'. - < PUBLIC SPEAKING Creative on WITH SELECTIONS FOR DECLAIMING BY EDWIN DUBO1S SHURTER ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF ORATORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS ALLYN AND BACON Boston an& /^Av- COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY EDWIN DyBOIS SHURTER. NortoooU J. S. Cushing & Co. Berwick & Smith Co. Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. PREFACE. THIS book is intended to help those who would speak well in public. It deals not so much with What to Say as How To Say It; and is designed to prepare students for sub- sequent training in formal oratory, debate, and extempore speaking. Most of the books that deal with the art of delivery belong to one of two general classes : (1) those containing generalizations that are all very good, but of no practical utility to the student of speaking; (2) those that are full of elocutionary directions and rules, that lean toward dramatic reading rather than public speaking, an The Philippine Question . . . Albert J. Beveridge 148 Our Policy toward the Philippines . George F. Hoar 152 America a World Republic . . . Albert J. Beveridge 156 America and International IVace . Y7?/Wore lioosevelt 150 A Talk on Books //>//// Drummond 161 The Masterpiere of God . . . Elbert Hubbard 163 Public Opinion and Agitation . . \]'i -ml, // /'//////;>* 166 The Triumph nf Truth .... Thomas Carlyle 1<>8 Character Essential for a Great Lawyer MY//r/r// 1'liillips 170 Jury Address Daniel Webster 172 The Great Chart, r U. M. Rose 176 Training for the Legal Profession . Eir i * Murray Jintb-r 246 The Puritans and Twentieth Century Problems . Arthur Tinnimj Hartley 248 The Symmetry of Life .... Phillips Brooks 251 INTRODUCTION. IN his little book on Hints on Writing and Speech-making, Colonel Thomas \\Cntworth Higginson points out that "the number of graduates going forth each year from our Ameri- can colleges must be several thousand, since the number of undergraduates is more than twenty thousand. If we add those who are graduates of academies . . . the figures will be greatly swelled. The majority of all these graduates will be called upon, at some time or other during their lives, to make a speech, as will also thousands of young Americans who have never seen the inside of college or academy." Speech-making, as Colonel Higginson suggests, is a condition of American life and government. True, newspapers and magazines have in some ways affected the requirements for the public speaker, but they have by no means supplanted him, and they never will. The proof of this assertion lies not alone in the peculiar social and politi- cal demands under a republican form of government, but is inherent in human nature itself. If men are moved by the printed word, must they not be aroused still more by the spoken word ? If the author can convince through the lifeless type, how much more effectively can men's sensi- bilities be touched through the directness and earnestness of the living man ! " In these days," says Ex-Premier Salis- bury, " whether we like it or not, power is with the tongue, power is with those who can speak." And Gladstone declared, " All time and money spent in training the voice and the body is an investment that pays a larger interest than any other." 1 % PUBLIC SPEAKING. The school and college graduates referred to by Colonel Higginson will become or should become leaders in moulding and directing public opinion in their respective communities. Now, if education should help prepare our school and college graduates for the duties and privileges of citizenship and who will say that it should not? the question arises, Are our schools and colleges performing their duty in the training of public speakers ? In some institutions, yes ; in many others, no. There has been, even during the past ten years, a marked improvement in this regard, but yet there is no generally accepted opinion that instruction in public speaking demands a place in school and college curriculum. Why this seeming indifference ? In part, at least, because of a widespread prejudice among educators against so-called "elocutionary" training. It must be admitted that the prejudice is well founded. "Long-haired men and short- haired women," with what Emerson calls a "patty-pan ebullition," have gone about the country giving " readings " wherein self-conscious posing, and the artificial vocalizing of hothouse " literature," have long afflicted a patient public. Now, the association of this brand with the idea of public speaking is most unfortunate. I am not pooh-poohing all public readings, by any means. The intelligent and sympa- thetic oral interpretation of good literature is certainly an enviable accomplishment, and of great educational value; but even that is not public speaking. Much less so, the dramatic " reading " above described. But, granting this distinction, the objector interposes, " Speaking cannot be taught." And in this connection I wish briefly to notice some of the falla- cies relative to instruction along these lines : 1. " Training makes one self-conscious and artificial." This may at times be true, but it all depends upon the quality and quantity of the training. The exemplification of this INTRODUCTION. 3 tbjection is seen in the crude attempts of persons who have mastered the beginnings of an art, and mistaken them for the end. Certainly the masters of the art of speech, both ancient and modern, did not become masters without laborious and long-continued training. Such training was the lifelong work of the Greek and Roman orators. Curran, the celebrated Irish orator, was so handicapped in his youth that he was called " stuttering Jack Curran." He said of himself, "My friends despaired of my ever making a speaker, but I would not give it up." Says one of his friends, k> II- turned his shrill and stumbling brogue into a flexible, sustained, and finely modulated voice; his action became free and forcible ; and he acquired perfect readiness in thinking on his legs." With reference to botl^ matter and muiiner, Webster said of himself: "When I was a young man, and for several years after I had acquired a respectable degree of eminence in my profession, my style was bombastic in the extreme. Some kind friend was good enough to point out that fact to me, and I determined to correct it, if labor could do it. Whether it has been cor- rected or not, no small part of my life has been spent in the attempt." 2. " The orator is born, not made." True, in a sense, but we must qualify and distinguish. No man will ever be a great orator without certain inborn qualities and the oratorical instinct. But it does not follow that a young man cannot be taught to correct bad habits of speech and form better habits; to train himself, during his school or college course, in speaking before an audience; to conquer stage-fright, and develop self-control, ease, and power. He may not have in him the making of an orator; but he can, by due attention and systematic work, acquire such knowledge and skill as to increase his effectiveness as a public speaker. And if he has that indefinable quality termed the "oratorical instinct," 4 PUBLIC SPEAK I \<,. training is none the less necessary to make him an orator Xo orator is born any more than an artist or a musician is born. The orator who relies solely on his birth is never heard from. 3. "Be in earnest; forget about yourself and think only of your subject" This is most excellent advice. In the actual process of speech-making, the less one thinks about himself, and the more intensely he thinks about his subject, the more effective his delivery. " Clearness, force, and earnestness are the qualities which produce conviction." But we must distinguish between the end and the means to such end. In the period of preliminary training, perhaps the last thing the young speaker should do is to forget about himself. He may be deacon earnest about his subject, but such earnestness is ineffective as to his audience unless he speaks, for instance, so that he can be heard. He may have a hundred and one man- nerisms, vocal and physical, that most seriously intervene between his earnestness and those to whom he would convey his thought. Says Cicero, in his De Oratore, " What Socrates used to say, that 'all men are sufficiently eloquent in that which they understand,' is very plausible, but not true. It would have been nearer the truth to say that 110 man can be eloquent on a subject that he does not understand; and that, if he understands a subject never so well, but is ignorant of how to form and polish his speech, he cannot express him- self eloquently even about what he does understand." 4. " Be natural, and you will speak well." This, too, is a most excellent direction, so far as it applies to the avoidance of artificial and mechanical methods in the act of speaking ; but what do we mean by being "natural " ? Talking through the nose or teeth, or in the throat, or at the walls, may seem natural to many ; but these are matters of habit rather than of nature. Students who in their school or college course first give attention to the manner of their speech, bring to the INTRODUCTION. 5 study certain habits. These habits may be good or bad. The good habits need developing and strengthening ; the bad represent sundry faults, some curable, many needing to be eradicated and supplanted, all capable of improvement. Now, these bad habits are not natural, in the sense that they are true exponents of nature. They are, rather, a cultivated unnaturalness. We must therefore be careful not to con- found habit with nature, peculiarity with individuality. On this "being natural' 7 fallacy, Professor Hiram Corson, in his little book, TJie Voice and Spiritual Education, says: " 'Enter into the spirit of what you read, read naturally, and you will read well/ is about the sum and substance of what Arch- bishop Whately teaches on the subject, in his Elements of Rhetoric. Similar advice might with equal propriety be given to a clumsy, stiff-jointed clodhopper in regard to danc- ing, 'Enter into the spirit of the dance, dance naturally, ami you will dance well/ The more he might enter into the spirit of the dance, the more he might emphasize his stiff-jointedness and clodhopperishness." There is this further phase of the problem : in addition to natural or normal faults of speech, the presence of an audi- ence often superimposes abnormal ones. If one, without training or practice, could rise and face an audience, large or small, and speak with the interest, vivacity, earnestness, and naturalness that he would employ in good conversation, there would be no need of this book or of teachers of expres- sion. But the most casual observation shows that this is not the case. To learn to speak, then, one must in some way (1) acquire the right mental attitude toward his message and his au- dience ; and (2), as a means to this end, remove, so far as possible, vocal and bodily limitations that hinder the most effective delivery of the thought. There are some who assert that if the first requirement be attained, the second 6 PUBLIC SPEAKING. will naturally and necessarily follow. This position doubt- less represents the reaction from the mechanical, artificial, "elocutionary" methods, but like most reactions, the truth probably lies midway. It is better, of course, to have mind- action and a rough mechanism, than a finished method and no motive power ; but it does not follow that some attention should not be paid to the voice and body as agents of expression. In short, public speaking is an art, and it does not come by chance. To acquire this art requires work conscientious, systematic, continuous preparation and practice. Like every other study, we get out of it what we put in. Any young person who expects to speak in public should, at the outset, disabuse his mind of the idea that a term's or a year's lessons in oratory will turn him out a finished product. Years of study and practice are required, and then no one can be said to have acquired perfection in the art. We listen to an effective speaker, and remark how easily his periods roll out. But we forget that behind them lies a long course of study and self-discipline, study not neces- sarily of any particular system of expression, nor under any teacher, but certainly not without training in the school of experience. Fortunate that young speaker whose first efforts are directed along right lines, and whose first experi- ences are had under helpful conditions. CHAPTER I. THE NATUKE AND BASIS OP PUBLIC SPEAKING. Public Speaking Defined. What is public speaking ? It is speaking to a collection of individuals. Its purposes are to convey thought, to mould opinion, and to awaken feeling. Any one or all of these purposes may be present in a given address, but in any case there is thought to be conveyed, whether in the form of exposition, argument, or appeal. Public speaking, then, as the term is used in this book, is speaking in public with the purpose of convincing and persuading, and not for entertainment simply, which is usually the purpose in reciting, dramatic reading, or acting. Tests of the Best Public Speaking. You are to speak to ten, one hundred, or one thousand people collectively your audience. How best speak to them for the purposes of instructing, convincing, or persuading? This question is^ best answered by asking, How best speak when you are talking to any one of them? That is, the criteria of the best public speaking are those of the best conversation, not the most showy or noisy, but the best, from the stand- point of effectiveness. In the conveyance and lodgement of thought, what constitutes effectiveness in conversation? Among other things, a good conversationalist must possess the qualities of clearness, directness, simplicity, vivacity, spontaneity, and sincerity. Hence these same qualities must be effective in public speech. 7 8 PUBLIC SPEAKIXG. What Public Speaking is Not. Eliminate, at the outset, the extraneous or fanciful ideas often connected with the art of speaking in public. A pleasing, musical voice is an added charm, but not indispensable. Grace is desirable, but a fine carriage or pretty gestures do not carry a cause or win a verdict. Nor is there any ready-made prescription. Many students seek instruction in oratory who seem to imagine that the teacher can furnish them with some patent device whereby they will become proficient in the art. Banish from your mind any thought that this or that " system," this or that "method," will make you an orator, or even what is far more to our purpose an effective public speaker. No method but your own the expression of your individuality will ever make you any sort of a speaker other than a parrot or a machine. Be yourself, not a mere imitator. Certain principles are fundamental, but expression will be as varied as individualities. Avoid any " system " that would cast all speakers in the same mould. Aim not to become a Demosthenes or Cicero, a Webster or Clay, but aim for the best and most effective expression of Yourself. Above all, eschew any ambition to become " elo- quent," as the term is commonly used. "to soar among the constellations and strew the floor with star-dust." Further- more, true eloquence never comes from a conscious effort toward that in itself. " It comes, if it come at all, like the outbreak of a fountain from the earth, or the bursting forth of volcanic fires, with spontaneous, original, native force." The speaker " should pray to be delivered from the ambition to be eloquent," says Dr. Lyman Abbott, " by an ambition to win a result ; be careless of admiration and covetous of practical fruits in his auditors' lives. Without this moral preparation he will be a mere declaimer ; with it he may be an effective speaker. And whether he is what men call an orator or not is a matter of no consequence." NATURE AND BASIS OF PUBLIC SPEAKING. 9 The Basis of Public Speaking: Clear, Orderly, Intense Think- ing. Public speaking, then, being the communication of thought, it follows that you must have something to say; and a clear and vivid concept of this something to say must be present to the mind at the moment of its utterance. Public speaking is the science and art of thinking aloud. If there is any one thing that the modern audience wish to be delivered from, it is mere volubility, with thought in inverse proportion. The most inveterate bore in modern assemblies is the chronic talker the man who has nothing to say and is forever saying it. So we can well understand Lowell's suggested addition to the Beatitudes, "Blessed is he who hath nothing to say and cannot be persuaded to say it." Processes in the Preparation of an Address for Delivery. 1. Tfte Selection of an Address. Oratorical composition is not within the province of this book ; it is therefore assumed that you have something to say. With young speakers, who have as yet neither the material nor the ability for original composition, it is often quite as well to borrow another's thoughts and words, for the purposes of training in expression. Only selections worth memorizing should be chosen. Literature is full of such selections adaptable to speaking. The memorizing of choice selections from the best literature has been sadly neglected in our modern educational system. Its value successful public speakers have long recognized. It furnishes a storehouse of illustration and expression ; it aids the memory, furnishes a means of culture, and is a never-failing source of pleasure. Further, in class-room work, it affords a common basis of study and reference for teacher and class. 2. Perspective. You have an address to prepare for deliv- ery. Let us note some of the steps in such preparation. If 10 PUBLIC SPEAKING. the address be not original, the first step is to get a proper perspective of the thought as a whole; for just as in the preparation of an original address the audience and occa- sion must be carefully considered, so, in preparation for the delivery of another's thought, must the student go outside of the printed words and study the writer or speaker, and the circumstances surrounding the first writing or delivery. Truly to interpret and sympathetically to express another's words one must know the author, and live again in his ex- periences at the time he gave his thought to the world. Moreover, such external study is desirable, in order that the speaker may breathe the atmosphere of a particular address, be put in the proper mood 1 for its delivery. 3. Tlie Theme of the Address. Turning now to the con- tent of the address itself, the student must first note the gist of the discourse as a whole. What is the thought, in a nutshell ? Grip it. The introductory, explanatory, and modifying ideas must be noted, and subordinated to the essential and controlling ideas. The controlling ideas will be found in those key-words or sentences that together express the theme of the discourse. This theme must be grasped, and must dominate the expression. 4. Paragraphs. Every paragraph of the address, if well constructed, represents a unit in the development of the thought ; and each paragraph, in turn, denotes a progressive transition in the thought movement. A paragraph will usually contain a key-sentence, around which the thought of that paragraph clusters. It is for the speaker to discover this key-sentence, make it stand out in the utterance, and subordinate the matter of less relative importance. 1 " Less intensive degrees of emotion are called moods. It is a general rule that the duration of emotion varies inversely with its intensity; so that moods are more permanent states of mind than emotions proper." SCRIPTURE: Thinking, Feeling, Doing, p. 227. NATURE AND BASIS OF PUBLIC SPEAKING. 11 5. Sentence*. Sentences are made up of ideas and express complete thoughts. In every sentence the two leading ideas always are, first, something you are speaking of, and second, what you say of that something; or, subject and predicate. In addition to these two primary ideas, every sentence may have numerous words, phrases, and clauses that limit or qualify the thought. For the purposes of expression, the student should first discover these two leading ideas. Fol- lowing the first sentence in any selection, he should note what new idea each sentence contains, and what ideas are merely repetitions or echoes of preceding sentences. He should note the words that bear the burden of this new idea, and in speaking, of course, express the new or important ideas as such to the hearers. < 6. Words. Thought is conveyed by means of words ; but words as such are meaningless. They are simply signs of ideas. The mere utterance of words may be as expres- sionless as the vocalizing of an uneducated deaf-mute. For example, take the following word-combination which the man in one of George Eliot's novels found so much comfort in repeating: " Sihon, King of the Amorites, for his mercy endnreth forever. And Og, King of Bashan, for his mercy endureth forever." Beware, then, of uttering words instead of thoughts. Observing the foregoing suggestions, study the following selections : CONSERVATISM. Speaking of conservatism, George William Curtis said : " A friend of mine was a student of Couture the painter, in Paris. One day the master came and looked over the pupil's drawing and said to him, 'My friend, that line should go so'; and indicated it lightly on the paper with his pencil. To prove the accuracy of the master's eye, the 12 PUBLIC SPEAKING. pupil rubbed out the correction and left the line. The next day Couture came, and looking over the drawing, stopped in surprise. i That's curious,' said he, ' I thought I altered that. This line goes so,' he added, and drew it firmly in black upon the paper. Again the pupil rubbed out the cor- rection. The next day the master came again, stopped short when he saw the drawing, looked at it a moment without speaking ; then, with his thumb-nail, he cut quite through the paper. ' That's the way this line ought to go,' he said, and passed on. " So the hearts and minds of our fathers marked the line of our true development. Conservatism rubbed it out. The Missouri struggle emphasized the line again. Conservatism rubbed it out. The tragedy of Kansas drew the line more sternly. Conservatism rubbed it out. Then, at last, the Divine finger drew in fire and blood, sharply, sharply, through our wailing homes, through our torn and bleeding country, through our very quivering hearts, the line of lib- erty, and justice, and equal rights ; and conservatism might as well, try to rub out the rainbow from the heavens, as to erase this, the decision of the age." THE HOME AND THE REPUBLIC. In an address delivered at Elberton, Georgia, in June, 1889, Henry W. Grady said : " I went to Washington the other day, and as I stood on Capitol Hill my heart beat quick as I looked at the towering marble of my country's Capitol, and the mist gathered in my eyes as I thought of its tremendous significance, the army, and the Treasury, and the courts, and Congress, and the President, and all that was gathered there. And I felt NATURE AND BASIS OF PUBLIC SPEAKING. 13 that the sun in all its course could not look down upon a better sight than that majestic home of the Republic that had taught the world its best lessons in liberty. "Two days afterwards I went to visit a friend in the country, a modest man, with a quiet country home. It was just a simple, unpretentious house, set about with great big trees, encircled in meadow and fields rich with the promise of harvest. The fragrance of pink and hollyhock in the front yard was mingled with the aroma of the orchard and of the garden, and resonant with the cluck of poultry and the hum of bees. Inside was quiet, cleanliness, thrift, and comfort. Outside there stood my friend master of his land and master of himself. There was his old father, an aged, trembling man, happy in the heart and home of his son. And as they started to their home the hands of the old man went down on the young man's shoulders, laying there the unspeakable blessing of an honored and grateful father, and ennobling it with the knighthood of the Fifth Commandment. . . . And I saw the night come down on that home, falling gently as from the wings of an unseen dove, and the old man, while a startled bird called from the forest, and the trees shrilled with the cricket's cry, and the stars were swarming in the sky, got the family around him, and taking the old Bible from the table, called them to their knees, while he closed the record of that simple day by call- ing down God's blessing on that family and that home. "And while I gazed, the vision of the marble Capitol faded. Forgotten were its treasures and its majesty, and I said, ' 0, surely, here in the hearts of the people at last are lodged the strength and responsibilities of this government, the hope and promise of this Republic.' " 14 PUBLIC SPEAKING. In any selection for delivery, preliminary study, with a view of comprehending and assimilating the thought and feeling, should always precede any attempt to speak. A fter such study, speak colloquially as you would in conversa- tion making your delivery thoughtful, earnest, direct, strong talk. The general suggestions previously made in this chapter are summarized and made more specific in the appended directions and questions. It will be found profitable to write out a report of your selection, answering fully all the following whenever an answer is possible. The Mastery of an Address: Questions and Suggestions. 1. Who is the author or speaker? Under what circumstances was the selection first written or spoken? If possible, read the article or address in full. 2. Read the selection silently, and re-read until you grasp its meaning as a whole. Express in a single sentence the gist of the whole selection. 3. Can you see the thought-movement from beginning to end ? Is the line of thought logical and consecutive ? Do the paragraphs mark the natural divisions? If not, re-paragraph ; then stat.-, in a single sentence, the central thought of each paragraph. 4. What is the first new idea in each sentence? (I'nderscore once.) What word, phrase, or clause in each sentence carries the principal idea? (Underscore twice.) Note that the answers to these two questions may sometimes be identical. 5. What word or group of words in each sentence exprv- single idea? Separate these groups by vertical lines. 6. Dwell on the meaning of each word. Note the relative importance of each word as expressive of the thought. ])< you know the meaning of every proper name? Comment on wonls of peculiar significance. 7. Analyze the language in order to call up the associated ideas. What associated ideas present themselves to your mind? 8. Explain all historical or other allusions. NATURE AND BASIS OF PUBLIC SPEAKING. 15 9. Analyze the selection to find its emotion. Note the varied and changing emotions. What is the predominant emotion or atmosphere of the selection ? Think over the selection, and wait until the emotion matures. 