenhower?
Well, he started off as General. He was an accomplished officer all through the early 20th century and then he was the Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in World War II.
And so now he's most famous for D-Day. He was leading it?
Or he was on the battlefield? No, he was the organizer.
Oh, he's kind of like the brains behind the operation.
Yeah. I don't know if you want to leave this in, but there's a there's a really cool document that he wrote right before the invasion.
And it said. He basically knew that this was going to go one of two ways, and he wrote down a script to read in case it failed, and he basically said, you know, I'm sorry to inform you that The invasion did not go as planned and this has set back our war effort.
And when the invasion went well, he threw that in the trash, and then one of his aides found that and was like, wow, this is a historical document, and they kept it.
Oh, really? Yeah. So they have the copy.
Alternate history. All right. So he was an accomplished general, an amazing warrior.
But what about his presidency? Well, at the beginning, probably the biggest thing he did was to wrap up the Korean War. which was a vow he made during his campaign.
And then he visited Korea. Obviously, the war is still technically on, but they did arrange a ceasefire.
Eisenhower built up the... interstate highway system, which is one of the big reasons that America was able to become economically successful in the 20th century.
He did it basically so that in case of a war, we'd have an easy way of shipping our soldiers and nukes across the country.
But it worked well anyway. Yeah, it's one of these things that pays a side benefit.
At least he had to sell it to the country that way.
It's very likely that he... didn't intend ever to use it that way but you know you have to It's like the war on terror.
You've got to sell these things. Well, and I guess it's had a huge impact not only on the economy of the states but also like the culture and the way that –
People view the car and its effect on society.
Definitely. So a pretty influential guy, this Eisenhower.
Yeah, and a very historical lesson. It's just a little bit of a culture and maybe some... insight on American history.
It's not like we're politically active or anything, but But yeah, it was some interesting information there and also, well, he was considered to be a pretty good president.
Yeah, he's rated, I wouldn't say among the top five or so, but quite accomplished.
Well, maybe not the greatest president we've ever seen, but he wrote a pretty good... farewell speech.
So I think we have that to thank him for.
All right, guys. So if you have any other questions or comments, you can come to the website at EnglishPod.com and you can leave them there for Erica or I.
Okay, so thanks for downloading, you guys, and until next time, goodbye.
Bye.