10. In the process of memorizing, observe the following steps : (1) Link the ideas together in a chain of thought. Close the eyes and follow the thought of the speech through without vocalizing a word. ("2) With closed eyes try to express orally the chain of ideas in the words of the writer. Wherever difficulty arises, study that particular part. Do not memorize the words by a parrot-like repetition. It is not necessary to use in minutest detail the exact words of the author. (3) Now talk the address to yourself or to an imaginary hearer, as you would converse. Do not try to " speak " or gesticulate until the speech is a part of yourself. Make tin- thought your thought, the words your words. Re-create the thoughts and emotions of the speech, you are then prepared to use your mind and feelings in speaking it to your audience. This preliminary preparation is not the easiest process, but it outlines the only proper method of approaching the delivery of any address. Clear expression is born of clear thought. Unless thought and emotion are present .in the act of delivery, there can be no effective speaking. Public speaking, we might say, is the oral reproduction of one's own or another's ideas, in either case, of ideas previously thought out, classified, and assimilated. When thought, not the vocalizing of words merely, becomes the primary object, public speaking is an incomparable means for mental training. Consider the sustained mental effort, in the midst of distractions such as other experiences rarely involve, that is required in a successful public address. The stu- dent in his room may alternately think and muse. The public speaker must think, intensely, clearly, consecutively, moving by natural transitions from idea to idea; for any musing or wool-gathering in the presence of an audience is fatal. 16 PUBLIC SPEAKING. We thus see that there must be a mental and emotional basis for public speaking. But this alone is not enough. Thought must be communicated through a physical medium. This medium is the voice and the body. It is therefore necessary to give some attention to the technique of expres- sion. This is set forth in succeeding chapters. It should be constantly borne in mind, however, that technique the art side of our subject is a means, not an end ; and further, this end the conveyance and impress of thought must be constantly in mind, else there can be no true mastery of the means. SUMMARY. The best public speaking is enlarged and heightened conversa- tion, The basis of effective speaking is clear and orderly thought, attained by a thorough analysis and assimilation of the discourse, Such thought-preparation must always precede, and thinking must always accompany, all efforts in the art of delivery. CHAPTER II. THE VOICE, The Importance and the Possibility of Voice Culture. There are two means of expression, by the voice and by the body. For our purposes, the voice demands the first and foremost attention. A clear, resonant, musical voice is surely an enviable possession. " A good voice has a charm in speech, as in song ; oftentimes of itself enchains atten- tion." In an article in Scribner*s Magazine for June, 1901, Senator Hoar says : " When every other faculty of the orator is acquired, it sometimes almost seems as if voice were nine-tenths, and everything else but one-tenth, of the consummate orator. It is impossible to overrate the im- portance to his purpose of that matchless instrument, the human voice." This chief medium of expression, capable of conveying all shades of thought with exquisite delicacy, be it in con- versation, reading aloud, or public speech, the great instru- ment whereby the hearts of an audience may be made to beat in unison, is it not a matter for wonderment that we do not give more attention to the training of the speaking voice ? What sort of a voice have you ? High-pitched or low ? Throaty, hollow, or breathy ? Have you ever asked yourself, or had a good judge tell you? If you have a weak or harsh, disagreeable voice, can anything be done to help it ? Certainly there can. We have gymnastics to straighten the back, to develop the chest or any specially weak organ 17 18 PUBLIC SPEAEIX',. or muscle. So are there gymnastics that will strengthen and improve the voice ; but just as in all gymnastics, there must be systematic and continued practice before results will follow. A good voice is not altogether a freak of nature. We certainly do not act on this principle in dealing with the singing voice. While a "naturally" good voice is a boon, it is generally recognized that to be a really success- ful singer, one must take at least two or three years of special training. The same is true of the speaking voice, and the same training will produce equally satisfactory results. The trouble is, few speakers realize this, or have the patience and perseverance to undergo a training similar to that which we know is indispensable for the singer. The singer develops not only strength and volume of tone, but also improves the quality, or timbre. The same may be done by properly training the voice for speaking. If, then, the voice can be strengthened and controlled for speaking in public, it becomes apparent that this strengthening and controlling process should be gone through with in the preliminary stages of the development of the speaker. How many public speakers there are whose voices grate and grind on the nerves of the hearers, voices whose defects a mini- mum of preliminary attention would at least have mended, if not wholly cured. In the vocal and other exercises that are suggested in this and succeeding chapters, the question is perforce brought home to the mind of the student, What am I doing with my voice and body ? Am I making the best use of them as mediums of expression? In other words, good habits are to be strengthened and perfected, bad habits are to be eliminated and better habits formed in their stead. To form a new habit in the place of an old one, we must give conscious attention, first, to the fault; and secondly, to the formation of the new habit. This, you say, makes you THE VOICE. 19 self-conscious. True, but only as a means to an end. Self- consciousness on the part of many public speakers to whom we are compelled to listen would be a blessed relief to the audience. By this is meant, of course, consciousness of glaring faults for the purpose of correction. The young speaker should first know what he is doing with his voice and his body. After conscious attention to faults, prac- tice conscientious, systematic, continued practice, and then practice again. Cicero long ago taught that "the exertion and exercise of the voice, of the breath, of the whole body, and of the tongue itself, do not so much require art as labour." Like every other art, if public speaking is one one-hundredth theory, it is ninety-nine one-hundredths practice. The formation of this new habit to supplant the old is hard at first. You have years of wrong practice to overcome; but by constant watchfulness and persistency the new habit becomes easier and easier until what was at first conscious, painful rtt'urt lias become an accustomed prac- tice, a new habit. In other words, the task is, through conscious attention for a time, to form other and better li ub its, which when firmly fixed will be as unconscious as were formerly the faulty ones. How Speech is Effected. It is unnecessary to treat in any detail the anatomy or physiology of the vocal organs. We all know the process of voice-production, how the column of air coming from the lungs through the trachea is arrested in the larynx by the vocal cords, which, vibrating, produce sound. This sound, by various positions of the throat and mouth cavity, is converted into vowels, and by sundry inter- ruptions and modifications through the action of the palate, tongue, teeth, and lips, the consonants are formed. The various combinations of these vowel and consonant sounds constitute our spoken language. 20 PUBLIC SPEAKING. Breathing. Scientists tell us that man's vitality is meas- ured by his lung capacity. The speaker needs vitality if he is to vitalize his audience. He needs the all-round, health- ful physical training now generally recognized as essen- tial to real education, and which Herbert Spencer calls "physical morality." And just as the athlete needs spe- cial training for a special event, so the speaker needs special gymnastics for the use of the breath. Breath is the stuff of which voice is made. To produce tone we must have breath coming from the lungs ; to produce a strong tone, we must have breath in sufficient volume and force ; to pro- duce a sustained tone, we must have a generous supply of air stored in the lungs. Again, in ordinary breathing we inhale and exhale regularly a constant stream of air going to and coming from the lungs. In speaking, however, we must inhale quickly at the pauses in our speech, and exhale slowly, converting the exhalations into vocal sounds. Now, we must learn to perform properly this inhaling and exhal- ing process. How often do we hear speakers gasp for breath at the beginning of a sentence, and perhaps audibly breathe out a generous supply at the end of a sentence. Or they inhale with a loud gasp on beginning, as though they had just come above the surface of the water, swallow the sentence, as it were, then bang out the first few words to "split the rafters," and soon subside to end the sentence in another gasp. They " get out of breath " and run down at the end of a sentence, like a clock that needs winding. This suggests the need not only of breath-quantity, but of breath-control. And first, as to quantity. We know the different ways in which the chest capacity is enlarged whereby the lungs are filled with air. We may lift the shoulders and collar-bone and so enlarge the upper part of the chest. This is called clavicular or collar-bone breathing. This method is some- THE VOICE. 21 times necessitated temporarily by disease, permanently by tight lacing, and is as bad for the voice as it is for the health. To use only the upper and smaller part of the coni- cal shaped chest requires frequent respiration. By this method we secure the smallest supply of breath at the greatest expense of strength. Further, this method necessi- tates an attempt to control the breath in the throat, which was never intended for this purpose. It tends to cause the breath to come in spurts, or more air to escape than can be vocalized, making the voice trembling, jerky, wheezing, or "throaty." It causes a constrained position of the vocal organs, a condition that is responsible for " clergyman's sore throat." A second method of enlarging the chest is by extending the lower or floating ribs sideways. This is called costal or rib breathing. It has many advantages over the first method. It fills the middle portion of the lungs, and should be employed in connection with the third method, whereby the lower part of the lungs are reached. This is called abdominal, diaphragmatic, or deep breathing. The dia- phragm contracts, moves downward, while at the same time the abdominal muscles expand the lower chest later- ally, thus creating a large cavity for the air to enter. Now, the muscles that control respiration are partly voluntary and partly involuntary. By conscious attention we can learn to use them properly. Do you use the lower part of your lungs in respiration ? If not, you must learn to do so. This is an exercise not for the voice only; athletes, and others who need their full lung capacity, acquire the habit of deep breathing. In forming this habit, give your pri- mary attention to using the diaphragm, and the rib breathing will take care of itself ; think of filling the lower part of the lungs. Place the hands above the hips, press firmly as you inhale, and you can soon learn if you are using the 22 PUBLIC SPEAKING. diaphragm in breathing. If not, use it, and practise using until it becomes an unconscious habit. Watch yourself when walking or reclining. The speaker cannot have a strong, pure, resonant, sustained tone unless he breathes deeply. This method gives him a reserve supply of air in the lungs. Further, the speaker frequently needs to con- trol the voice with the diaphragm. This is the case in strong, dynamic utterance. Again, with the breath supply removed from the upper chest, this is left free for the cen- tre of resonance, a function it performs in producing the orotund or chest tone. Pure Tone. The lungs may be said to occupy one ex- treme in the machinery of voice production. The mouth is the other extreme. The vocal sound, sometimes called the " middle voice," is produced in the larynx. We not only need propelling power for a current of air against the vocal cords, but we must also open the mouth in front and back to let the sound out. It is obvious that if sound is to proceed from the mouth, it must have room to pass, yet in both conversation and public speaking this principle is constantly disregarded. We cramp the throat muscles and swallow the sound. We mumble. We send the sound partially or wholly through the nose. We roll the tongue around and so obstruct the sound. We close the jaw and bite off the sound. We close the lips and sputter. The mouth-opening habit, in speaking, should be encouraged and practised. And at the very outset, the power should be acquired of giving an open or pure vowel tone. What is a pure tone ? It is a tone that comes directly from the vocal cords, unvaried and unobstructed. The point is, to keep your tongue, jaws, and lips out of the way, and especially to keep the throat muscles relaxed. The back part of the mouth is to be opened as well as the front part. Remem- THE VOICE. 23 bering, then, to keep the mouth well opened in exhalation, practise the following Exercises in Deep Breathing. 1. Hands on hips. Open mouth widely. Inhale slowly by using diaphragm. Exhale slowly. "2. Inhale quickly, exhale slowly. :>. Inhalf quickly, exhale slowly, vocalizing uh with a dia- phragmatic impulse. 4. Inhale quickly, -\Iiale slowly, vocalizing in turn, after suc- cessive inhalations, ah, oh, aw, making diaphragm muscles active and throat muscles passive. 5. Cultivate muscular consciousness by breathing deeply when lying on your hack or when walking. 6. Take a deep inhalation, and read, at your ordinary rate, as many lines as you can easily, of the following extract from Southey's Cntnrnrt nf l.ntlorf. Practice should enable you to read the whole in a single expiration, but do not exhaust the lungs in the prn and leaping, Sinking and creeping, Swelling ami flinging, Showering and springing, Eddying and whisking, Spouting and frisking, Twining and twisting, Around and around; Collecting, disjecting, With endless rebound ; Smiting and fighting, A sight to delight in, Confounding, astounding, Dizzing and deafening the ear with its sound. In practising the exercises, the main point is, I repeat, systematic and continued practice. Practice for two or three days, or once a week, is worthless. Set aside fifteen 24 PUBLIC SPEAKING. minutes at two periods of the day. This had best not be when tired or directly after eating. Even if you have already acquired the habit of deep breathing, the practice will do no harm. Especially Exercise 4, for a pure tone, should be practised daily for a long period. Listen to the quality of your tone in giving these vowel sounds, and cul- tivate an ear for a full, round, musical, pure tone. You will soon learn to- detect for yourself the quality of your tone in giving these vowel sounds, and to open the voice-channels so that the sound is free and unobstructed pure. Along with the breathing exercises, and preparatory to facility in enunciation, practise the following Exercises for the Vocal Organs. 1. Lips. (a) Open the mouth widely in every way. Take a mirror and look at the tongue, the soft palate, the back of the throat. (ft) Round the lips, sounding oo. (c) Draw lips sideways, sounding ee. 2. Tongue. (a) Open the mouth wide. Put the tongue out straight as far as possible. Then draw it back quickly, and let it lie flat and low in the mouth. (6) With the very tip of the tongue touch, in turn, the lower teeth, upper teeth, roof of the mouth. 3. Nasality. Close the nostrils and say, sending none of the vocalization through the nose, " I try to speak clearly." 4. Throat and Glottis. With a ringing utterance, sound ing in " recoilm<7, turmoilm^, and foiling, and boilm<7," prolonging this syllable with a bell-like resonance, avoiding sympathetically squeez- ing the throat. 5. Jaws. Drop the lower jaw as far as possible and repeat, very slowly at first, gradually accelerating at each repetition, " We, wick, wack, walk." All this may appear simple, if not silly. But if you have, for example, for years been accustomed to close the THE VOICE. 25 jaw, or partially close it, in the act of speaking, and so swallow or muffle your tones, it is a little matter that may of itself prevent you from speaking clearly ; and the only way for one to form the habit of opening the mouth is to open it. Such things may be trifles; but attention to trifles often makes the difference between a good speaker and a poor one. When you find you have some special trouble covered by the foregoing exercises, practise this, and keep at it. Do not at first overdo these exercises. Just as one when first riding a bicycle finds that he is using a new set of muscles, so in these exercises, if you have not had a full and free play of the vocal organs, you will find you are using muscles that have been lying dormant. Never carry the practice to the point of weariness. SUMMARY. We have seen that the voice can and should be cultivated ; that the basis of tone-production is breath-quantity and breath-control, acquired by deep breathing; that the vocal organs may be strengthened and controlled; and that faults of voice can and should be cured by systematic and persistent practice, CHAPTER III. PRONUNCIATION AND ENUNCIATION, Definition of Terms. Good pronunciation is that manner of uttering words which is held to be correct, as based on the practice of the best speakers. Enunciation, also called Articulation, relates to distinctness in the utterance of sylla- bles or words. These terms are often used interchangeably, but Pronunciation refers especially to giving the proper accent and syllabication, and to correctly sounding the vowels ; Enunciation and Articulation refer especially to the distinct utterance of consonants and syllables. Pronun- ciation refers to correctness in speech, Enunciation to dis- tinctness. PRONUNCIATION. Importance of Correct Pronunciation. To pronounce cor- rectly the words in our language uniformly to give in every word we utter the proper vowel sounds and the proper accentuation is a consummation as desirable as it is rare. One seldom attains perfection in the pronunciation of words in the English language, and many educated people fall far short of an approximation to correctness. Glaring faults of pronunciation, however, grate upon the ear, just as mis- spelled words disturb the eye. While absolute correctness is rarely found, one can, by attention and practice, attain a fair approximation to good usage. Faults of Pronunciation. As a general principle, we may say that any method of utterance which calls attention to 26 PRONUNCIATION AND ENUNCIATION. 27 the speaker's pronunciation or enunciation rather than to the thought his language is intended to convey, is a fault. The two extremes of faulty pronunciation are the careless and provincial on the one hand, and the unusual and precise on the other. He who pronounces for as fur, since as sence, window as winder, now as naoiv, catch as ketch, from as frum, and so on, represents the provincial class that usually has the further faults of slovenly articulation and bad grammar. On the other hand, we have the over-precise, affectedly cultured class that pronounce neither as nither, pretty as pretty, nature as natyoor, laugh as lawf, and so on. But while a strained and unusual pronunciation is a common fault, carelessness is a far more common one. Tests of Good Pronunciation. The test of good pronunci- ation is the common practice of the best speakers. True, the "best speakers" an- not easily determined; but supple- mented with a study of the dictionary, the best usage can be discovered and acquired. It should be remembered that pronunciation is, after all, a matter not of right, but of cus- tom. It is a somewhat varying thing, changing from age to age, and even from decade to decade. No absolute standard of pronunciation can be laid down ; it is simply a matter of having uniformity for the sake of convenience. We have in America no one locality that can assume to set the standard. The main reliance as to the most generally approved usage is a good dictionary ; and yet, as Professor Lounsbury states, " Not a single one of our pronouncing dictionaries is a final authority.'' Though not an infallible guide, an up-to-date dictionary is, however, reliable enough for all practical pur- poses. .The main point is, our pronunciation should not reveal an ignorance of the standard pronunciation of com- mon words. For example, on page 28 is a brief list of words suggested by the mistakes of students in pronouncing them. PUBLIC SPEAKING. List of Words frequently Mispronounced. abdomen Daniel homage nature acoustics deaf horizon none again decorous hovel now against deficit humble oath America despicable humor oaths anarchist duty ideal prairie antarctic economic ideas precedence applicable education inaugurate precedents Arab either inchoate prestige auxiliary England incomparable pretty aversion English indisputable principle balm envelope infamous regular because every inquiry research been fa9ade integral resource believe faucet interest rid blithe February intrigue rinse buoy financier irregular robust catch forehead isolate Rio Grande calm fountain Italian sergeant certainly gallant (brave) jaunty since chastisement gallant (chival- just squalor Chicago rous) laboratory stalwart citizenship gather lamentable steady cleanly gaunt languor toward column gentleman laugh turbine constitution genuine legate vehement corps haunt leisure which courier hearth lever window courtesy heinous literature whole cow herb memory wound creek history mischieyous zoology The list might of course be extended almost indefinitely. For the most part, the words given belong in an ordinary vocabulary. Test yourself on this list. You will find that some of the words may be correctly pronounced in more than PRONUNCIATION AND ENUNCIATION. 29 one way; and in such cases the preferred dictionary pro- nunciation should always be tested by the common practice of good speakers. ENUNCIATION. Importance of Distinct Enunciation. Objectively consid- ered, we may say that effective speaking must be (1) heard, (2) understood, and (3) believed. It is evident that speech is futile when it cannot be heard, although the speaker may have a clear understanding of, and most earnest belief in, his message. " Is not this, then," says George William Curtis, "the beginning of oratory, to make yourself heard and to make your hearer wish to hear?" Enunciation has largely to do with the first of these tests of effective speaking, that of being heard. The best speak- ers not only may be heard, but they enunciate so clearly that there is the best economy of the hearer's attention. It is a lamentable fact that many experienced speakers, who have something to say really worth hearing, are only half intelligible because of their faulty enunciation. The trouble is a lack not of loudness, but of distinctness. Mere loud- ness, in fact, in many auditoriums, will only accentuate a poor enunciation; and the mistake is frequently made of speaking loudly rather than clearly. If a speaker cannot be heard, the cause will be found not so much in weakness of voice as in weakness of articulation. Char- lotte Cushinan and Edwin Booth, it is said, could whisper so that every word uttered would be heard in the most dis- tant part of a large auditorium. How was this possible ? By a vigorous and clear-cut articulation. True, other things contribute to clearness of utterance, force, modulating the voice to the audience room, and sending it out to the audi- ence ; but experience shows that young speakers need more drill on articulation than perhaps on any other one thing. It is the basis of all intelligible speaking. 30 PUBLIC SPEAKING. The Need of an Exaggerated Enunciation in Public Speech. We all recognize the importance of distinct enunciation in conversation, but students usually fail to realize the need of an exaggerated articulation in public speaking. That is, a mode of utterance partially indistinct in conversation be- comes wholly indistinct when the auditor is farther removed from the speaker; one who can be heard in conversation with an effort becomes unintelligible when addressing an audience. We must, therefore, draw the distinction between a conversational manner and conversational articulation. In Chapter I, public speaking was characterized as " enlarged and heightened conversation." These adjectives are espe- cially applicable to the enunciation required for public speaking. The syllables and words must be more clearly separated and sounded than in conversation, and the voice sent out to the audience. You cannot speak to an audience of any size with the same enunciation that you would use in speaking to a friend at your side. If you do, you will not be understood. Faults in Enunciation and their Correction. Excepting cases of stuttering, or of real impediment in speech, such as may need the employment of a surgeon, any one, by system- atic practice, can attain a distinct enunciation. If you lisp, giving the th sound for s, you must learn to get control of the tip of the tongue, and keep it from contact with the upper teeth, in giving the s sound. If your tongue is too large for your mouth, enlarge the mouth cavity and keep the tongue out of the way when not in use. If your lower jaw protrudes, or if you have a sort of chronic lockjaw, if you habitually bite your words off, or have "flannel in the mouth," or" whistle your s's, when you find any special trouble in enunciating clearly, practise correcting it, and keep at it until you have overcome the fault. PRONUNCIATION AND ENUNCIATION. 31 Now, good enunciation involves the three processes of (1) sounding distinctly the consonants, (2) separating the syllables, and (3) separating the words. And first, one must attain power over the consonants. An old writer has said, " Take care of the consonants, and the vowels will take care of themselves." The common trouble is, not lack of power over the consonants, but a lack of the exercise of such power. Bring out the final t's and d's, and do not mumble. Remember the articulating organs the lips, jaw, teeth, and tongue should be ac- tively employed. The point for obstruction of the vowel sound, whereby the consonant is sounded, should be exactly and vigorously attacked, and the reaction should be quick and smooth. One student will barely close the lips in giving 6, p, and v. Another will talk through the teeth, with the mouth nearly or quite closed. With another, the tongue is everywhere, indeed, an " unruly member." A little atten- tion to this matter of sounding the consonants will show the number and variety of muscular movements, in and about the mouth, required for the proper enunciation of a common word like cirifi'.n ; and to many students it will show that many vocal muscles that have been lying dormant should be developed. Secondly, the syllables should be distinctly and accurately separated, each syllable enunci- ated, and no syllable added. This will avoid the common fault of running the syllables together, and of omitting or adding syllables. We will not say jography for geography, art ic for arctic, liistry for history, Amerka for America, citzen- *////> for citizenship, acrost for across, genelmun for gentle- man, etc. Lastly, the words should be clearly separated. Careless speakers give their phrases or sentences as a single word. Light and dark are given as lighten dark; that will do, as that'll doo; the minute-man of the Amer- ican Revolution, as u-min't-man-o'-u-murkan-rev'lution, etc., 32 PUBLIC SPEAKING. speaking like a drunken man, whose muscles are semi paralyzed. In the exercises that follow, which are for the purpose 01 practice in articulation, be overprecise, if you please, only bring out clearly every consonant sound. To correct any fault, it is well at first to go to the opposite extreme; so overdo the effort for distinctness. When you find a diffi- cult sound, or combination of sounds, practise these over and over until you master them. The exercises are arranged with reference to the various organs primarily used in articu- lating the respective consonant sounds. Exercises in Articulation. I. The Labials, made primarily with the lips, are : /, />. m, w, v,f. 1. Both brown beauties bit the black bait. 2. Brawny black brutes bounded back, breaking the big bridge. 3. Be bold, be bold, be not too bold. 4. Hope on, hope ever. 5. The porter's parents, praying pardon, pleaded pitiably. 6. Ponto, the flippy, puffing uninterruptedly, jumped up on the top of the porch. 7. Many unmanageable monsters, married to magnanimous men, make much mischief. 8. Mary's mamma, admiring mammon and missing the man's money, murmured much and mourned many months. 9. Milestones mark the march of time. ^40. Well, Washington was wiser than Webster. II. When William went west where Wheeler was working. \y wished vve were where we^oald warn lu'm. 12. The wherry at the wharf was weighed with whale oil and wheat. 13. Vain was the valor of the brave savage. 14. The^voiuble, vivacious villain vociferously vowed revenge. 15. Vivian's vernacular gives vividness to every verse. 16. Victor's verses revived a love of adventure. PRONUNCIATION AND ENUNCIATION. 33 17. Firmly the fowl faced the fierce fox. 18. Frugal Flavius, flushing feverishly, found fault with Flora i frivolity. 1!. Flags fluttered fretfully from foreign fortifications and fleets. II. The Dentals, made by the action of the tongue against the teeth, and by the emission of breath between the teeth, are : d, t, 8, /*, z, zh, j, ck, and the two sounds of th. 1. The band blared sadly, Dan declared. 2. Daniel dared to dare Darius. :5. Dora, defending sound doctrines, discomfited the dis- putant. 4. Tie taut the tent, and test it. 5. To-morrow try to talk truly and truthfully. 6. Tom treated the delicate subject touchingly, tenderly, and tactfully. 7. Thomas, talking trivial twaddle, tried twice to treat Tim- othy truculently. 8. If Theophilus Thistle, the thistle-sifter, sjfted a sieve of unsifted thistles, where is the sieve of unsifted thistles that Theophilus Thistle, the thistle-tifter, sifted? 9. Breathe with care, do not mouth thy words. 10. Thursday Theodore gave Thisbe the thousandth thwack. 1 1. Thr^u^h the thin cloth the thief thrust thorns. 12. Cease sighing, since sighs seldom secure success. 13. Surely slowness and slovenliness should be shunned. 14. Seated on shore, she sees ships with shining sails on the shimmering sea. 15. Rouse the zealots to resist the Zulus. 1<. The zephyr has gone, the blizzards are rising. 17. Each daisy teaches a lesson. Abuse them not. 18. Ezra's seizure caused displeasure. 19. James, the jailer, judged John justly. 20. Jacob, the Jewish jockey, jovially jingled Juliet's jewels. 21 Gems and jewels just from Japan. 22. The chief cheerfully chose the choicest chair. 34 PUBLIC SPEAKI.\<;. 23. Richard chanted in church like a cherub. 24. Chastened with chafing chains, Chauncey challenged Chandler. III. The Palatals, made by the aid of the palate, are : g, h, k, y. 1. Go get the gun and give the goose a shot. 2. Great-grandf ather, gowned gaudily, gallantly guarded ( I garlands. 3. Who gave Hugh that howling hyena? 4. I did not say, wig, heart, ear, hair, and all, but whig, art, hear, air, and hall. 5. ** Kill the king," the crank cried crossly. 6. Kittens cunningly crept across the cotton coverlet. 7. The Ku-Klux Klan caused the cook to keep her carving knife keen. 8. Youthful Yankee yachtsmen squared the yards. 9. The yarns of the ubiquitous Yankee used to be humorous. 10. Europe's universities euphemistically eulogized the union. IV. The Nasals, made by a free escape of vocalized breath through the nostrils, are m, n, and ng, the only sounds in our language, by the way, wherein any vocalized breath is to be sent through or started toward the nasal passages. 1. No man need know need in this new nation. 2. Noisy nomads never noticed Naaman's noble name. :J. Xext noon non-conformists announced renewed enmity to the government's enrolment. 4. The cataract strong then plunges along, Rising and leaping, sinking and creeping. Showering and springing, flying and flinging, Writhing and ringing. V. The Linguals, made chiefly with the tongue, are I and r. 1. They fell like leaves and fill long lists. 2. Little likeliness, laughed the low lawyer, that legibility and liability are linked indissolubly. PRONUNCIATION AND ENUNCIATION. 35 3. The wronged, ragged rabble roared ravenously. 4. The car was adorned with corn and drawn by four horses. 5. Rude, rocky, rural roads run round rocky ranges. 6. Around the rough and rugged rock the ragged rascal ran. The foregoing examples include, it is true, many unusual combinations and repetitions of consonant sounds. Practice on such combinations will serve only as a means to an r ml, an active use and ready control of the articulating organs. So I repeat, overdo these exercises. In the actual process of reading or speaking, the mind must of -course conceive the words as expressing thought to be communi- cated. A desire to be clear must always be at the basis of a clear-cut articulation. But frequently this is not enough. The physical means of, and individual limitations upon, rli-ar speech, must be noted and mastered. By this is meant, not the over-precision of the " prunes, prisms, and potatoes " variety, or stressing sound rather than thought, but distinct speech. We are not to articulate as if such modifiers and connectives as a, the, of, etc., were as important as the nouns and verbs. The unimportant words are to be subordinated in utterance, but they are to be enunciated, else they may as well be eliminated from the language. In other words, \\v are to acquire, in this matter of articulation, combined naturaliifss, ease, and distinctness. Try this desired com- bination in the examples following, and avoid both the over- precise and the slipshod. 1. Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue. But if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town crier spake my lines. SIIAKSPEAKE. J. When thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest : but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not. ST. JOHN xxi. 18. 36 PUBLIC SPEAKIM;. 3. And the Gileadites took the passages of Jordan before the Ephrai mites : and it was so, that when those Ephraimit-s which were escaped said, Let me go over; that the men of Gilead said unto him, Art thou an Ephraimite? If he said, Nay; then said they unto him, Say now Shibboleth ; and he said Sibboleth : for he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him and slew him at the passages of the Jordan: and there fell at that time of the Ephraimites forty and two thousand. JUDGES xii. .". ;. 4. Nature has proved that the great silent Samuel shall not be silent too long. CARLYLE. 5. Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation. LINCOLN. 6. From the dark portals of tjie Star Chamber, and in the stern text of the Acts of Uniformity, the pilgrims received a commis- sion more important than any that ever bore the royal seal. EVERETT. 7. In this God's world, with its wild, whirling eddies and mad foam oceans, where men and nations perish as if without law, dost thou think there is therefore no justice? CARLYI.I For further practice, read any of the selections in Chapter XIII, giving special attention to clear enunciation. SUMMARY. Pronunciation relates to correctness in speech, Enunciation to distinctness, The speaker's aim should be to utter his words in such a manner as to be readily understood, and not in such a manner as to excite remark. Especially should he remember that distinct enunciation is the basis of all intelligible speech, and that to attain this, the enunciation of ordinary conversation must be exaggerated, CHAPTER IV. KEY, Definition of Terms. Key is the predominating tone or pitch of the voice, in speaking. In music, as we know, key refers to the place of the voice upon the musical scale. It depends upon the rapidity with which the vocal cords vibrate. The higher the pharynx is raised and the tauter the cords are drawn, the greater the rapidity of vibration and the higher the key. Key is not to be confused with loudness. A sound may be subdued in a high key or loud in a low key. By Compass, we mean the range a voice has, the range between its highest and lowest limits. The Middle or Average Key. Now, just as there is a range within which one can sing, so there is a range within which one can speak, most easily and effectively, and for the longest time. This average range will determine the dominant note or key. One of the first questions the young speaker must ask himself is, Do I speak in that key most conducive to ease, effectiveness, and sustained effort ? Bear in mind that an habitual key is not necessarily a natural key. Many people have accustomed themselves to speak in either the highest or lowest note of their key- range, rather than in the medium range. One who speaks in a high, thin, squeaky tone, represents the one extreme, while one who speaks as from the bottom of a well, repre- sents the other extreme. Either extreme is a fault. In his 37 38 PUBLIC SPEAKING. treatise on Orators and Oratory, Cicero writes : " There is in every voice a certain middle key, but in each particular voice that key is peculiar. For the voice to ascend gradually from this key is advantageous and pleasing ; since to bawl at the beginning is boorish, and gradation is salutary in strengthening the voice. This variety and this gradual pro- gression of the voice throughout all the notes will preserve its power, and add agreeableness to delivery." Ease, variety, and strength depend on using the middle or average pitch of the voice ; we then have a common point above and below which the voice is allowed to play. The im- portance of this free and easy play of the voice in speaking cannot be overestimated. Inflection, emphasis, climax, and many other elements of expression, depend upon it. Now, this middle pitch will vary with the individual. Physio- logical conditions will determine that the key of one voice shall be tenor and of another bass. On the musical scale the bass voice will vary from say about G (bass staff) to D, and the tenor from about middle C to G. The point is, are you utilizing to the best advantage the key-range that nature has given you ? What key are you habitually using in speaking ? If you have a sense of key in music, ad- vantageous though not indispensable to the speaker, test your key with the piano, speaking a sentence in a monotone. Suppose you find that you habitually speak in about the highest pitch of your key-range, probably the more com- mon fault. You must get your voice down, else you can have no strength, no " body " to the speaking tone, and no sustained power. How acquire the lower key ? Lower it. Find the desired note on a musical instrument and speak to it. Relax the throat muscles and roll the voice out from the chest. Think of it as coming, if you.ploao^ from the diaphragm. Watch yourself in conversation, and do not allow your voice to rise into a high, constrained pitch. KEY. 39 On the other hand, if you speak down " in the shoes " so that the tone is habitually swallowed, learn to raise the key, project the tone, and get it out. This acquisition of your best individual average key may involve the formation of a new habit and a new voice. A good teacher can soon tell you your needs, but you must do the rest. A study of vocal anatomy or of rules will not aid so much as an appreciation of what you need to do, and systematic practice. "Even where Nature confers the blessing of a voice of adequate strength, she seldom adds the desirable flexibility or modula- tion. So, whether it be a stronger voice or a more manage- able one that the speaker needs, his only method of acquiring it is that of willing it into his possession. ... If your voice has a tendency to go up, you are to do with it just as you should do with your elbow if it has a tendency to go up at the table put it down and keep it down by an exercise of the will. Will it down and put it down, and keep it down until it stays down without a conscious exercise of the will." 1 Adaptation of the Voice to the Room. Every room has a key of its own; that is, has powers of augmenting some sounds, and confusing others, dependent upon the size of the room, and its acoustic properties generally. This key, or " overtone," the experienced speaker will learn to detect, and to adapt his key to the particular auditorium in which he is speaking. Especially should the speaker, when speak- ing to a large audience, avoid the common fault of a high, constrained pitch that soon becomes painful to both the speaker and the hearers. The natural key should be used. Colonel Higginson lays down as one of the cardinal rules of speaking: "Always speak in a natural key and in a conversa- tional manner. . . . But how to reach that easy tone is the 1 Sheppard : Before an Audience. 40 PUBLIC SPEAKING. serious question. . . . The best way, of course, is to be natural without effort, if one only could. . . . There is one very simple method, and one which I have seldom known to fail. Suppose the occasion to be a public dinner. You have somebody at your side to whom you have been talking. To him your manner was undoubtedly natural; and if you can only carry along into your public speech that conversational flavor of your private talk, the battle is gained. How, then, to achieve that result ? In this easy way : Express to your neighbor conversationally the thought, whatever it is, with which you mean to begin your public speech. Then, when you rise to speak, say merely what will be perfectly true, 'I was just saying to the gentle- man who sits beside me, that' and then repeat your re- mark over again. You thus make the last words of your private talk the first words of your public address, and the conversational manner [key] is secured. This suggestion originated, I believe, with a man of inexhaustible fertility in public speech, Rev. E. E. Hale. I have often availed myself of it, and have often been thanked for suggesting it to others." l It should be noted that the natural or conver- sational key here referred to, is wholly compatible with a non-conversational enunciation, which was treated of in Chapter III (p. 30). High Key not necessary for Increased Force. Again, there is a natural tendency to use a high key of voice as an accom- paniment offeree. To resist this tendency as old, it might seem, as oratory itself the ancients stationed a musical per- former near the speaker (the instrument used by the Romans being called a tonoriuiri), who from time to time reminded him of his normal pitch. The speaker of to-day must learn to re- mind himself. The young speaker is apt to " key up " as he 1 Higginson : Hints on Writing and Speech-making. KEY. 41 warms up ; as emotion rises, the voice rises, and his speak- ing becomes either yelling or screeching. But this is as un- necessary as it is undesirable. True, climax is often given in a higher key, but generally speaking, force can best be voiced by the combined strength and volume that the lower register alone can supply. There is a deepening of the feel- ings which come welling out through a lower key. So learn to inert-list 1 your force and keep the voice down in key. Do not raise the voice and rap the hearers over the heads, in expressing force, but rather keep the voice down and lift the audience from their seats. Modulation. Variation from the average key is one of the ways to avoid a monotonous delivery. By the relative degree and ease of such variation, we say one speaker's voice is flexible and another's stitf. A dead level in speaking is one way of putting an audience asleep. This monotony in key is sometimes heard from the pulpit. A key suited to the deeply emotional is carried also into the expression of the unemotional ; so that the announcement of a Sunday- school picnic is given in the same low, sepulchral tone as the announcement of a funeral sermon. No instrument, least of all the voice, can be well played in a single key. Variation is restful to both hearer and speaker. A song-note is uniform while it lasts, a speech- note is constantly varying. During the enunciation of a single word or syllable, the voice, in speaking, may move through its whole compass. The tension of holding the vocal cords in one position during a given note renders sing- ing more fatiguing. In the trial of Hastings, Edmund Burke spoke four days in delivering his opening speech and nine days in closing. To have sung during this time would have been an impossible feat. And to speak at such length, Burke must have relieved the tension of an unvarying key. 4-2 PUBLIC SPEAKING. If one speaks habitually in the " upper register," he has what is known as a " head-tone," if in the " lower register," a "chest-tone." In the one case he makes the head the roof of the mouth the sounding-board for his tones ; in the other case, the chest. A prevailing head-tone is the more common fault. In such cases, the speech-note should be lowered and the vowels rotted out from the lungs rather than from the throat. Think of the chest as the centre of voice-reverberation, and by conscious effort centre it there. Again, key should vary with the matter. The manuals of elocution give an elaborate classification of degrees in pitch, with rules as to how matter of a certain character fits into a certain " degree," but all this is largely dogmatic and artificial. At any rate, it is a case where the rule is worse than its violation. We know that the key in explanatory or narrative matter is higher than in the expression of deep feeling. In the one case the sole object is to get some- thing lying easily in the speaker's mind into the minds of the hearers ; in the other case, there goes with the thought something of the speaker's life and character : the impres- sion lies deeper, and for its expression a deeper note must perforce be struck. This is a single phase of the matter. On the other hand, strong feeling as an outburst of indig- nation may often best be expressed in a high key. The point is, to get control and variety of key. The rest can best be left to the requirements of the varied and changing emotions of a given address. Exercises in Key. 1. Test the compass of your voice by (a) giving the open vowel sounds ah, aw, 6, ow up and down the musical scale, (b) Re- peat in a monotone from the lowest to the highest key, and vice versa, " Repeat it over and over again." '2. Render the following in a rising series, like climbing a stair- KEY. 43 way, giving the first line very low, and each succeeding line higher, let ''ghosts" be the climax highest of all. "Amidst the mists With angry boasts, He thrusts his fists Against the posts, And still insists He sees the ghosts." 3. Practise Exercise 1 (a) without separating the notes, i.e. let the voice slide up and down the scale. This movement of the voice is called the rising or falling slide, as the case may be, and is widely serviceable. A flexible voice, for example, will slide easily from a low to a high key, in an interrogatory. Practise the rising slide in asking, " Are you going home to-day ? " Overdo it, perhaps, by using the whole compass of the voice. Suppose now your hearer does not uml-r>t;m>//// is the mot her of invention. (h) WhMv\vr you meet a dozen earnest men pledged to a new idea, you meet the beginning of a new revolution. (c) The development of Americanism was the predominant fact of the nineteenth century. (d) Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charily, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. (e) The story of Major Andre is the one overmastering romance of the Revolution. (/) A life of ignoble ease is as little worthy of a nation as of an individual. (#) A wise man seeks to shine in himself; afoot, in others. (h) Americans may be friends of the English, but subjects, never. (i ) He who would speak well, must acquire command of himself. Importance of Emphasis. It will be seen that emphasis is a ryost important element of expression. If you take the question, Do you ride to town to-day ? emphasizing by turn each word, as many different meanings will be expressed as there are words in the sentence. An example frequently given of the effect of misplaced emphasis is that of a young preacher who, on the theory that all italicized words in the Bible were to be emphasized, so read the following passage EMPHASIS. 49 in 1 Kings, xiii. 27, "And he spake to his sons, saying, * Saddle me the ass,' and they saddled him" Misplaced emphasis is the most fruitful source of the sing-song tone, which comes from the stress being applied at regular intervals. This is especially noticeable in the reading of poetry, but is not uncommon in the render- ing of prose. The paramount rule to be observed in em- phasis is, Read or speak as you would talk. Unfortunately, this rule is not always, or even generally, observed. For the purpose of correcting common faults, some further rules, with examples, are given below. It will be found that these rules are largely the reflex, just as emphasis itself is, of the thought-analysis as set forth in Chapter I. Rules of Emphasis. 1. The key-ivord or words of a sentence shoidd be discovered N and emphasized. To state the rule in another way : Analyze the sentence to find the word or words that carry the prin- cipal idea, or that express a new idea, and then give vocal expression to the results of such analysis. To determine the most important word or words in a sentence, three tests may be applied : Is it (1) a word that is indispensable to the thought ? (2) a word that a person must hear to tell what you are talking about? (3) a word that can, by rearrange- ment, be made the climax of the sentence ? Illustrative examples of this rule are given below. In the examples given under the various headings of this book, it should be understood that all the shades or degrees of emphasis, or of other elements of expression, are not indicated, nor can they be indicated, on the printed page ; that the marking of examples is intended to be sug- gestive merely, to aid in calling attention to one principle at a time, and to refer only to the particular rule or principle 50 PUBLIC SPEAKIXG. then under consideration. In the examples below, key words are suggested by the italicizing. Different results, however, may be obtained by the individual student, since analyses may differ. But the point is, have some reason for emphasizing a given word, else do not emphasize it ; and when you have a reason for emphasizing it, emphasize it know that your voice is obeying your mind. Examples. (a) Time has a dooms-day book, upon whose pages he is continually recording illustrious names. But as often as a new name is writ- ten there, an old one disappears. Only a few stand in illnminnted characters never to be effaced. These are the high nobility of nature lords of the public domain of thought. Posterity shall never question their titles. But those whose fame lives only on the /W /'.>- creel opinion of unwise men must soon be as well forgotten as if they had never been. To this great oblivion must most men come. LONGFELLOW. (>) There is a time in every man's experience when he arrives at the conclusion that envy is ignorance ; that imitation is suicide ; that he must take himself, for better or for worse, as his portion: that, though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed upon that plot of ground that is given him to till. The power that resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Therefore, my text is, Trust thyself. Is it not an iron string to which vibrates every heart? EMERSON. (c) Centuries ago, on the rock-bound coast of Massachusetts Bay, one night there was a wedding. The sky was the roof that covered the high contracting parties, and the stars, painted by the finger of God, were the fresco-work ; the music was that of the singing night-bird and the surge of the gray old ocean ; the biddf-n guests were the Puritan fathers and the Puritan mothers ; the un- bidden guests were the dusky savages : the bride and the bridegroom were the meeting-house and the schoolhouse, and from that marriage EMPHASIS. 51 there was born a child. They christened it New England Civiliza- tion. FRYE. 2. Subordinate the modifying or qualifying words, phrases or clauses. Keep the incidental or relatively unimportant matter in the background, and so put the leading ideas in the foreground. This subordination is accomplished by using less force, and usually a lower key, in delivery. Grady, for example, in his famous New England Society speech, after describing the return of the Confederate sol- dier at the close of the Civil War, says, " What does he do, this hero in gray with a heart of gold ? " The verb do ex- presses the new idea, and the added clause, being a repetition, should be subordinated in speaking. This is done by making it a continuation of the fall of the voice which follows the stress applied to "do." For further examples in subordination, see Chapter XIII, p. 195, " The New South," second paragraph ; and p. 169, " The Triumph of Truth," fourth paragraph. 3. Ideas compared or contrasted should be emphasized. The thought expression is essentially one of comparison. As will be seen in the examples below, comparisons or contrasts may be expressed or implied; and there may be double or triple antithesis. Examples. (a) A sin may be a sin of omission or a sin of commission. (6) It is not true that he played the traitor in the hour of his country's trial. (c) To flow with the current is easy ; a chip can do that, but a man ought to be able to stem the tide when necessary. (d) Public sentiment is beginning to measure a man not so much by his culture as by what he can do with his culture. It 52 PUBLIC ^I'EAKING. demands efficiency as \\vll as scholastic acquirements, claiming that a learnt if fool is no better than an if/nni-unt rspert. ( dedicated, can long endure. The Rising Inflection. Incompleteness of thought arises in a variety of forms, among which we may note (1) Doubt or Concession, (2) Appeal or Obviousness, and (3) Negation. 1. Doubt or Concession require* the Rising Inflection. In cases of doubt or concession, the sense is usually imperfect, something needs to follow, expressed or implied, to complete the thought. Examples. (a) He may be an nonest man ; he says he is. (b) I grant you that this is the true standard of statesmanship. Now the question is, did Mr. Webster measure up to that standard V 2. Appeal or Obviousness requires the Rising Inflection. That is, where the speaker impliedly says, " Is not this true ? " or " You will not question this, will you ? " INFLECTION. 63 Examples. () One must build to the praise of a being above, to build the noblest memorial of himself. (6) It is not necessary to be rich in order to be happy. . . . We have a false standard of these things in the United States. We think that a man must be great, that he must be famous, that he must be wealthy. That is all a mistake. It is not necessary to be rich, to be great, to be famous, to be powerful, in order to be happy. The happy man is the free man. 3. Negation frequently denotes incompleteness, especially when followed by an affirmation. When a statement is made in the negative, if we say a thing is not so and so, unless the negation is itself assertive or positive, the implication usually is that something is to follow by way of affirmation, that it is so and so, and the thought is incomplete until such affirmation. Examples. (a) I come not here armed at all points with law cases and Acts of Parliament, with the statute-book doubled down in dog's ears, to defend the cause of liberty. I would not debate a point of law with the gentleman ! I know his abilities. CHATHAM. (b) It was not his olive valleys and orange groves which made the Greece of the Greekt it was not for his apple orchards or potato fields that the farmer of Xew England and New York left his plough in the furrow and marched to Bunker Hill, to Bennington, to Sara- toga. A man's country is not a certain area of land, but it is a principle; and patriotism is loyalty to that principle. CURTIS. (c) The proposition is peace. Not peace through the medium of war"; not peace to be hunted through the labyrinth of intricate and endless negotiations ; not peace to arise out of universal dis- cord, fomented from principle in all parts of the empire ; not peace to depend on the juridical determination of perplexing questions, 64 PUBLIC SPEAKING. or the precise marking of the shadowy boundaries of a complex government ; it is simple peace ; sought in its natural course ; and in its ordinary haunts. BURKE. (rf) What constitutes a state ? Not high-raised battlements or labored mound, Thick wall or moated gate ; Not cities proud, with spires and turrets crowned ; Not bays and broad-arm ports, Where laughing at the storm, rich navies ride ; Not starred and spangled courts, Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. No : men high-minded men With powers as far above dull brutes endued In forest brake and den, As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude ; Men who their duties know, But know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain, Prevent the long-aimed blow, And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain ; These constitute a state. SIR WILLIAM JONES. Further Applications of the General Law of Inflection. 1. A loose sentence is usually delivered with the Falling Inflection at intermediate pauses, except the clause preceding the last, when the Rising Inflection is used. The reason for this general rule is, that by using the rising inflection on next to the last clause, the effect is to connect all the pre- ceding clauses with the very close. The demands of emphasis may of course vary this general rule. It is sometimes said that the falling inflection used at the pauses in the following examples is a partial fall only, as distinguished from the complete fall that denotes the conclusion of thought. That is, there are degrees of inflec- INFLECTION. 65 tion that will represent the various degrees of relationship between ideas. It would be impossible, as well as unde- sirable, to give an exposition of these various degrees on the printed page. Here again the speaker's mind must be the guide. Examples. (a) Today men point to Marengo in wonderment. They laud the power and foresight that so skilfully planned the battle, but they forget that Napoleon failed ; they forget that he was defeated ; they forget that a general only thirty years old made a victory of the great conqueror's defeat, and that a gamin of Paris put to shame the Child of Destiny. (6) It should be the labor of a genuine and noble patriotism to raise the life of a nation to the level of its privileges ; to harmonize its general practice with its abstract principles ; to reduce to actual facts the ideals of its institutions ; to elevate instruction into knowledge; and to deepen knowledge into wisdom. (c) So long as men touch the ground and feel their own weight, so long they need the aptitudes and the instrumentalities of the human body; and one of the very first steps in oratory is that which trains the body to be the welcome and glad servant of the soul ; for many a one who has acres of thought has little bodily culture, and many a one who has sweetening inside has cacophony when he speaks. 2. In aperiodic sentence, the Rising Inflection should usually be given at the intermediate pauses. The construction of a periodic sentence is especially adapted to oratorical dis- course, its leading idea, the climax, being reserved till the close. The thought is onlooking, and the rising inflection aids the thought-movement onward to the climax. In a very long sentence, the demands of variety may necessitate a change from the general rule, for when variety demands it, any general rule should be broken. 66 PUBLIC SPEAKING. Examples. (a) Now we see the superstructure pillar after pillar, tower after tower, column after column. . . . Scaffolding, ropes, ladders, workmen ascending and descending, mar the beauty of the build- ing, but by and by, when the hosts who have labored shall come up over a thousand battle-fields, waving with bright grain never again to be crushed in the distillery, through vineyards, under trellised vines with grapes hanging in all their purple glory, never again to be pressed into that which can debase and degrade mankind; when they shall come through the orchards, under trees hanging thick with golden, pulpy fruit, never again to be turned into that which can injure and debase, when they shall come up to the last distil- lery and destroy it, to the last stream of liquid death and dry it up, to the last weeping wife and wipe her tears gently away, to the last little child and stand him up where God meant that man should stand, to the last drunkard and nerve him to burst the burning fetters, and raise the song of freedom by the clanking of his broken chains, then, ah ! then will the copestone be put upon it, the scaf- folding will fall with a crash, and the building will stand in its wondrous beauty before an astonished world^and the last poor drunkard shall go into it and find a refuge there. JOHN B. GOUGH. (ft) When round the lonely cottage Roars loud the tempest's din ; And the good logs of Algidus Roar louder yet with in 7 When the oldest cask is opened, And the largest lamp is lit ; When the chestnuts glow in the embers, And the kid turns on the spit ; When young and old in circle Around the firebrands close ; INFLECTION. 67 And the girls are weaving baskets, And the boys are shaping bows ; When the goodman mends his armor, And trims his helmet's plume; When the goodwife's shuttle merrily Goes flashing through the loom ; With weeping and with laughter, Still is the story toldT How well Horatius kept the bridge In the brave days of old. MACAULAY. .3. In alternative and antithetical expressions, the first part I usually takes the Rising, the secoml jmrt the Falling, Inflection. Examples. (a) Is it a dog^or is it a rug ? (b) Must we use force, or can we use argument? (c) For I am persuaded, that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. ROMANS viii. 38, 39. ( ~^*s not say; as, "Brutus was an honorable man. So are they atl all honorable men." Some of the principal words, whereby either a serious or an ironical idea may be expressed by use of the appropriate circumflex, are marked in the following extracts. Examples. (a) Suppose you do contradict yourself; what then? "Ah, then," exclaim the aged ladies, " you shall be sure to be misun- derstood." Misunderstood? It is a right fool's word. Every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh was misunderstood. EMERSON. (6) The citizen who supposes that he does his whole duty when he votes, places a premium upon political knavery. Thieves wel- come him to the polls and offer him a choice, which he has done nothing to prevent, between Jeremy Diddler and Dick Turpin. 70 PUBLIC SPEAKING. The party cries for which he is responsible are: " Turpin ana Honesty ! " " Diddler and Reform 1 " CURTIS. (c) Signior Antonio, many a time and oft In the Rial to you have rated me About my moneys and my usances : Still have I borne it with a patient shnig; For sufferance is the badge of all our tribe. . . . Wt-11, then, it now appears you need my help: Go to, then ; you come to me, and you say, Shylock, we would have moneys. . . . "What should I say to you ? Should I not say, Hath a dog money? Is it possible A cur can lend three thousand ducats? Or Shall I bend low, and in a bondman's ki-y, With bated breath and whispering humbleness, Say this, Fair sir, you spit on me on Wednesday la~ You spurn 'd me such a day; another time You calFd me dog ; and for these courtesies I'll lend you thus much moneys? The Merchant of Venice, Act I, Scene ITT. (d) The advocates of Charles the First, like the advoca other malefactors against whom overwhelming evidence is pro- duced, generally decline all controversy about the factj and con- tent themselves with calling testimony to character. He had so many private virtues! And had James the Second no private virtues? Was Oliver Cromwell, his bitterest enemies themselves being judges, destitute of private virtues? And what, after all, are the virtues ascribed to Charles? A religious zeal, not more sincere than that of his son, and fully as weak and narrow-minded, and a few of the ordinary household decencies which half the tombstones in England claim for those who lie beneath them. A good father ! A good husband ! Ample INFLECTION. 71 apologies indeed for fifteen years of persecution, tyranny, and falsehood! We charge him with having broken his coronation oath ; and we are told that he kept his marriage vow ! We accuse him of having given up his people to the merciless inflictions of the most hot-headed and hard-hearted of prelates ; and the defense is, that he took his little son on his knee and kissed him ! We censure him for having violated the articles of the Petition of Right, after having, for good and valuable consideration, promised to observe them ; and we are informed that he was accustomed to hear prayers at six o'clock in the morning ! It is to such considerations as these, together with his Vandyke dress, his handsome face, and his peaked beard, that he owes, we verily believe, most of his popularity with the present generation. MACAULAY. The Slides : Definition. The slides are those variations from the key whereby the voice is carried through a series of words, phrases, clauses, or sentences, from below the key to and above it, or vice versa. From below the key upward is called the Rising Slide ; as, From above the key downward is called the Falling as, 72 Pl'BLIC SPEAKI\<;. The slides, then, are exaggerated or prolonged inflections, and the same General Law applies in their use. In the illustrations above, for example, the first question " Can you not let your voice fall?" expresses a doubt. The sense is incomplete until the answer is received, therefore the voice rises. The second question " Why don't you let your voice fall?" assumes that you can let it fall, and requires for an answer an explanation complete in itself, therefore the voice falls. Usage. The principal uses of the slides are : 1. A definite question takes the Rising Slide. A definite question is one that can be answered by yes or no ; and the thought is incomplete until the answer is given. Examples. () Will any man deny that? (h) Will any man challenge a line of the statement that free consent is the foundation rock of all our institutions? (c) Is it ever true that our efforts td impress are greater thaii our efforts to be ? (d) Is there, then, no death for a word once spoken ? Was never a deed but left its token Written on tablets never broken? WHITTIER. (e) Are we to go on cudgelling, and cudgelling, and cudgelling men's ears with coarse processes? Are we to consider it a special providence when any good comes from our preaching or our teaching? Are we never to study how skilfully to pick the lock of curiosity ; to unfasten the door of fancy; to throw wide open the halls of emotion, and to kindle the light of inspiration in the souls oi m.-n ? Is there any reality in oratory? It is all real. BEECH KR. INFLECTION. 73 2. An indefinite question takes the Falling Slide. An in- definite question is one that cannot be answered by yes or no. * Examples. (a) What can this man say? What can he do? Where can hego*? ^ (6) Why was the French Revolution so bloody and destructive ? Why was our Revolution of 1641 comparatively mild? Why was our Revolution of 1688 milder still? Why was the American Revolution, considered as an internal movement, the mildest of in? (c) Shut now the volume of history, and tell me, on any prin- ciple of human probability, what shall be the fate of this handful of adventurers? Tell me, man of military science, in how many months were they all swept off by the thirty savage tribes enumer- ated within the early limits of New England ? Tell me, politician, how long did this shadow of a colony, on which your conventions and treaties had not smiled, languish on the distant coast? Oftentimes a sentence in the interrogatory form is really an exclamatory sentence, an emphatic affirmation. Example. Is it possible that, from a beginning so feeble, so frail, so worthy not so much of admiration as of pity, there has gone forth a prog- ress so steady, a growth so wonderful, an expansion so ample, a reality so important, a promise, yet to be fulfilled, so glorious ! Contrariwise, a sentence exclamatory in form may in reality be a definite interrogation. Example. Charles Sumner insult the soldiers who had spilled their blood in a war for human rights! Charles Sumner degrade victories 74 PUBLIC SPEAKING. and depreciate laurels won for the cause of universal freedom ! how strange an imputation! 3. When a direct question is (a) repeated for emphasis, or (b) when the concluding question in a series emphasizes or the series, the Falling Slnli- /* used. Examples. (a) Q. Can you not let your voice fall? .1. Whit? Q. Can you not let your voice fan ? (b) Is he honest? Is he faithful? Is he competent? In short, will he fill the requirements of this position ? 4. When any dame or egression taking either a risimj r falling slide is followed by explanatory words, tli? ditlr in con- tinued over those ttw/.s. Examples. (a) Did you see the procession ? asked the little fellow, eagerly. (b) When are you going to pay me? he asked sternly. (c) Do you fear death in my company? he cried to the anxious sailors, when the ice on the coast of Holland had almost crushed the boat that was bearing them to shore. 5. At the close of a paragraph, and especially at the dose of a speech, cadence and emphasis usually require that the combined rising and falling slides be used. The proper delivery of oratorical discourse is characterized by a cer- tain cadence, expressed by a rhythmic swing of the voice, with periodic pauses. And nowhere is this cadence so marked as when the speaker utters his final words and leaves the final impression upon the minds of his hearers. Here is the climax in delivery. It is difficult to illus- trate, by single examples cut off from the main body of IX FLECTION. 75 the discourse, even one of the elements of effective climactic utterance. But one thing, surely, the speaker does need to do : he should come down, like a cannon ball from the ceiling, with a positiveness and weight a collusiveness that leaves no doubt in the minds of the audience of his having concluded. This is accomplished by a pronounced falling slide. To prepare for this, the phrase preceding the closing phrase should be given with the rising slide. In the exam- ple below, note the difference between giving " eternal tendencies " in a monotone and giving it with the rising slide and a pause, followed by the falling slide on " cannot l)e conquered " : Example. Fight on, thoii brave, true heart, and falter not, through dark fortune and through bright. The cause thou fightest for, so far as it is true, no further, but precisely so far, is very sure of victory. Th falsehood alone of it will be conquered, will be abolished, as it ought to be; but the truth of it is part of Nature's own laws, nni|K rates with the world's eternal tendencies, and cannot be conquered. C ARLYLE. Faults of Inflection. 1. A general monotone. When a generally level tone is used in speaking, the relation of ideas is not expressed to the hearers. True, in highly emotional expression, when the thought is dominated by some one emotion, the inflections are not pronounced, they are subordinated swallowed up, as it were in the expression of the prevailing emotion, 76 PUBLIC >f MAKING. Abide with me: fast falls the eventide: The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide: When other helpers fail, and comforts flee, Help of the helpless, O, abide with me. The prevailing emotion in this selection is reverence. l-t us say; and to over-inflect at the pauses to use a " wrig- gling" voice, as Professor Corson says is to make it over- conversational, matter-of-fact. But a large part of speaking has to do with explaining the thought The inflections at pauses show the relation of the ideas. Acquire the habit of using them. If you are accustomed to speak on a dead level, overdo the inflections until the new habit is fixed. Limber up ! The well-known lines of Hamlet, given below, will servo as an excellent example for practice in acquiring flexibility. Some of the principal inflections that might be used in the rendering, are indicated; but here again, the mind of the i in ffri dual reader must be the guide. Example. Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue ; but if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus ; but use all gently : for in the very torrent, tempest, and (as I may say) the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smooth- ness. Oh, it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious, periwig- pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who, for the most part, are capable of nothing but inexplicable dumb-shows and noise. I would have such a fel- low whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it. Be not too tame neither, but let your o\v n discretion be your tutor : suit the action to the word, the wordlo the action ; with this special INFLECTION. 77 observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of Nature : for any- thing so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is, to hold, as 't were, the mirror up to Nature, to show Virtue her own feature, Scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure. Now, this overdone, or come tardy off, though it make the unskill- ful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve ; the censure of the which one must, in your allowance, o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. Oh, there be players that I have seen play and heard others praise, and that highly not to speak it profanely, that, neither having the accent of Christians, nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of Nature's journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably. 2. A Monotony of the Rising Inflection. The effect is a continuous flow of words without any breaks or stops. The audience feels impelled to say " Give us a rest ! " It is fre- quently noticed that this habit is carried to such ridiculous extremes that those speakers who swing into a "ministerial" or " oratorical " tone, will close a speech or address with the rising inflection. The hearers are left suspended, as it were, in mid-air, and must come down of their own accord, after they realize that the speaker has concluded. The habit has its origin, no doubt, in the use of the rising inflection for voicing an appeal, a characteristic of oratory proper. But it is sadly overworked, even by prominent and suc- cessful orators. Young would-be orators imitate and per- petuate the fault, just as young preachers imitate the faults of their elders. Avoid it. 3. A Monotony of the Falling Inflection. We have seen the use of the falling inflection in expressing " momentary completeness," in giving added emphasis, strong affirma- tion, positiveness. For such purposes it is widely service- 78 PUBLIC SPEAKING. able in oratory. But the proper use of the falling inflection is a very different matter from its habitual and almost con- stant use. Many speakers never seem to see farther than the length of a phrase or clause, and at well-nigh every pause the voice goes down, no matter what the phrase- relation may be. This habit gives a scrappy, disconnected, heavy and tedious effect to speech. Avoid it. 4. Using a semitone, instead of a complete fall, especial!?/ on the last syllable of a ivord that competes the thought. The speaker with this habit seems to be always feeling bad. The effect is to turn plain discourse to pathos. The fault may be corrected by testing the voice with the piano, and make it descend at least an octave in giving the falling slide or falling inflection. 5. Dropping the voice so suddenly or so low that the last syllable /* ////>/// <>,- innmUble. This may arise either from an excessive fall of the voice on the final word or sylla- ble, or from delivering the syllable or word preceding the close in so low a key that there is no room in the compass for a further distinct fall. The fault may be corrected by keeping the voice up or raising it if need be on the syllable or word preceding the close, and thus prepare for the complete and normal fall. SUMMARY. Inflection refers to the bends or waves of the voice above and below the Key. The General Law of Inflection is: When the thought is complete, the voice falls ; when the thought is incomplete, the voice rises, There are many and various cases that come under this General Law, but the point for remembrance is: The test of the proper use of inflection is not the punctuation marks or rales, but the test is, What inflection best realizes the speaker's purpose at the moment of utterance ? CHAPTER VII. TIME: RATE, PHRASING, TRANSITION, Definition. Time is the duration of utterance. It relates to the length of vocal sounds, to the rapidity of word-utter- ance, and to the pauses in speech. The leading phases of Time may be classified as Rate, Phrasing, and Transition. Rate. Rate, also called time or movement, has reference to the rapidity or slowness of utterance. The average rate of delivery in public speaking, allowing for pauses and transitions, is usually placed at one hundred and twenty words per minute. Rate, however, is a matter of relativity. It varies with the individual temperament, the matter, and the circumstances under which an address is given. The common faults of rate are : (1) speaking too rapidly or (2) too slowly, (3) a fitful, unsteady movement, and (4) lack of adaptation of rate to express the varying thoughts and emotions. We may therefore deduce the following : Admonitions as to Rate. 1. Avoid speaking too rapidly. With the young speaker, under stress of more or less nervousness, over-rapid utter- ance is by far the more common fault. So it is well for every beginner to suspect himself of trying to speak too fast. In the first place, he must always speak slowly enough to enunciate clearly. Then he must speak deliberately enough for the hearers to get the thought as he proceeds : 79 80 PUBLIC SPEAKING. he must not set a faster pace than the audience can easily follow. Especially at the beginning of a speech, when the audience is as yet more or less inattentive, when emotions are quiescent, and the speaker is pulling himself and his thoughts together, he should proceed slowly and deliberately. The same suggestion applies, as we shall see, to the begin- ning of new lines of thought. Usually begin slowly at the transitions. By acquiring the power and habit of slow, measured utterance, by making the words, in the process of utter- ance, speak all they can speak, a student can increase many fold his power and effectiveness in delivery. When a speaker pauses or lingers on a word, he does so that he and his hearers may have more time in which to think of its meaning. "Dwell upon expand these words," is a frequent direction that needs be given the young speaker. Now, rate is affected in two principal ways : by the pause between words, and by the time taken in enunciating a word. The matter of time-taking for pauses we shall con- sider under Phrasing. But a whirlwind rate is marked by a snappy, jerky vocalization. If you find you speak too fast, practise taking about three times as long to enunciate your words as you have been accustomed to. Take a simple sentence, as, "Most beginners speak too rapidly, but slow down with experience," and give it at your usual rate, then with gradually increasing slowness, drag, if you please, it will seem to be dragging to you, anyway, only get in the habit of speaking more slowly. In prolonging the sounds that go to make up a word, it should be noted that certain classes of sounds are capable of almost unlimited prolongation, other sounds of limited prolongation, and still others of little or none. Generally speaking, the vowel sound, which is the body of the word, and not the consonant, is to be prolonged. Especially is TIME: RATE, PHRASING, TRANSITION. 81 this true of the long vowel sounds in such words as maim, eve, roar, long, all; they are "continuant" sounds, long " quantity." Of medium quantity are such words as let, ft/tithe, mart, boat; while such words as quick, stop, spot, back, pretty, are of short quantity, "stopt" sounds, and to prolong them produces the drawl. Exercises for acquiring: Slow Bate. (a) Practise prolonging the vowel sound in such words as all (juhl, tiinr, sorrow, glory, defile, grandeur, patriotism. (l>) Practise prolonging the emphatic words in a sentence ; as, ' This was the noblest Roman of them all." (c) Repeat sentences with varied rate ; as, " The glorious achieve- ments of the nineteenth century will never be forgotten." 2. Avoid a dragging or drawling utterance. While the speaker should keep his hearers close upon his heels, he should not allow them to run on ahead of him. The modern audience wants the speaker to move along. They may not insist on a lightning express, but they do not care for a slow freight. The student with a dragging, tedious rate of deliv- ery frequently needs to go through a general waking-up pro- cess, physical and mental, foot-ball and mental arithmetic, for example. He needs to get, in some way, more life and energy into his being. Occasionally, however, a student will have acquired a drawl who has plenty of physical energy and mental alertness ; it is simply a habit. The remedy is the reverse of the suggestions given under the preceding heading. Clip the words shorter, especially the final syl- lable of the final word at a partial or complete fall, and cut out any addition like " ugh," " ah," after the final syllable. Let the words of your sentences be given with a snap and a ring. Use the staccato, dynamic mode of utterance, with the diaphragmatic impulse. See the thought-movement, and 82 PUBLIC SPEAKIXG. make it move accordingly. Practise this ringing, dynamic style of delivery in the following selection : Example. The American people have advanced from the seaboard with the rifle and the axe, the plough and the shuttle, the teapot and the Bible, a rocking chair and a spelling book, a bath-tub and a tree constitution, sweeping across the Alleghanies, overspreading the prairies, and pushing on until the dash of the Atlantic in their ears is lost in the murmur of the Pacific ; and as, whenever the goddess of the old mythology touched the earth, flowers and fruit answered her footfall, so in the long trail of this advancing race, it has left clusters of happy states, teeming with a population man by man more intelligent and prosperous than ever before the sun shone upon, and each remoter camp of that triumphal march is but a further outpost of American civilization. CURTIS. 3. Avoid an unsteady, jerky movement. This fault is espe- cially common with speakers of a nervous temperament. It manifests itself by long and too frequent pauses, by a terrific rate for a few words and then a sudden stop, or by any lack of proportion in the rate. The utterance moves by fits and jerks, like a horse that has not learned to pull steadily. Proper timing will result in that rhythmic move- ment which is a characteristic of oratorical prose, as of poetry. This well-timed, balanced movement should be appreciated and acquired. Practise giving the following extract in slow, rhythmic, measured utterance. Example. So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, that moves To that mysterious realm where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go, not like the quarry slave at night TIME: RATE, PHRASING, TRANSITION. 83 Scourged to his dungeon, but sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. BRYANT. 4. Learn to adapt the Rate to the thought and the emotion. This is, after all, the conclusion of the whole matter. We have observed that the two extreme faults of rate are mere hurry on the one hand, and tediousness on the other. Good movement will reveal the thought-pulsation in such a way as to avoid either of these extremes. True movement, in speaking, is continually varying; as varied as the thoughts and emotions which it helps express. We have seen that one should begin an address with deliberate movement, and have noted the reasons for this general direction. We know, too, that the mind and hence the voice will dwell upon the important, and pass more lightly and quickly over the unimportant; that movement should be retarded when speaking of the point at issue, accelerated in speaking of a side issue ; slower in the main current of the thought, faster on the incidental or illustrative matter. We know that emotions of awe, grandeur, sorrow, reverence, and the like, where the speaker's feelings are choked, or weighed down, or overawed, are voiced in slower movement; that the light, joyous, or enthusiastic, the description of movement, the expression of passion, as in anger or indig- nation, are relatively faster. This cannot of course be done by rule; but the student should learn to appreciate and put in practice the general principle of adaptation by variability. Thus, in the first example below, we might say that the eulogy of the Minute Man begins strong, with moderate rate; when the famous saying of Adams is reached, the mind lingers on the scene and on the significance of his 84 PUBLIC SPEAKIXG. exclamation, " O, what a glorious morning ! " This, there- fore, should be given more slowly. Then at once the scene shifts to the charge upon the British soldiers in their retreat from Concord, and all is movement, hills, woods, and roads ablaze the impetuous charge the disorderly retreat, and should be given with much faster rate. In the second example, the key-word is "Wait." The thought-movement is deep, calm, and stately, hence should be given with slow rate. Examples. (a) He [the Minute Man of the Revolution] was the man who was willing to pour out his life's blood for a principle. Intrenched in his own honesty, the king's gold could not buy him ; enthroned in the love of his fellow citizens, the king's writ could not take him ; and when, on the morning at Lexington, the king's troops marched to seize him, his sublime faith saw, beyond the clouds of the moment, the rising sun of the America we behold, and, can - less of self, mindful only of his country, he exultingly exclaimed. * O, what a glorious morning ! " And then, amid the flashing hills, the ringing woods, the flaming roads, he smote with terror the haughty British column, and sent it shrinking, bleeding, wavering. and reeling through the streets of the village, panic stricken and broken. CURTIS. (6) Perhaps the greatest lesson which can be found in the lives of great men is told in a single word : Wait ! Every man must patiently bide his time. He must wait. With calm and solemn footsteps the rising tide bears against the rushing torrent upstream and pushes back the hurrying waters. With no less calm and solemn footsteps, and no less certainty, does a great mind bear up against public opinion and push back its hurrying stream. There- fore should every man wait, should bide his time ; not in listless idleness, not in useless pastime, not in querulous dejection, but in constant, steady, cheerful endeavor, always willing, and fulfilling and accomplishing his task, that, when the occasion comes, he mav be equal to the occasion. LONGFELLOW. TIME: RATE, PHRASING, TRANSITION. 85 Phrasing. Phrasing is that phase of time which relates to pausing. Our language is made up of groups of words ex- pressing single ideas. These ideas are more or less closely related, and of more or less importance in relation to the thought. Clearness in utterance requires that these rela- tions be expressed. Both the speaker and his hearers must give attention to one idea at a time. A group of words that expresses a single thought or feeling, describes a single event, or pictures a single scene, is called a phrase. To group these words that express single ideas is known as phrasing. Phrasing is vocal punctuation (indicated by vertical lines, thus : | | ) ; it is frequently identical with gram- matical punctuation, but not necessarily so. Phrase-pauses should also be distinguished from, although they may in- clude, emphatic pauses. (See "Pause-emphasis," p. 45.) Other vocal elements, as we have seen in treating of Emphasis, Inflection, and Rate, may aid in showing the relation of one phrase to another, but phrasing the time- element refers to the discrimination of ideas by pausing between them. The pauses will be of greater or less length, according to the degree of separation. No hard and fast rule can be laid down. The frequency and length of his pauses in utterance will be determined by the speaker's con- ception of relationships. But, to illustrate, the extracts that follow might be phrased as indicated. Examples. (a) He laughs best | who laughs last. (6) Whether 'tis nobler in the mind | to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, j Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, | And by opposing | end them ? (r) When public bodies are to be addressed on momentous occa- sions, | when great interests are at stake, | and strong passions 86 PUBLIC SPEAEIX',. excited, | nothing is valuable in speech, | further than it is con- nected with high intellectual and moral endowments. | Clear- ness, | force, | and earnestness | are the qualities which produce conviction. Faults of Phrasing. 1. Pausing only at long intervals. This is a most common fault, especially in the delivery of a memorized selection or address. Words are continuously poured out, with little or no recognition of relationships. Mere fluency is not elo- quence. The young speaker should remember the old-time direction, " Mind your stops." A pause may be far more expressive than continuous vocalizing. At such pauses the mind is not blank, but is thinking for and with the audience; it is a very different pause from that caused by the failure of the memory or by stage-fright. Cultivate the habit of ease and time-taking. Pauses, as we have seen, will vary in length, but always take time for a deep inhalation. 2. Pausing too frequently. This is a common fault with those of a nervous temperament, or who naturally speak rapidly. The thought is thrown out in chunks, a word or two at a time. Such a speaker utters words rather than ideas, parts rather than units. The delivery is puffy, like a steam engine, choppy, disconnected. If you find you have either of these faults, take a givon selection, properly mark the phrasing, and then practise by pausing at the places marked, and only at such places. Transition. In the nomenclature of delivery, transition refers to the changes that take place in passing from one thought-group to another. It is, in a sense, phrasing on a large scale. The transition from one mmi^-tftl idea to another, from a literal statement to an illustration, from one part of a description to another, must be distinctly in- dicated in the delivery. The larger groups, as represented TINE: RATE, PHRASING, TRANSITION. 87 by the paragraph, require transitions of wider intervals. The speaker, at such a transition, silently says to himself and to his audience, " I have concluded with that line of thought. I now take up a new line of thought," or " I am now to speak of another phase of this idea," as the case may be. The speaker must take time to adjust his mind to the change, and he must in some way indicate the change to his hearers, just as a paragraph indicates it to readers. To accomplish this, the time-element is employed in taking a relatively long pause, aided, usually, by a change in rate, key, and tone. In nine cases out of ten, the young speaker will either not take sufficient time to make his transitions marked, or else what is oftener the case no transitions are indi- cated in the delivery. He seems to proceed on the assump- tion, " If I don't continue to pour out words, I am lost ! " So a new paragraph, for example, is taken up as though it were a new sentence, or clause, with no change whatever in the general delivery. It should be realized that well- marked, easy, natural transitions in a speech, besides show- ing changes in the thought, aid much in breaking up a general monotony of delivery. It would be impossible to illustrate how transitions, at the varyingly separated thought-groups, can be effected. As illustrative of the transitions that occur within a paragraph, and also between paragraphs, see the selection, " Character Essential for a Great Lawyer," Chapter XIII, p. 170. SUMMARY. Time relates to duration of utterance, expressed by the length of vocal sounds, and by tho pauses between words, phrases, and para- graphs, It is an important means of expressing thought-relations, The various ideas and emotions in a discourse should be given with well-proportioned rate, and their relations expressed by proper pauses and changes, CHAPTER VIII. FOEOE, OLIMAX, VOLUME, Force. The public speaker aims to have his hearers think as he thinks, believe as he believes, and act as he would act. Broadly considered, that element of delivery which induces belief and action, is called Force. It is the per- suasive element in oratory. It refers to the energy, the power with which one speaks. Force is audible earnest- ness. It should not be confounded with mere loudness. Increased loudness may be an accompaniment of increased force, but is not necessarily so. Indeed, great intensity of feeling is seldom shown by mere noise. Since force has to do with emotional expression, it must result from, and vary with, the various emotions that rise from the ideas uttered. Hence the absurd classifications found in elocution manuals, wherein certain emotions are to be given with " normal effusive " or " guttural explosive " force, are worse than useless. Certain leading faults, how- ever, in the use or lack of use of force, embodied in the general suggestions that follow, may well be heeded by the student of speaking. General Suggestions regarding Force. 1. Adapt the voice to the room in which you are speakimj. Proper adaptation will depend upon the physical condition of the speaker and upon the size and acoustics of the audience-room. Ordinarily, in beginning an address, no FORCE, CLIMAX, VOLUME. 89 marked force is required. In delivering the introductory matter, the emotions are not as yet aroused. Stress is laid upon a clear statement of the subject-matter as a basis for whatever emotions subsequently grow out of it. " It is of eloquence as of a flame : it requires matter to feed it, motion to excite it, and it brightens as it burns." There is much practical sense in the old rule: "Begin low, speak slow; take fire, rise higher ; when most impressive be self-posses- sive." We have already seen, in the chapter on Key, that it is not always necessary to "rise higher" as you "take fire"; but "begin low " is a good general rule. It indicates the absence of rant or bluster, and the presence of poise and coiitroL But while a purely conversational key should ho struck, the voice should l>e sent out with sufficient strength to reach every person in the audience. Henry Ward Beecher, who had many theories about the art of public speaking and the way of managing an audience, used to advise young speakers to begin in a low tone, rather below the normal, so as to catch hold of the watch- ful attention of the meeting, and then, when that atten- tion was secured, to let the voice out to its normal strength. This plan might do for Mr. Beecher, but it is a dangerous rule for speakers whom audiences are not so anxious to hear as they were to hear him. A safer plan is for the speaker to begin with such clearness and strength that the entire audi- ence will have the comfort of knowing from the very first sentence that they will have no trouble in following. Now, to do this, it is never necessary to yell. Deep breathing, clear enunciation, and sending the voice out to the farthest auditors, are the primary requisites of being heard. This sending of the voice out to the whole audience, known as " carrying power," is one of the several means of objectifying the thought, which is the speaker's sole aim. To secure this carrying power, practise speaking a given sentence, ten, il 90 PUBLIC SPEAKING. twenty, and one hundred feet distant. Learn to get your voice away from you. The speaker must have a conscious- ness of those farthest away in the audience, and aim to include them within his vocal range. But do not shout or rant. Avoid all attempts at " pulmonary eloquence." Thunder without electricity is a contradiction in nature. If the thunder tones come from electrical, emotional states, well and good. But do not force your force. Remember that oftentimes the most forceful effects come from a quiet intensity. The greatest force comes from a reserve of force. The force is there, but the most effective speakers seldom let their voices out to the full capacity. You always feel that there is a reserve of power, a repose that is in itself an emblem of strength. Such repose is simply an indication that activity at the centre transcends activity at the surface; that the motive power is controlling and moving the machin- ery. "People always perceive," says Emerson, "whether you drive or whether the horses take the bits in their teeth and run." A speaker uftvn tries !< makr up tor a lack of thought or iVelinu r l>y noise. Such a >peak-r n.-.-ds to tak- tor him- self the nrijie smt tor makin- a famoas brand of coffee : " Put some in." The relation of his vocal to his emotional power is like the Sangamon River steamboat that Lincoln describes. It had a ten-horse-power engine and a twenty- horse-power whistle; when the whistle blew the engine stopped. Henry Ward Beecher tells that his father, Rev. Lyman Beecher, on coming home from church one day, said, " It seems to me that I never made a worse sermon than I did this morning." "Why, father," said Henry, "I never heard you preach so loud in all my life." "That is the way: I always holler when I haven't anything to say." While there is the other side to this question of adapta- FORCE, CLIMAX, VOLUME. 91 bility, I have stressed the fault of mere loudness because it needs especially to be guarded against. Do not rant! 2. When force is required, use it. The speaker must not only be earnest, but he must put his earnestness into his speech. Failing in this, he is called dull, dry, lifeless without force. How attain this increased energy and in- tensity ? Force, as has been said, is the result of emotion. v This cannot of course be put on from the outside. Con- scious attention to force is in itself apt to result in arti- ficiality. Primarily, attention must be given to driving the ideas home ; let the emotion and its forceful expression grow out of the ideas. One can, however, by an exercise of the will, speak with greater energy. He can wake himself up. Further, by thinking over his speech, be it an~ original address or a declamation, by speaking it silently, he can , call up the necessary emotions, and so in delivery enter into the spirit of it. By a careful and thorough analysis, as out-- lined in Chapter I, he can get much more out of an address, and so into the delivery, than appears upon the surface. One might take an extract from the maiden speech of Wen- dell Phillips, for example, and have a certain vague and ill- defined emotion. Now, if he informs himself regarding the occasion of the speech, the cause for which Phillips pleaded and in which he believed; the opposition of the attorney general ; the youth and moral courage of the speaker, and all the attendant circumstances, he is in a position to deliver much more forcibly such an outburst as: Sir, when I heard principles laid down that place the murderers of .\ltou side by side with Otis and Hancock, with Quincy and Adams,! thought those pictured lips would have broken into voice to rebuke that recreant American, the slanderer of the dead. Sir, for the sentiments he has uttered on soil consecrated by the 92 PUBLIC 8PSAJHNG. prayers of Puritans and the blood of patriots the earth should have yawned and swallowed him up ! So, if one remembers that Grady's speech on the question of negro suffrage was delivered before a New England audience, hostile to his position ; if one has an historical perspective, and reviews the period of Reconstruction, and knows the existing conditions as Grady did, the following becomes charged with force in its utterance : The question is asked repeatedly, " When will the black man in the South cast a free ballot? When will he have the civil rights that are his ? " When will the black man cast a free ballot ? When ignorance anywhere is not dominated by the will of the intelligent; when the laborer anywhere casts a ballot unhindered by his boss; when the strong and the steadfast do not .-v.-ry where control the suffrage of the weak and the shiftless. Tlicn. l.ut not till then, will the ballot be free. . . . The negro can never control in the South, and it would be well if partisans in the North would understand this. You may pass your force bills, but they will not avail ; for never again will a single state, North or South, be delivered to the control of an ignorant and inferior race. We wrested our state government from negro supremacy when the Federal drum-ln-at rolled closer to the ballot-box and when Federal bayonets hedged it about closer than will ever again ! |>'rmitt*') Citizens of a great, free, and prosperous country, we come to honor the men, our fathers, who, on this spot and upon this day, a hundred years ago, struck the first blow in the contest which made that country independent. In the following extract from Phillips's eulogy of Daniel O'Connell, the description of Webster's physical advantage as an orator, and the illustration of the combined force and volume of O'Connell's voice, require volume for adequate expression. 96 PUBLIC SPEAKING. Example. Besides his irreproachable character, O'Connell had what is half the power of the popular orator; he had a majestic presence. In his youth he had the brow of a Jupiter or a Jove, and the stature of Apollo. A little O'Connell would have been no O'Connell at all. These physical advantages are half the battle. You remember the story Russell Lowell tells of Webster when, a year or two be- fore his death, the Whig party thought of dissolution. Webster came home from Washington and went down to Faneuil Hall to protest, and four thousand of his fellow Whigs went out to meet him. Drawing himself up to his loftiest proportions, his brow charged with thunder, before that sea of human faces, he said : "Gentlemen, I am a Whig; a Massachusetts Whig; a Faneuil Hall Whig; a revolutionary Whig; a constitutional Whig; and if you break up the Whig party, where am I to go ? " " And," says Lowell, " we held our breath thinking where he could go. If he had been five feet three, we should have said: 'Who cares \\IHMC you go ? " Well, O'Connell had all that. There was something majestic in his presence before he spoke, and he added to it what Webstn li;ul not, the magnetism and grace that melts a million souls into his. Then, he had a voice that covered the gamut. Speaking in Exeter Hall, London, I once heard him say, " I send my voice across the Atlantic, careering like the thunderstorm against the breeze, to tell the slave-holder of the Carolinas that God's thunder- bolts are hot, and to remind the bondman that the dawn of his redemption is already breaking." And you seemed to hear his voice reverberating and re-echoing back to London from the Rocky Mountains. And then, with the slightest possible Irish brogue, he would tell a story that would make all Exeter Hall laugh, and the next moment tears in his voice, like an old song, and five thousand men wept. And all the while no effort he seemed only breathing, " As effortless as woodland nooks Send violets up, and paint them blue." FORCE, CLIMAX, VOLUME. 97 SUMMARY. Force deals with the expression of feeling. It includes Olimax, the height of force, and Volume, expressive of largeness in con- ception or description, In all its phases, the mastery and use of Force distinguishes the successful speaker from the indifferent or mediocre, The speaker should learn to adapt his voice to the au- dience-room and to the emotional content of his speech by appropriate loudness and volume, and by bringing out the climaxes, Above all must emotion, induced by the mental concept, be the inspiration and guide in the use of Force. CHAPTER IX. TONE-COLOR, Tone-color. Tone-color (German Klang-farbe) signifies that quality of voice whereby emotions find expression. Reference has previously been made, expressly or impliedly, to the leading feature of this element, but its Importance as a medium of expression will justify something of a repeti- tion here. And first, tone-color is expressive of emotion growing out of, and gwen along with, the intellectual aspects of the thought. Its basis is sympathy. It is not primarily ex- pressive of ideas or logical relations. It shows rather the speaker's point of view; it reveals the nature and degree of his responsiveness to the thought. Now, since tone- color grows out of emotional states, and emotional states grow out of the point of view, and the point of view de- pends upon the individual speaker, we must conclude that the classification by some writers of a given selection as adapted to a given "tone," that certain emotions labelled with certain adjectives require the "orotund," or " falsetto," or " aspirate," or " pectoral " quality ; that such a classifica- tion is as artificial as the speaker must be who attempts to follow it. Conscious attention to tone-color as such is apt to result in artificiality ; the attention had best be directed to clarifying and intensifying the ideas that give rise to the emotions. True, certain physical states react upon and pro- duce emotional states. One may, for example, " bring his voice up in the throat" and by a tremulous vocalization in- TOXE-COLOR. 99 duce a certain degree of sorrow. It is such vocal gymnastics as this by certain speakers and " readers " that render their utterance excruciating to a sensible mind and sensitive ear. Attention must therefore be directed mainly to awakening the appropriate emotions. To this end let us consider two phases of tone-color: (1) word-coloring, and (2) the emo- tional setting, or " atmosphere," of a paragraph or selection as a whole. Word-coloring. In the formative period of language development, men attempted to convey a given picture by imitative sounds. There are many such words in our lan- guage, such as buzz, swish, hiss, hum, bang, boom, etc. Tone-color, however, while it may include onomatopoeia, is a great deal more than mere imitation. Its use is to mirror the emotional significance of words over and beyond their literal signification. Strong men infuse into their work a great deal of their own spirit. Likewise strong speakers ; their words are charged with a suggestion and meaning beyond tin* mere sound. Says Cicero, in his Dr Oratore, " The tones of the voice, like musical chords, are so wound up as to be responsive to every touch, sharp, Hat, quick, slow, loud, gentle. Anger, fear, violence, pleasure, trouble, each has its own tone for expression." Now, it is the function of tone-color to show the speaker's responsiveness to the emotional touch. Beauty of sentiment must be mirrored by melody of voice, strong feeling by strength of voice, tenderness by gentler tones, and so on. To do this, the most that can be said by way of direction is: Dwell upon the important words, and allow time for the emotion to express itself. Take the follow- ing from Curtis's eulogy of Phillips; note the variety in emotional expression and aim to give the words their appro- priate tone-color. 100 PUBLIC SPEAKING. Example. He faced his audience with a tranquil mien, and a beaming aspect that was never dimmed. He spoke, and in the measured cadence of his quiet voice there was intense feeling, but no decla- mation, no passionate appeal, no superficial or feigned emotion. It was simply colloquy a gentleman conversing. And this wonderful power, it was not a thunderstorm ; yet somehow and surely the ear and heart were charmed. How was it done? Ah! how did Mozart do it, how Raphael? The secret of the rose's sweetness, of the bird's ecstasy, of the sunset's glory, that is the secret of genius and eloquence. What was heard, what was seen, was the form of noble manhood, the courteous and self-possessed tone, the flow of modulated speech, sparkling with richness of illustration, with apt allusion and happy anecdote and historic parallel, with wit and pitiless invective, with melo- dious pathos, with stinging satire, with crackling epigram and limpid humor, like the bright ripples that play around the sure and steady prow of the resistless ship. The divine energy of his conviction utterly possessed him, and his " Pure and eloquent blood Spoke in his cheek and so distinctly wrought That one might almost say his body thought." The " Atmosphere " of the Address. Have a proper per- spective of the thought breathe the atmosphere, and so enter into the spirit, of an address as a whole. While the emotions within an address are often complex, now one and now another coming to the surface, there is usually some one emotion that represents the speaker's purpose and feeling, and dominates the address as a whole. " The whole must have that toning which reveals the spirit of the whole." Take, for example, the following eulogy of the old- time Southern gentleman, by Grady, and give it the tone- color to voice the appropriate emotion. TONE-COLOR. 101 Example. Rome one has said, in derision, that the old men of the South, sitting down amid their ruins, reminded him of " the Spanish hidalgos sitting in the porches of the Alhambra and looking out to sea for the return of their lost Armada." There is pathos but no derision in this picture to me. These men were our fathers. Their lives were stainless. Their hands were daintily cast, and the civilization they builded in tender and engaging grace hath not been equalled. The scenes amid which they moved, as princes among men, have vanished forever. A grosser and more material day has come, in which their gentle hands can garner but scantily, and their guileless hearts fend but feebly. Let me sit, therefore, in the dismantled porches of their homes, into which dishonor hath never entered, to which discourtesy is a stranger, and gaze out to sea, beyond the horizon of which their Armada has drifted forever. And though the sea shall not render back to them the Argosies which went down in their ships, let us build for them, in the land they loved so well, a stately and enduring temple ; its pillars founded in justice, its arches springing to the skies, its treasuries filled with substance, liberty walking in its corridors and religion filling its aisles with incense. And here let them rest in honorable peace and tranquillity until God shall call them hence, to " a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." SUMMARY. Tone-color, or quality, is expressive of the spiritual, as opposed to the literal, signification of words, Its touchstone is sympathy, It cannot well be described or its use reduced to rules, but the emo- tional content of words should be appreciated and its sympathetic rendering acquired, CHAPTER X. EAENESTNESS, The Gauge of Success. Earnestness is the soul of oratory. It manifests itself in speech by animation, wide-awakeness, strength, force, power, as opposed to listlessness, timidity, half-heartedness, uncertainty, feebleness. " Earnestness is that intense and instinctive nwliin^ out for the part in the nature of another man which is awake in our own." 1 \\'/n>n communicated to the nmiit ,,<- ( >, earnestness is, after all i and done, the touchstone of success in public speaking, as it is in other things in life. Essentials of Earnestness. Earnestness comes, if it come at all, from a thorough knowledge of your subject, from a sincere faith in that subject, and from a determination to implant in others that knowledge and that faith. These three essential conditions of earnestness are applicable to all kinds of speech-making, be it a declamation, a memorized speech or oration, or an extemporaneous address. Special means for creating and replenishing the first two essentials have been suggested in Chapter I, but two points may again be stressed here : (1) Previous study may give you clear ideas as to the thought, and you may thoroughly believe them, but while this is essential, it is not enough: There must be, at the moment of their utterance, a vivid conception of the thought 1 Curry : Vocal Expression, p. 254. 102 EARNESTNESS. 103 and a strong belief in the ideas conveyed. The ideas and emotions must be re-created in the act of speaking. Only in this way can "thoughts that breathe" find expression in " words that burn." (2) If, as is often desirable in the early stages of train- ing, you are to deliver a declamation, select one that will induce earnestness. Take a subject in which you are inter- ested, and in which you want and expect to interest your audience. If you are in earnest, you will avoid anything \ that is purely humorous or trivial. Beware of the ex- travagant, dramatic compositions often found in books of "Choice Selections." Good literature only is worthy of study and memorizing. Seek something of present interest to the audience. Selections from speeches published in the daily papers, articles in current periodicals, or extracts from the published speeches of modern orators, are usually the best. If a book of selections is used, do not fail to look up the source of the extract chosen and learn the author's full meaning and original purpose. Then make the thought your own and give it as your own. "If I were speaking something of my own," a student is often heard to remark, "I could speak more earnestly." If this is really true, write out the thought and give it in your own language. If, however, the method of preparation here recommended be adopted, a student is not apt to speak any more ear- nestly with an original production than with the words of another. Again, earnestness is often attained by a proper exercise of the will. Of course, the ideal earnestness comes from the speaker's interest in his hearers and self-abandonment to his subject ; but there is such a thing as willing earnest- ness into his speech, compelling attention and awakening emotion. A speaker at times finds it necessary to command an earnestness which does not come otherwise. Teachers 104 PUBLIC SPEAKIXG. of oratory sometimes find that by probing a student's dormant mental and emotional faculties until he becomes indignant at the teacher or at himself, he will then begin to speak. Learn to do your own 'probing, if necessary. Realize your opportunity, your power to choose what shall have expression. Choose. Realize that your will can com- mand expression for what you dictate, and for nothing else. Shall a listless, feeble expression at your lips belie the honest impulses of your heart, which you are not able to force into expression? Conquer such weakness by will-power. The Occasion. Do not let earnestness depend upon the occasion, but master the occasion through earnestness. True, one audience will incite earnestness, while the same speech to another audience may fall flat. The atmosphere of the particular occasion reacts powerfully upon the speaker. Speaking to a small, scattered audience, with stragglers loitering in and out at the doors, is a very different matter from speaking to a crowded house. And, too, audiences have what may be called a composite individuality that effects the speaker for weal or woe. This interplay of influence between the speaker and his audience has its advantages and its dangers. If the occa- sion is fortunately inspiring, the speaker will yield himself to it, and often finds himself surpassing his preparation and himself outdoing himself. Only he who has ex- perienced it knows the exhilaration and exquisite pleasure that comes to the speaker on such occasions, when he carries his audience with him to invigorating heights and inspiring views. More frequently, however, the occasion is as the Valley of Despair, and the danger is, that the speaker may despair of getting through successfully. Herein lies the folly of trusting to the inspiration of the audience : the audience may refuse to furnish inspiration. In such a EARNESTNESS. 105 case there is nothing for the speaker to do but inspire himself and, in turn, his audience. Not easy ? Of course not. Here again the speaker needs to exercise his will power. Master the situation: this is the criterion for suc- cess in life, and public speaking is no exception. The speaker that cannot do this is a creature of impulse purely, and has not his powers under control. In their attitude toward the speaker, audiences may be classified as interested, indifferent, critical, or hostile. If the audience is interested, the speaker has easy sailing. He can begin his speech on a plane to which, under other cir- cumstances, he must needs rise ; and all that is required is to maintain the interest. Oftentimes audiences are more or less indifferent. The unuttered attitude is, " If you have anything worth listen- ing to and can say it in an interesting manner, very well; otherwise we don't care to hear you." Such an occasion is the speaker's opportunity. He must conquer this indiffer- ence by his earnestness, cause fhe listless to wake up and become aroused, the thoughtless to think, the doubter to be- lieve, and all to become infected with his own earnestness. The critical audience is the most trying one to address, to most speakers more trying than a hostile audience. An audience may be critical toward the speaker or toward his subject. If the latter, the problem is to work out the best method of approach to his subject, a matter with which, attain, we are not now primarily dealing. If the audience is critical toward the speaker, he must present his ideas with such earnestness as to disarm criticism, directing the attention of the hearers from himself to his subject. The burden of his plea must be, " Hear me for my cause ! " This critical attitude of an audience, the school or college speaker must frequently meet and master. In practising for skill, the consciousness of a critic or critics among the 106 PUBLIC SPEAKING. hearers is a severe test of the speaker's earnestness. The student becomes afflicted with self-consciousness ; sometimes the sense of the incongruous is overmastering; an address that he spoke earnestly, it may be, to an imaginary audience in his room, he finds difficulty in delivering earnestly in a class exercise. The difficulty, it must be admitted, is a real one, but this does not mean that it cannot be overcome. Indeed, the very fact that it can be overcome should lead the speaker to summon all his powers in the way of ear- nestness. There is this encouraging feature : students in oratory, while they are quick to detect poor speaking, are also quick to recognize good speaking. As to the seeming incongruity of speaking before a teacher alone, this, too, can be eliminated by training and practice. The student with the oratorical or dramatic instinct finds no great difficulty in imaginatively peopling the empty seats, as Henry Clay found an audience in the forest trees. Under such circumstances under all circumstances it should be remembered that it is always easy to speak according to habit, be the habit good or bad. The faults that appear in the class room usually characterize the student's delivery on other occasions. Granting that the circumstances mentioned do make earnestness difficult, it is all the more valuable training for more propitious occasions. The best training for speaking earnestly on all occasions is to speak earnestly on the least favorable occasions. The well-trained speaker, as the well-trained actor, will not fail, though his audience does. Rarely does the young speaker meet a hostile audience, and in any event so much depends upon the peculiar circum- stances that directions are impracticable. The speaker's purpose is, of course, to master such an audience. He may do this by placating at first, or by the majesty of moral courage. Beecher at Liverpool said the unexpected thing, EARNESTNESS. 107 and appealed to the sense of fair play. Phillips at Faneuu Hall threw down the gauge of battle and hurled the invec- tive of which he was a master. When an audience perceives that a speaker will not be downed, there gradually develops the feeling, if no sinister motive lies back of the hostility, that he ought not to be downed; and "He is God's own anointed king," says Carlyle, "who melts all wills into his." Relation to Technique. It may be asked, and frequently is asked, by the student, " How can I think of so many things at once ? How can I think about how I am carrying myself, or using my voice, and at the same time think of the ideas and respond to the emotions be in earnest ? " In Chapter II it was shown that drill in technique should lead to an unconscious habit. One should never have his art on exhibition. The highest art is to conceal art. But while his technique must never be uppermost in the field of consciousness, the trained speaker will always have a sub- consciousness as to whether or not his thought is finding effective expression. He will know what he is about. He will know what he should be doing, and know if he is doing it. There should be a coordination of thought, emotion, and will. The relative amount of attention that should be paid to each of these elements will vary with the individual. One student is all emotion ; he needs to stress the mental aspects of his address. Another is coldly intellectual ; he needs to stimulate his imagination and cultivate the senti- mental, emotional side of his being. Another is knock- kneed has not the courage of his convictions ; he needs to cultivate more will power. The will should also be exercised in directing earnestness through proper channels. Self-consciousness comes from a clogging of the natural channels of expression. " Forget 108 PUBLIC about yourself and think only of your subject" is a common direction that needs qualifying. Forget about yourself in one sense, it may be ; but know what you are doing with voice and body. Do you say they will take care of them- selves ? Perhaps so and perhaps not. We have all heard speakers when we wished a kind Providence would remind them of themselves. Of course the speaker is not to indulge in vocal or physical gymnastics on the platform, nor is he by any means to give the detailed attention to technique which has been given earlier in this book. But, I repeat, he is to know what he is doing; if his voice is way up, to bring it down ; if he is yelling, to return to a normal force. Now, this knowing what you are about, this sub-consciousness, is not incompatible with the most sincere earnestness : it is earnestness in its highest sense, for it is the method of a rational being. Emerson refers to this coordination of mind, emotion, and will when he says that " the truly eloquent [earnest] man is a sane man with power to communicate his sanity." Earnestness the Expression of Character. Earnestness may be stimulated and directed by the mind, the emotions, and the will, but the speaker cannot give more than he has ; he cannot express more than he is. Earnestness cannot be feigned, for an audience soon distinguishes the true coin from the counterfeit. Surely art alone will never make an effective speaker. Some would-be orators go to a teacher of oratory when they should be seeking a minister. " There can be no true eloquence," says Emerson, " unless there is a man behind the speech." True eloquence springs from the moral nature. Hence Christ, who spake as never man spake, represents the ideal in oratory, as He does in conduct. The history of oratory shows that it has flourished at those times when great moral questions were at stake, EARNESTNESS. 109 injustice to be resented, a reform to be instituted, and that its exponents were men terribly in earnest ; that " its great masters," to quote Emerson again, " whilst they valued every help to its attainment, and thought no pains too great which contributed in any manner to further it, ... yet never permitted any talent neither voice rhythm, poetic power, sarcasm to appear for show ; but were grave men, who preferred their integrity to their talent, and esteemed that object for which they toiled, whether the prosperity of their country, or the laws, or a reformation, or liberty of speech, or of the press, or letters, or morals, as above the whole world, and themselves also." SUMMARY. We have seen that earnestness, communicated to the audience, is essential to effective public speaking; that earnestness may be acquired through study of and belief in the subject-matter of a speech, and its expression aided by the use of the will ; that prac- tice in the technique of delivery is not incompatible with the most sincere earnestness; and lastly, that the character of a speech is limited, as regards its earnestness, to the character of the speaker. CHAPTER XI. PHYSICAL EABNESTNESS GESTUEE, Expression by Action. We now approach the second means of expression, that effected by action ; for while other arts appeal to but one of the senses, speech appeals to both the ear and the eye. Avoid it as we will, that part of public speaking that appeals to the eye is a most im- portant part, and is too often sadly neglected. Were it not important, nay, essential, then the speaker had a> speak behind a screen, and there would be no cause for that instinctive desire on the part of all listeners to see the speaker. The public speaker cannot, if he would, escape the public gaze. His action, therefore, his carriage, bearing, physical control, poise, play of features, in short, his whole bodily expression, may powerfully aid or mar his expres- sion by voice. This, in its broad sense, is gesture. It is a " physical action caused by psychic activity." It is that part of delivery that speaks to the eye. The student of speaking must therefore answer such questions as these: How do you carry yourself? Do you stand up or slouch? Have you a graceful carriage and pleasing bearing ? Is your body the servant of your soul, as it should be, or is your soul cramped and buffeted by a listless, uncontrolled body? If you have riot, like O'Connell, the "stature of Apollo," or, like Webster, a "precipice of brow, with eyes glowing like anthracite coal," even if you have not a com- manding physique, are you making the best possible use of the physique that you have ? In considering means of ex- 110 PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. Ill pression, then, we must not overlook that element commonly known as physical earnestness. Physical Earnestness. We have seen the importance in speech of mental and moral earnestness. Now, for the adequate expression of such earnestness, the speaker must also have physical earnestness. By this is meant having the body awake. It is the quality referred to by Webster when he speaks of " the high purpose, the firm resolve, the dauntless spirit, speaking on the tongue, beaming from the eye, informing every feature, and urging the whole man onward, right onward to his object." To be thus urged onward, the whole man wide awake, is an element, or an accompaniment, of effective speaking. Mental and emo- tional states, we know, react upon the physical, and vice versa. It is a contradiction in nature for one to be mentally and emotionally awake and physically asleep, yet with speakers such is often the case. In his Before an Audience, the Kev. Nathan Sheppard whose whole theory of learn- ing to speak, by the way, is that the speaker needs only to bring his will to bear upon his faults has an excellent chapter on physical earnestness, from which the following is an extract : With an adequate use of his will, an adequate knowing of what he is about, the speaker will make a right use of his physical organization will be physically, as well as morally or spiritually, in earnest. . . . We are always to bear in mind that an im- pression is produced by the speaker quite apart from and often in spite of the words he utters. It is a mesmeric influence, it is feeling, reflection, thought produced by the animal galvanic battery on two legs. . . . Never allow yourself to go physically to sleep if you expect to keep yourself mentally awake. A good preacher once asked me what I thought he needed most to make his speaking more effective. " Put one thing into your style," I said, "and I'll let you off." "What is that?" 112 PUBLIC SPEAKING. * Vivacity." He had an excellent bass voice and unexceptional manners, but he was monotonously orotund, and getting more and more so. Vivacity would improve his oratory and prolong his pastorate. He could secure it, not by forgetting himself and think- ing only of his subject, that he had done for twenty years, or by five-dollar lessons in imitative elocution, those he had tried to his cost, he could secure vivacity by willing it into his style. The way to be vivacious is to be vivacious. The education is all done upon one side of the man, the intellectual side, and it fails from not getting something in the way of " earnest " educa- tion on the physical side, the outside, which it is the fashion to look upon as the lower side. . . . Straighten up and keep yourself straight. Walk upright The " shoulder-braces " are of no use except to suggest bracing yourself up. They will not keep your shoulders back, but they will make you keep your shoulders back. They jog the will. When you straighten up for the first time you will find that your clothes do not fit you. . . . This physical discipline will suggest and promote physical self-respect, and that in turn will promote moral self-respect. The attitude of dignity dignifies the feeling. Straightening the spine stiffens the moral vertebra. The self-dis- trustful speaker is helped by a confident demeanor. Try it. True physical earnestness is something more than physical energy. Such energy must be held in proper reserve and directed by the will. When so held and directed, it becomes physical control ; and just as the highest form of earnest- ness is self-control, so the highest form of physical earnest- ness is physical control. It will depend upon the individual as to whether he needs physical excitation or repression. To check energy is, however, always easier than to excite it. It is therefore best, as a general rule, to give enthusiasm vent and cut loose. " Something may come of this, whereas nothing can come from doing nothing;" and "no man," says Edward Everett Hale, " will ever become a speaker until he is willing to make a fool of himself for the sake of his subject." PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 113 Let us see some of the ways in which physical earnestness manifests itself in the act of speaking. The Expression of Physical Earnestness. 1. Approaching the Audience. The moment that you rise to walk upon the platform, or to step out before the audi- ence, as the case may be, you begin to speak with the body. Self-mastery and self-poise at this point will go far toward winning your audience. In this position, what do you most need ? First and foremost, the right mental atti- tude toward the audience. What is that ? First, realize the importance of the occasion, for any occasion is important that calls a number of persons to hear you speak: you should therefore be dignified. Secondly, being prepared with something that you very much want to say to that audience, you are interested in the subject-matter of your speech: you^will therefore show this interest by a direct, businesslike, animated carriage. Thirdly, common courtesy will impel you to be thankful to the audience for this oppor- tunity to deliver your message : therefore your bearing will be deferential. With such a mental attitude toward your subject and the occasion, you will bow respectfully to the presiding officer, if there be one, and walk easily and directly to where you begin speaking. This walk should be neither a mincing step nor a stride ; neither the walk of a soldier on the march, nor the shuffling gait of the aged and infirm ; nor should it be a sort of a catlike tread taken by speakers who seem to be trying to approach the audience unobserved. It should be that easy,. dignified, upright walk that denotes that the speaker knows what he is there for, and is not mak- ing any fuss over getting to the proper place for speaking. He stops and bows? That depends upon the formality of the occasion, or the amount of " enthusiastic applause" 114 PUBLIC SPEAKI\<;. that greets him. Nowadays the bow to the audience is often given only at the close a bow of thanks, on retiring in token of the speaker's appreciation. But in any event, look about at your audience for a moment, thus asking their atten- tion to what you have to say. Accustom yourself to look calmly and directly at the audience; this is half of the battle at this point. If control is difficult, take a deep breath before beginning to speak. Assume an attitude of physical ease; and having taken that position, do not shuf- fle the feet. You are told to stand so that "a plumb-line dropped from the chin would pass through the heel of the left foot ; " but realize your business and your dignity, and never mind the plumb-line. Stand up! the hips thrown back, the chest forward, representing the Delsarte principle of " strength in repose." This erect position, with the easily poised, is the natural position in the " repose " of the public speaker. It signifies earnestness and the serenity of conscious power. Begin speaking deliberately, easily, ami clearly. After talking a moment to one portion of the audience, turn and speak to another portion. This much, together with some simple directions that follow later, may properly be said to the beginner; but beware of directions for "toeing a line" and measuring the proper "angle between the feet," for the speaker's carriage cannot be assumed by rule. It results from the mental attitude and one's all-round physical training. 2. Carriage. The normal, fair-weather attitude that characterizes an easy and graceful carriage has been de- scribed above. For the most part the body is left in easy poise, so the weight may be easily shifted from one foot to the other. As has been said, much depends upon the mind. Cultivate the feeling of ease, and let the carriage adjust itself to this feeling. This adjustment to a feeling of easy poise will keep you from straddling, or standing rigid PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 115 as though the feet were glued to the floor and the knees had no joints in them, or swaying the body constantly from one foot to the other, or sagging down on one hip. Along with the acquirement of this easy poise, form the habit from the outset of letting the arms and hands hang easily at your side. This may seem awkward at first. You are apt to be painfully conscious of these appendages, and the first impulse is to get them out of the way. But by compelling yourself to let your arms and hands go, an unconsciousness of them will in time come that will never come from trying to do something else with them. Do not fold them behind the back or in front of you; do not dig them into your clothing; do not employ them in fumbling your watch chain or adjusting your cuffs ; and, above all, do not thrust them into your pockets, it is not dignified, and is a signal of nervousness to the audience. The importance of a speaker's bearing cannot be over- estimated. We know the importance in conversation of a pleasing bearing, of an animated and mobile facial ex- pression. It is quite as important in the enlarged and heightened, conversation of public speech. How an arro- gant, conceited bearing repels, and a sympathetic, modest, deferential bearing attracts ! How an uncertain bearing disturbs, and how a confident bearing imparts ease to the audience ! Now, here again it should be borne in "mind that bearing, as a phase of physical expression, is or should be the outward manifestation of inward states. We must therefore set aright the inward states. What should be the proper mental attitude that is indicated by one's bearing? First, since public speaking has for its primary purpose the communication of thought, the speaker should consciously assume and maintain the communicative attitude. Such a mental attitude will result in the physical attitude of directness. Face your audience squarely. Do not 116 PUBLIC SPEAKING. speak over one shoulder. Do not look at the floor, or at the ceiling, or out of the window, or anywhere but at the audi- ence. This habit, trying in conversation, is exasperating in public speaking. Your business is with your audience, and it is your business to make them realize this fact. More- over, to look directly at your audience is one of the best cures for stage-fright, for it takes the speaker's attention from himself and puts it where it should be on getting the thought from his own mind into the minds of his heaivrs. In doing this the eyes are constantly saying to the heaivrs, "I am speaking to you, and you, and you." Now, this does not mean singling out any individual in the sense of recog- nizing him, but it means keeping the audience within the range of vision. In this connection, avoid showing a par- tiality for one group of hearers to the exclusion of others. Look about, while looking at, the audience. Do not shift the eyes capriciously, but do it deliberately and easily, as the natural thing to do. And turn the body with the eyes, not the head alone, nor the trunk alone, but the whole Karely should the speaker'^eyes leave the audience. The actor talks with others on t . the public speaker carries on a one-sided dialogue with the audience only. The actor may occasionally even turn his back to the audience; the public speaker, never. True, he may at times, in picturing a scene or describing an object, turn the eyes momentarily from the audience, but only momen- tarily. In such a case the eyes play back and forth from the picture or object to the audience, and are all the time saying, Do you see it ? The impersonation of the actor or dramatic reader is rarely to be employed by the public speaker. To turn away at any length from the audience indicates a wrong mental attitude and is apt to give the impression of artificiality. The speaker who has and main- PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 117 tains the communicative attitude will speak to, not before, his audience. He will objectify his thought, not soliloquize. He will centre his attention in his audience, not in himself. Further, such an attitude will be characterized by good will toward his audience. The speaker takes the audience into his confidence. This in turn inspires confidence on the part of the audience, and a mutual sympathy is established. Thus will result a bearing deferential though dignified, con- fiding though confident. Thus the speaker's bearing becomes an important aspect of physical earnestness. This communicative attitude being taken, this sympa- thetic relation between yourself and your audience being established, do nothing to destroy or mar it. Herein the instruction must be largely negative. No one can or should, in the act of speaking, be giving his chief attention to this or that peccadillo regarding his carriage or bearing, but certain common bad habits should receive attention and be willed out of one's speaking. The point is, every movement that a speaker makes means or should mean some- thing. Hence avoid indulging in movements which are purely habit and which mean nothing. One will naturally move the body slightly, as we have seen, as he turns from one portion of the audience to another. He will move still more, stepping backward or forward (not hitching sideways), at his transitions. But do not be constantly moving; it makes the audience also restless. Do not walk back and forth along the edge of the platform like a caged lion. Do not shrug your shoulders, or twist your mouth, or make faces. Note how the water-drinking or handkerchief habit will distract the attention of an audience; the thought is, when will the speaker take another drink or next grasp his handkerchief ? If the distracting cause is beyond the speaker's control, circumstances must of course determine the course of action, but the mistake is often made of 118 PUBLIC SPEAKING. attempting to ignore things that an audience will not ignore. During the opening song at a recent olnm-h service the minister dropped his glasses. He began preaching ex- temporaneously, presently started to consult his notes, and then seemed first to miss the glasses. He kept on slowly with the introductory exegesis of his text, meanwhile on a still hunt for the glasses. He raised the Bible not there. He felt in all his pockets. He scanned the floor, and finally saw where they had fallen. Then he gradually edged toward them all the while speaking and finally, at the end of a long sentence, dove down and brought them up, like a fish-hawk his prey, and the congregation breathed a common sigh of relief. The preacher's composure was more admirable than his judgment. Before the search had proceeded far, the whole congregation had forsaken the sermon and joined in the search for the glasses. It would have been far better to have stopped, hunted up the glasses, and then proceeded with the sermon. So, if a window is to be opened or closed, or a dog removed, let the speaker, when possible, join the audience in watching the proceeding, and then proceed with the speech. Gesture. If the speaker be physically in earnest, what is commonly known as gesture should not seriously trouble him. Reference is now made to gesture in its narrower sense, the use of the arms and hands as an aid in em- phasizing or suggesting the thought There has probably been more nonsense written about gesture in manuals of elocution than about any other one thing connected with delivery. We are told, for example, that this or that mental or emotional state is represented by " hand supine '" or " hand prone." The body is divided into " spheres " or "zones," and we are told that gestures made below the waist line denote the lower passions, and those above the PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 119 shoulder the higher passions. Elaborate charts are given to indicate the action of various parts of the body in ex- pressing various emotions. In such a chart, prepared by the professor of oratory in a prominent Eastern university, forty-four emotions are listed. We are told, for example, that " Appeal to Conscience " is indicated by " head thrown forward, eyes and brows looking forward, lips and counte- nance earnest, trunk erect, one hand on breast, lower limbs erect, movements slow." Now there are two palpable objec- tions to this sort of instruction : first, the assumption that a given emotion will naturally be expressed by every indi- vidual in the same way or in a given " sphere," is not true ; second, if there were some truth in the underlying princi- ples presented, all these directions are bound to produce mechanical and artificial results. And yet the problem remains. Gestures, used sparingly and effectively, are a powerful aid to public speech. They constitute our sign-language. They are used much more freely by some individuals than by others ; yet any speaker, if he is awake, if he is physically in earnest, will at times in the relatively stronger utterance, feel an impulse to use his arms and hands to emphasize or illustrate his thought. And the problem is, to see to it that these movements of the arms and hands work themselves out along graceful and effective lines. It is a problem in economy of muscular energy, in the union of action and repose, and in the co- ordination of physical energy with mental and emotional energy. General preparation must therefore be made in an all-round physical training. Playing tennis, dancing, swing- ing Indian clubs and dumb-bells, gymnasium exercise, especially the free movements of the " Swedish System" are all excellent for acquiring muscular control and relaxa- tion. If a gymnasium is accessible, by all means use it, and let a physical expert prescribe for you. The first effort of 120 Pl'KLIC 8PKAKI\f;. the student usually needs to be directed toward limbering ii}) his arms and body, avoiding all rigidity, and cultivating a passive or elastic state. For the benefit of those who may not have access to a gymnasium, a few simple calisthenics are appended which, if regularly and faithfully practised, will be found helpful, especially in getting a desired relaxa- tion, of the arms and hands. Calisthenics Preparatory to Gesture. 1. Stand erect, chest prominent, body in easy poise. 2. Dangle the hands, and shake the arms freely from the shoul- ders, (a) at the side, (6) held horizontally in front, and (r) hori- zontally at the side. 3. Rotate the body on the hip-joints, letting the arms and hands swing freely. Begin slowly, turning the trunk and head as much as possible, then gradually accelerate until the movement is as rapid and energetic as possible. 4. Raise the upper arm slightly, the fore-arm and hand trailing. Now unfold the arm and hand by consciously vitalizing in turn the fore-arm, wrist, palm, fingers, the hand opening at about the level of the hips and midway between the front and side. Pru. tise this with the right arm and hand, then the left, then both together. 5. The same as 4, except that the hands are to be unfolded at about the level of the shoulders. i). Practise the foregoing unfolding movement, first with one arm and hand, and then with both together, the hands unfolding directly in front at first; then, in succession, during live or six repetitions, end the movement at varying angles between the front and the side. 7. Imagine you are raising a pound ball held in the palm of the baud; raise it to a level with the head, then cast it down, letting it roll out of the palm and over the fingers. We shall presently see the practical use of these exercises. In practising, cultivate muscular consciousness, and have the PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 121 mind work in coordination with the prescribed movement, active when action is prescribed, at ease when relaxation is desired. The Mechanics of Gesture. Just how much attention should be called to mechanics in gesture, is a mooted ques- tion with teachers; but this, again, depends upon the indi- vidual. Certainly no one wants to become a " looking-glass orator," but in the process of preliminary training and prac- tice, the young speaker may well turn his attention and his will, if need be, upon his arm and hand movements, even to watching himself before a large mirror, and note whether or not he is making these movements along graceful and expressive lines. Now, any gesture may be analyzed into the movements (a) of preparation and (6) of execution, or stroke. Let us see how this works out in a given gesture. Suppose you want to emphasize by gesture the negation expressed in the following: "You say that we are weak; but I say that we are not weak, if we make a proper use of our God-given powers." You are to emphasize not. Begin- ning with the second clause, you have this purpose in mind ; this purpose is indicated by raising the arm and hand, the elbow and fingers slightly bent not rigid, yet alive the arm descending with a vigorous stroke on not. The culmi- nation of this stroke is marked by a straightening of the arm, hand, and fingers (though not stiffly), the impulse going out through the tips of the fingers. Remember that the impulse is to be sent out to the audience, and not lodged in the elbow or wrist, with a resulting lifeless hand. The hand should be opened toward the audience, palm, thumb, and fingers neither perpendicularly nor horizon- tally, neither rigid nor lifeless. Try to feel the impulse to the very finger-tips, and hold the hand there a moment until the impulse is spent, then allow the arm to come back 122 PUBLIC SPEAKIXG. easily to the side. Try this, first one hand, then the other, then both together, aiming to economize muscular energy by avoiding all rigidity. Gestures Classified. For the purposes of the public speaker, gestures may be classified as Emphatic, Suyy> and Locative. These terms are largely self-defining. The Emphatic gesture is most commonly used by the pub- lic speaker. It aids the vocal emphasis, and indicates strong mental or moral earnestness. The illustration used above would be an emphatic gesture. The emotional force, it should be noted, will determine the length of the sweep on the preparatory movement and the vigor of the stroke. Any gesture, to be expressive, must be neither lifeless on the one hand nor over-elaborate or jerky on the other. Many of the most expressive emphatic gestures are made with a slight movement of the arm near the hips, the easy, offhand colloquial gesture. This was a characteristic gesture with Wendell Phillips, and made so unobtrusively that contem- poraries differed as to the frequency of his gestures, some testifying that he used many, others claiming that he made very few. The lesson is, his gestures, as gestures, made no impression upon the audience. The Suggestive gesture might also be termed the gesture of description. Its use is to stimulate the imagination, first of the speaker and then of the audience, in more clearly perceiving objects or scenes spoken of, but not present to the view. You see the object or scene, you want the audience to see it. The vividness with which you see it will deter- mine in the first instance your ability to make your audience see it. Now, if your audience is to share in your mental picture, you must place the picture where the audience can see it with you, not back of you, nor too far to one side. The eyes will precede the gesture, and will play back and PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 123 forth (as previously suggested) from the picture to the audience. The gesture will not mark the object or scene described by metes and bounds : it is suggestive merely. Another point to be remembered : Be consistent in descrip- tion. If, for example, you are describing a battle, you place the cavalry on one side here, the infantry there, the enemy over yonder. In the progress of the battle you will not have one army move now one way, now another, nor have the cavalry on one side charge upon its own infantry. The suggestive gesture is widely serviceable, yet it is often much overworked. It is a good plan to present many things directly to the imagination of the audience without seeking the aid of gesture. The Locative gesture is used to point out or refer to persons or objects that may be actually seen by the audience. If a lawyer in the court room says, "There sits my client," or a speaker asks, " Do you see that tree standing yonder ? " the locative gesture would naturally be used. When the statue of the Minute Man of the Revolution was unveiled at Con- cord-, Mr. Curtis said, in the course of his oration (addressing the statue), "But should we or our descendants, false to justice and humanity, betray in any way your cause, spring into life, as a hundred years ago, descend and lead us, as God led you in saving America, to save the hopes of man." Now, when invoking the spirit of the Minute Man, the speaker, must have used a locative gesture of some sort ; it may have been with the eyes only. It is apparent that if this passage occurred in a declamation (unless the speaker were in sight of the statue), the gesture becomes suggestive merely. The general principle is, then, do not look at any object or scene, real or imaginary, at any length, unless you want the audience to look there too. If they are really fol- lowing you, they will follow your look. The foregoing classes of gestures are variously combined. 124 Pl'BLlC SPEAKING. For example, the use of the index-finger in close reasoning is a combination of the suggestive and emphatic; as, "The point I make is this." So also, the arms extended, denoting breadth of ideas, or extent; as, "Everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, let there be inscribed that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart, Liberty and Union." Again, the gesture of appeal, single or double, is a combination of the locative and emphatic, locating those appealed to, and at the same emphasizing the idea or senti- ment; as, "I appeal to you, fellow-students, to make this institution all that it should be as an influence in this com- monwealth." General Principles of Gesture. 1. Gesture should be made from the chest as a centre. The impulse should go from the speaker out through the arm to the audience. The upper arm should lead, as we have seen, followed more or less quickly by the fore-arm, wrist, and hand. This done, there will result a free arm movement that should characterize even the most colloquial gesture. Avoid starting the impulse at the wrist, or at the elbow, with the upper arm hugging the body. 2. The curve is the line of c/race and beauty. The Greeks long ago discovered this truth. Angular movements are awkward. Gestures should therefore, generally speaking, be made along curved lines. In the preparatory movement there is the folding-up, and in the stroke the unfolding, of the arm and hand, not like a jack-knife, but in a spiral movement, like the snapping of a limber whip. Now, the preparatory movement and stroke depart from the curve and approximate the straight line, in proportion to the force of the gesture used. A suggestive gesture is usually made in easy, graceful curves, while in a strongly emphatic gesture the arm is raised and sent forth much more directly. But PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 125 in any case the arm itself in almost any gesture is slightly curved. Rarely are the arm and hand so held as to make a straight line. 3. A gesture either precedes or accompanies the vocal expres- sion. Suggestive and locative gestures precede the vocal expression. The psychology of gesture dictates this law. The idea of suggestion is in the mind. Gesture being a sign-language, the sign of the suggestion anticipates the vocal description, the eyes preceding the gesture, the gesture the spoken description. Since an emphatic gesture simply supplements the vocal emphasis, this gesture is given simultaneously with the vocal utterance. A violation of this principle by gesturing too soon or too late will demon- strate the incongruity. Learn to have the preparatory movement and the stroke well-timed. Cautions. Among the many faults in gesturing, the fol- lowing are noted as things to be avoided : . 1.' Avoid gesture at the beginning or at the very close of a N speech. The reason for this admonition is obvious. Since gesture is largely a phase of emotional expression, one does not ordinarily reach the gesturing point in the introductory sentences; and to employ gestures then, usually indicates either mechanical movements or a lack of repose. And to employ gesture on the very closing words is to let the audience drop, as it were, without any warning. Further, gesture at this point obtrudes itself upon that direct contact of mind with mind, which should characterize the very close of an address. 2. Avoid subjective gestures. That is, gesturing to your- self or toward yourself. Remember that any gesture that takes the attention of the audience from the thought either to the gesture or to the speaker, is a poor gesture, for it violates the first essential of public-speaking, thought 126 PUBLIC SPEAKING. communication. Hence many gestures often used by the dramatic reader are to be shunned; such as striking atti- tudes with hands clasped, or hand on the heart, or exhibit- ing your hands when you are speaking of some one's else hands, or pointing to any part of the body in short, calling attention in any way to your person. True, a bit of imper- sonation may at times be called for, but rarely. There should be an exposition of the thought, not an exhibition of the speaker. It follows that gestures should curve out toward the audience, and not, as is sometimes done, in toward the speaker. 3. Avoid see-saw gestures. That is, beginning a gesture with one hand and then bringing in the other hand ; or beginning with both hands, and then dropping one. It is true that good speakers occasionally do this, and at times, in suggestive gestures, it may be appropriate, but very rarely; for when an impulse to gesture is begun with one hand, or with both hands, that impulse will naturally work itself out along the lines originally intended. Gestures that are see-sawing one hand up, then the other show a lack of coordination, and are apt to appear studied. 4. Avoid a too literal representation of figuratlfi language. It is amusing to note how some speakers will try to define the metes and bounds, the ins and outs of a figure of speech, instead of suggesting its broad outlines and leaving some- thing to the imagination of the audience. For example, I have seen students, in speaking such sentences as, " Go back with me to the commencement of this century, and select what statesman you please," turn about and point backw;ml, and in so doing make the further mistake of translating time as distance. Duncan Campbell Lee, professor of oratory at Cornell University, relates the following as coming under his obser- vation : A young man was declaiming a selection containing PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 127 the following sentence : " A handful (looking in his hand) of men rushed up the incline (motion of sending them up). they were driven back again (receding movement of hand] and where were they ? " (looking in his hand again ending with a " lost " look at the audience). Says Professor Hiram Corson : " Gesture results, or should result, from emotion, and should therefore be indefinite. Mimetic ges- ture, or mimetic action of any kind, is rarely, if ever, in place." He goes on to say that the meaning of such words as " rotatory " or " somersault " requires no illustration to an audience of ordinary intelligence ; and cites an example published in " Expression," where a popular public reader of Boston, in rendering the last two lines of Wordsworth's Daffodils," " And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the daffodils," put her hand to her heart and, with " pleasure," indicated by a'sentimental flash of the eye upon the audience, danced a few graceful steps expressive of exuberant joy, and bowed herself off the platform amid the vociferous applause of the audience. The reader's taste in this case was no worse than that of the audience that applauded her. The incident shows how great the general lack of taste, and the need of system- atic study of fitness in relation of thought to its expression. 1 These imitative movements are affected by some elocu- tionists, and students adopt such gestures as the proper thing. Avoid them. They are rarely used in good inter- pretative reading, and certainly have no place in public speaking. It may be added here, that since figures of speech are ordinarily used to illustrate the thought, the burden of the gesture expression should not be put upon such figures, but 1 Corson: The Voice and Spiritual Education, p. 128. 128 PUBLIC SPEAK I \(;. rather reserved for emphasizing the thought itself, the plain statements of the leading ideas. 5. Avoid iifdn'f too many gestures. As in other elements of expression, too many gestures lose their force by monotony. You have seen speakers who were continually waving their arms and hands, producing a sort of windmill effect. Do not think that every idea must be painted on a banner and waved at the audience, or reflected in some way in tin- action. This is a mistake that many dramatic readers make, every idea is pictured in some form upon the body. On this point Professor Corson says : I was once present, by accident, at a lecture given by a Delsarto-elocutionary woman, and in the course of th- lvtmv. she presented what, she said, would be false gestures in reciting Whittier's -Maud Muller." She then recited the poem, with. according to her notions, true gestures, which were more in num- ber than Cicero made, perhaps, in his orations against Catiline. or Demosthenes, in his "Oration on the Crown." Kvery idea of the poem told outwardly on her body. If a woman, in reading -.Maud Muller," has emotions which must find vent in gesture and various physical contortions, she ought to be put under treatment that would tone up her system. A speaker with a nervous temperament, having an impulse to gesture frequently, needs to repress rather than encourage the use of gestures, and put the impulse on the vocal delivery. Avoid all side-twitchings and meaningless movements of the arms and hands, termed by the classic writers the "bab- bling of the hands" ; but when a gesture is employed, make it strong and finished, realizing the purpose of its use in the execution. It is always best to reserve gestures for the strong places in a speech they are then all the more force- ful. Excess of action weakens, while economy of appro- priate aotion strengthens. PHYSICAL EARNESTNESS GESTURE. 129 Variety in gesture is desirable. The direct, emphatic gesture is the preferable type for the public speaker, but do not be confined to a single gesture for this single type. Speaking on this subject, the Rev. Herrick Johnson, of Chicago, himself widely known as a forcible speaker, says : Economy of gesture is just like precision in speech. You do not want too many words to express thought, but you want enough. Not two arms where one would suffice. Not a gesture for every varying thought, and not too frequent gestures for the same thought. For example, the digital tinger is very strong in gesture if used with economy. If it is used now and then you can send the thought right down into the hearer's heart by shaking your forefinger at him. But if you are shaking it all the time, what does it amount to ? 6. Do not gesture irithout an impulse to gesture. This is, v > after all, the conclusion of the whole matter. To be sure, in the process of training, directions previously given may well be followed for the sake of practice ; for as the physical reacts upon the mental, a given physical movement may induce a corresponding emotion. But in the actual process of delivery the rule as laid down should be scrupulously followed. Attempting to put on gesture from the outside has been so glaringly the fault of elocutionists as to offend people of culture, and prejudice them against any attempts at teaching the art of public utterance. In the synthesis of delivery, if the mind and emotions are active, and are free- ing themselves through an active and well-poised physical medium, appropriate gestures will make themselves. At any rate, conscious attention to gestures, as such, should be reduced to a minimum. Those that come spontaneously are the best, and enough. Even in the preliminary training of a school or college, a disproportionate amount of time is often given to the subject of gesture ; the control, poise, and grace 130 rt'BLic SPEAK i.\<;. that characterize a finished speaker usually come after much practice in public speaking. SUMMARY. Action, which includes physical earnestness and gesture, is an important means of expression, It manifests itself especially in the speaker's carriage and in the movements of his arms and hands. The speaker should sometimes stimulate, and should always control and guide, the impulse to actional expression ; but he should never gesture without such impulse. CHAPTER XII. GENERAL SUGGESTIONS, Style of Delivery. In the opening chapter it was shown that the basis of the best speaking lies in the best con- versation ; that the act of speaking is only the enlarged conversation that comes from speaking to a collection of individuals ; that the most effective public speaking comes from talking to the audience. Now, if the student can from the outset be persuaded to take this attitude toward any audience he may address, he has gained more than he could from" a year's study and practice of the technique of delivery. Tliis conversational basis in speech is of the very essence of the problem. If the audience is to be impressed by your thoughts, convinced of your convictions, and persuaded of your beliefs, its attention should not be distracted by a method of communication outside the ordinary experience. And if here and there a speaker who has special qualities of force or attractiveness attains a certain measure of success by another method, it does not affect the truth of this under- lying principle. Then, too, the conversational style of delivery accords with modern taste; for oratory, like other arts, may have a certain type or style, varying with changing conditions. The style of popular oratory has undergone a marked change in this country from the heavy and bombastic to the simple and direct within the past twenty-five years. It was Wendell Phillips who more than any other one 131 132 Pl'BLlC SPAMA'/.V';. man first set the fashion which has largely done away with barn-storming and haranguing. Curtis, in the excerpt quoted on p. 100, describes his manner as that of a " gen- tleman conversing." Says Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson : The keynote to the oratory of Wendell Phillips lay in this : that it was essentially conversational the conversational raised to the highest power. Perhaps no orator ever spoke with so little appar- ent effort, or began so entirely on the plane of his average hearers. It was as if he simply repeated, in a little louder tone, what he had just been saying to some familiar friend at his elbow. The collo- quialism was never relaxed, but it was familiarity without loss of dignity. Then, as the argument went on, the voice grew deeper, the action' more animated, and the sentences came in a long, sonorous swell, still easy and graceful, but powerful as the soft stretch of a tiger's paw. The conversational style is first of all spontaneous. The speaker's individuality speaks along with his words; he is what we call "natural." It is so easy and tempting for the young speaker to imitate some one whose delivery he particularly admires, forgetting that had the model sunk his individuality by copying another he would not have seemed so admirable. Secondly, the conversational style is simple and direct. There are no superfluous frills and flourishes in getting the message from the speaker directly to the audi- ence. The speaker's art is not that of the dancer, as is so often thought. It is rather that of the wrestler. There must be a personal grapple with the audience. The speaker's aim must be not to have the audience admire him, but to have it follow him. Lastly, the conversational style is characterized by variety. This comes from the speaker's spontaneity and from a flexibility of voice and body that produce frequent and natural changes. GENERAL SUGGESTIONS. 133 As was shown in Chapter III, this conversational style, or what has been referred to as the conversational basis, does not mean that one is to speak in a large room to a num- ber of persons in the same manner as he would speak to a single person standing by his side. If he did he would not be heard ; or, if heard, his words might fall flat and lifeless. Colonel Higginson, in the quotation given above, shows that Mr. Phillips did not so speak. Public speaking is a magni- fied, heightened conversation. It is, as Colonel Higginson says, "the conversational raised to its highest power!" ( )rutory in its higher reaches, where the emotional element predominates over the mental, is characterized by an idealized language which lifts speakers and hearers above the hum- drum of common speech. It must be admitted, too, that something depends upon the character of the audience. By an audience of average culture nowadays and beware of/ talking down to any audience the simplicity of convert sation is relished, as of one man talking earnestly with another, resting down upon his subject and making that speak. Mere emotionalism tends to disappear with the advance of civilization, but certain classes of men, such as judges in courts of law and college professors, used to hear- ing much speaking and trained to value the intellectual, are perhaps inclined to undervalue, as young speakers are in- clined to overvalue, the emotional element, for the purposes of popular oratory. It was noticed, for example, that Mr. Bryan's style of delivery when speaking to a university audi- ence was more quiet than when giving practically the same speech the next afternoon at a political barbecue. Mr. Sheppard, in his Before an Audience, remarks that even Phillips "required listeners that were accustomed to listen- ing." And yet, after making all allowances for varying con- ditions, the best public speaking is fundamentally strong, direct talk. 134 PUBLIC SPEAKING. Stage-fright. It is qnite impossible to diagnose tha<: common malady known as stage-fright. Usually it afflicts the speaker during the first few seconds, or first few min- utes, of his speech. Most speakers have it, in varying de- grees. Preachers tell us, for example, that even after long experience, they never begin their weekly sermons without the most intense nervousness. True, experiences vary. Gladstone, when asked if he never became nervous before speaking, said that he often did in opening a debate, but never in replying. An amusing feature of this matter is, that young speakers are apt to think that they are the only ones that become seriously embarrassed. And right here is the lesson : trained speakers learn to control their embarrassment. It should be remembered that a nervous tension, if brought under control, may prove a help rather than a hindrance to the speaker, for it puts a nerve-force into his delivery that might otherwise be wanting. How attain that control ? There is no way but through practice in speaking to audi- ences. Continued practice, if it does not eliminate all embarrassment, gradually does reduce the earlier terrors. The practice should, of course, be directed along right lines. Nervousness may be aided much by a feeling of menial and physical preparedness. Have the speech thoroughly in hand long enough beforehand to give both mind and body a rest. Students often make the mistake of worrying over a speech up to the very moment of its delivery. This method is suicidal. Even speakers of experience sometimes fail to realize how much the success or failure of a speech depends upon physical conditions. To undergo the severe nervous strain of public speaking, mind and body should be fresh. The day preceding an athletic event the trained contestant either rests or exercises very moderately. So, if a speech is to be given at night, say, the speaker should GENERAL SUGGESTIONS. 135 wholly lay it aside during the afternoon and go for a walk or go to sleep do anything but exhaust faculties that will be needed in the evening. Control is also effected through the communicative, con- versational attitude, as one rises to speak, and by an exer- cise of the will. Again, self-confidence should be cultivated. Self-fear is quite as often a cause of stage-fright as is a fear of the audience. Encourage a feeling that you and your audience are getting on well together. Self-confidence is not undue conceit, or " brag, brass, and bluster " ; it is hav- ing the courage of one's convictions. It is that self-reliance which enables one to rise to the occasion. It is that confi- dence which leads the speaker to say to himself, "I know what I want to say and I am able to say it." Study and Practice. Like every other art, public speaking demands long-continued study and practice. The most pro- ficient always feel there is room for improvement; and like other things in life, if one is earnestly striving to reach an ideal, there is hope for him ; if he thinks he has reached it, he is lost. The complex art of public address cannot be learned quickly, and should never be taken up as a play- thing. If you expect to be a speaker, make a business of the study, as you would of anything else worth learning. Do not dabble in it. A little dabbling with the technique given in this book is useless. It is because we have so many dabblers that we have so many bunglers. And by way of repetition, do not expect to correct in a month a fault that is the habit of years. Along with practice in vocal technique, the student should daily practise reading aloud, preferably to a listener or listeners. And even after vocal technique may have been fairly well mastered, daily practice in oral reading should be continued, for in intelligent and sympathic reading aloud 136 I'fliLIC 8PEAKI.\<:. may be found a powerful means of culture. The scarcity of good readers is another reason for the acquisition of the art. Ask the average college graduate to read a piece of simple prose, and hear him jumble it! Says Professor Edward Dowden, in his New Studies hi Literature : The reading which we should desire to cultivate is intelligent reading, that is, it should express the meaning of each passage clearly ; sympathetic reading, that is, it should convey the feeling delicately; musical reading, that is, it should move in accord with the melody and harmony of what is read, be it in verse or prose. To attain this, the reader must train the eye to look ahead of the vocalization and take in a clause or a sentence at a glance ; that is, it should be phrase-reading, not word-reading. In reading in public, directness should be cultivated by allowing the eyes to play back and forth from the book or manuscript to the audience. At the beginning of a given sentence, the reader should be able to see through to the end of that sentence, and the closing words should be spoken directly to the audience, independently of the book, then return again to the copy. This power can be acquired by practice. Practice, indeed, is the main thing. Certain incurable defects may be fatal, certain natural qualities are desirable, though not indispensable ; the rest is work, thorough preparation and continual practice. It is unfortunate if one must face an audience for the first time without previous training. The drill of school or college may be irksome, but the student should undertake it as he would any other task, do it and make it count for something. If you have a declamation, an oration, or an argument to deliver, drill on the oral presentation. Speak to an imaginary audience. Invite your friends in and compel them to listen. Do not be afraid of drilling too much. I have heard students c F. V Kit A L 8 UGGESTIONS. ^ , 137 talk about getting "stale" who did not even enunciate clearly. An expert in technique to criticise and suggest is desirable, but not indispensable. Sometimes a friend who is not over-fastidious, has no dogmatic standards, and can judge of general effectiveness, is the most valuable sort of a critic. Take all the advice offered and do not always act on it. A little experience will enable you to judge of its value ; you will soon learn to know your leading faults yourself; and unless you are to surrender your individu- ality, you must be the final judge. And then, when the occasion arrives, put your technique in the background ; let mental and moral earnestness be the predominant processes ; ;inl let the practice in technique unconsciously repeat itself in the final effort. CONCLUSION. Practice faithfully the technique of delivery until it becomes a second nature, Do not fail to make conscientious and thorough preparation for all those occasions, so frequent nnder the conditions of American life and government, when you will be called upon to speak : and thereby make general preparation for those times, unforeseen yet also frequent those social or political crises in the affairs of a community, a State, or a Nation when the public speaker, " sending the truth home," as Beecher defines oratory, "with all the resources of the living man," creates, moulds, and directs a public opinion that conduces to right thinking and right acting, CHAPTER XITT. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. THE ALAMO AND THE NEW SOUTH. HENRY W. ORADY. Extract from a speech delivered at the Dallas, Texas, State Fair, October S6, 1887. MEN, and especially young men, look back for their in- spiration to what is best in their traditions. Thermopylae cast Spartan sentiments in heroic mould, and sustained Spartan arms for more than a century. Thermopylae had survivors to tell the story of its defeat. The Alamo had none. Though voiceless, it shall speak from its dumb walls. Liberty cried to Texas as God called from the clouds unto Moses. Bowie and Fannin, though dead, still live. Their voices rang above the din of Goliad and the glory of San Jacinto, and they marched with the Texas veterans who rejoiced at the birth of Texas independence. It is the spirit of the Alamo that moved above the Texas soldiers as they charged like demigods through a thousand battle-fields, and it is the spirit of the Alamo that whispers from their graves and ennobles the soil that was crimsoned with their blood. In the spirit of this inspiration and in the thrill of the amazing growth that surrounds you, my young friends, it will be strange if the young men of Texas do not carry the 138 SELECTIONS FOB PRACTICE. 139 Lone Star into the heart of the struggle. The South needs her sons to-day more than when she summoned them to the forum to maintain her political supremacy, more than when the bugle called them to the field to defend issues put to the arbitrament of the sword. It is ours 'to show that as she prospered with slaves she shall prosper still more with freemen ; ours to see that from the lists she entered in pov- erty she shall emerge in prosperity; ours to carry the transcending traditions of the old South, from which none of us can in honor or in reverence depart, unstained and unbroken into the new. Let every man here pledge him- self, in this high and ardent hour, that in death and earnest loyalty, in patient painstaking and care, he shall watch her interest, advance her fortune, defend her fame, and guard her honor as long as life shall last. With such consecrated service, what could we not accom- plish; what riches we should gather for her; what glory and prosperity we should render to the Union ; what bless- ings we should gather unto the universal harvest of human- ity! As I think of it, a vision of surpassing beauty unfold-; to my eyes. I see a South, the home of fifty millions of people, who rise up every day to call from blessed cities, vast hives of industry and of thrift ; her country-sides the treasures from which their resources are drawn ; her streams vocal with whirring spindles ; her valleys tranquil in the white and gold of the harvest; her mountains showering down the music of bells, as her slow-moving flocks and herds go forth from their folds ; her rulers honest and her people loving, and her homes happy and their hearthstones bright, and their waters still and their pastures green ; her wealth diffused and poorhouses empty, her churches earnest 140 PUBLIC SPEAKfXG. and all creeds lost in the gospel. Peace and sobriety walk- ing hand in hand through her borders ; honor in her homes ; uprightness in her midst ; plenty in her fields ; straight and simple faith in the hearts of her sons and daughters ; her two races walking together in peace and contentment. All this, my country, and more can we do for you. As I look the vision grows, the splendor deepens, the horizon falls back, the skies open their everlasting gates, and the glory of the Almighty God streams through as He looks down on His people who have given themselves unto Him and leads them from one triumph to another until they have readied a glory unspeaking, and the whirling stars, as in their courses through Arcturus they run to the milky way, shall not look down on a better people or happier land. THE AMERICAN' UNIVERSITY AND AMERICAN CITIZENSHIP, WOODROW WILSON. From his address delivered on the occasion nf his inauguration as President of Princeton University, October 5, 190S. 4.4 ? 2 American universities served free nation, whose progress, whose power, whose prosperity, whose happiness, whose in- tegrity depend upon individual initiative and the sound sense and equipment of tl^e r&nk and file. Their history, moreover, has set tjiem apart to a character and service of their own. They are not mere seminaries of scholars. They never can be. Most of them, the greatest of tlu-m and the most distinguished, were tirst of $11 great colleges before they became universities, and their tsk is twofold, the SELECTIONS FOR PUACTICE. 141 k production of a great body of informed and thoughtful men, and the production of ti small body of trained scholars and investigators. It is one of their functions to Ake large bodies of young men up to the places of outlook whence the world of thought and'Wairs is to be viewed ; it is smother of their functions to take some men, a little more mature, a little more studious, men s^lf-selected by aptitude and in- dustry, into the quiet libraries and laboratories where the close coni&cts of study are learned which yield the world "*""' jk ^\ new insight into the processes of nature, of reason, and of the human spirit. /These two functions are not to be per- formed separately, but side by side, and are to be informed with one spirit, the spirit of enlightenment, a spirit of learn- ing which is neither superficial nor pedantic, which values life more than it values the mere acquisitions of the mind. There are other things besides mere material success with which we must supply our generation. It must be supplied with men who care more for principles than for money, for the right adjustments of life than for the gross accumula- tions of profit. The problems that call for sober thought- fulness and mere devotion are as pressing as those which call for practical efficiency. We are here not merely to release the faculties of men for their own use, but also to quicken their social understanding, instruct their con- sciences, and give them the catholic vision of those who know their just relations to their fellow-men. Here in America, for every man touched with nobility, for every man touched with the spirit of our institutions, social service is the high law of duty, and every American university must square its standards by that law or lack its national title. It is serving the nation to give men the enlightenments of a 142 PUBLIC SPEAKING. general training; it is serving the nation to equip fit men for thorough scientific investigation and for the tasks of exact scholarship, for science and scholarship carry the truth for- ward from- generation to generation and give the certain touch of knowledge to the processes of life. But the whole service demanded is not rendered until something is added to the mere training of the undergraduate and the mere equipment of the investigator, something ideal and of the very spirit of all action. The final synthesis of learning is in philosophy. You shall most clearly judge the spirit of a university if you judge by the philosophy it teaches; and the philosophy of conduct is what every wise man should wish to derive from his knowledge of the thoughts and the affairs of the generations that have gone before him. We are not put into this world to sit still and know ; we are put into it to act. I have said already, let me say again, that in such a place as this we have charge, not of men's fortunes, but of their spirits. This is not the place in which to teach men their specific tasks, except their tasks be those of scholarship and investigation ; it is the place in which to teach them the relations which all tasks bear to the work of the world. Some men there are who are condemned to learn only the technical skill by which they are to live ; but these are not the men whose privilege it is to come to a university. University men ought to hold themselves bound to walk the upper roads of usefulness which run along the ridges and command views of the general fields of life. This is why I believe general training, with no particular occupation in view, to be the very heart and essence of university training, and the indispensable foundation of every special develop- SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 143 ment of knowledge or of aptitude that is to lift a man to his profession or a scholar to his function of investigation. A new age is before us, in which, it would seem, we must lead the world. No doubt we shall set it an example un- precedented, not only in the magnitude and telling perfec- tion of our industries and arts, but also in the splendid scale and studied detail of our university establishments ; the spirit of the age will lift us to every great enterprise. But the ancient spirit of sound learning will also rule us ; we shall demonstrate in our lecture rooms again and again, with increasing volume of proof, the old principles that have made us free and great ; reading men shall read here the chastened thoughts that have kept us young and shall make us pure ; the school of learning shall be the school of memory and of ideal hope; and the men who spring from our loins shall take their lineage from the founders of the republic. CHRISTIAN CITIZENSHIP. CHARLES H. PARKHURST. The fundamental service which the church has to render in the line of municipal or national betterment is to develop in Christians as such a civic consciousness. To an Ameri- can the Stars and Stripes ought to be as actually a part of his religion as the Sermon on the Mount. Other things being equal, it is as urgently the obligation of a Christian to go to the polls on election day as it is for him to go to the Lord's table on communion day. That sense of the holy obligation which citizenship in- volves must be made part of our Christian religion. It 144 PUBLIC SPEAKING. must be taught from the pulpit, rehearsed in the home, re- iterated in the Sunday-school, and practised in the life. . r wish the time might come when we could have our national colors displayed in the sanctuary ; not simply hung from the belfry in a shy kind of way on the Fourth of July and the twenty-second of February, but made a permanent part of sanctuary decoration. The old Hebrew never thought of patriotism as anything but a constituent part of religion. To him it was religion in its political aspects. I wish there were some way in which we could make civic virtue part of our creed. It would be a tremendous gain if we could all of us come to conceive of, and to handle, civic duties, such as attending the primaries and going to the polls, as lying on religious ground and contained within Christian jurisdiction. The instant effect of such civic consciousness would be to bring the citizen into direct practical relations to his city or country, and to make him feel in regard to his city, for example, " This is my city." No matter how many mayors or aldermen or police captains you have, it is your city all the same, and no city is safe unless its citizens tread steadily on the heels of those who have been hired to do the town's business. The mayor is bound to look after the citizens, but the citizens are just as much bound to look after the mayor. The police must watch the people, but the people must watch the police. The evil will have to be overcome with the good, and per- sonality is the thing that will have to do it. It will have to be done by men with convictions and with the courage of their convictions. It will have to be done by men who remember always that the security and the honor of the SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 145 community lies not so much in its greatest statesmen, in its powerful leaders, or even in its educational advantages, as it does in the number of its men with whom righteousness is a chronic passion, civic duty a part of Christianity. SOURCES OF OUR NATIONAL STRENGTH. WHITELAW RKID. Extract from an address delivered in Carnegie Hall, Pittsbury, Pennsylvania, November 6, 1902. We as Americans are intolerant believers in our form of government. Every child learns to think that it is the best in the world, not only for us but for all men. Every dema- gogue learns to bellow forth his unlimited, unquestioning certainty of that superiority and universal applicability. I am not here to dispute the belief only to define the facts about it. If our form of government is the best, it cannot be so because it is the cheapest. On the contrary, it is one of the most expensive in the world. Nor can it be the best because it is the most efficient. On the contrary, it is one of the slowest in the world; the most complicated, cum- brous, and limited. And even within the spheres in which it will work, our form of government is not the easiest to work. On the contrary, it requires, to keep it running suc- cessfully, more public spirit, more study about candidates, more time for multitudinous elections, more watchfulness of public officials, and a higher average of intelligence than any other in the world. Now, if these things are so, if our government does in any measure have these defects, then the old question of the Philistines comes up with insistent force, " Wherein lies its great strength ? " 146 PUBLIC SPEAKING. The answer has become a truism. Its strength lies in the quality of man it develops. The real merit is not in the machinery, but in the skilled intelligence absolutely required to frame and to work it ; in the combination of respect for authority on the one hand, with training in individual initi- ative on the other, which this work brings out and which the government has thus far scrupulously and religiously guarded. We brought the respect for authority from the birthplace of the common law ; and in proportion as harshness from its officers was resented in the old home, in like proportion the law itself was instinctively elevated into a veritable pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night in the wilderness of the New World. We found the individual initiative in the necessities of an untamed continent ; were driven to it, shut up to it at every turn, in the imperative, beginning of orderly self-government at a thousand isolated spots, in the long-protracted struggle with wild lands, wild beasts, and wild men, till it became the inheritance of the race; till under its stimulus men found their solitary way through trackless woods to make lonely clearings or start frontier settlements across the Alleghanies, through track- less prairies to possess the Mississippi Valley, through alkali deserts to wrest their gold "from the mountains, and at last through the Sierras to scatter up and down the enchanted shore of the Pacific. To such a continental conquest of nature and of men have those two traits of the fathers brought us: their respect for authority and their widest freedom of individual initiative. These, with the original vigor of the stock, have made Americans what they are; and by consequence have made this blessed country of ours SELECTIONS FOB PRACTICE. 147 fche joy and pride and hope of our lives. To harm either is Criminal whether to break down respect for authority by unlawful combinations, tricky evasions, and open defiance of order, or to cramp the widest freedom of the individual in any lawful enterprise or labor anywhere. Whoever or what- ever now dares to interfere with the permanent union of these two traits and their continued development in the American life, is an enemy to the Republic whether known as political boss, or as trust, or as trade union. This is the line along which the future of the Republic may be safeguarded. It is to endure, if at all, because the latest generations hold fast to the faith and practice of the fathers, respect for authority, and the widest liberty for individual activities. Mr. Dalzell once quoted to you very aptly the illuminating definition of civilization, given by a philosophic Frenchman. It is, said M. Guizot, the progress of society and the progress of the individual. But the society cannot make progress without that respect for authority which is its corner-stone ; and the individual can- not make progress without that freedom of initiative which is the essence of liberty itself. If society makes progress, and the individual does not, you have the condition, not of the Republic, which, we fondly trust, is to endure forever, but of the despotism which we have hoped was passing away. Let us not lose our heads in the midst of our bewildering prosperity, and risk shipwreck by getting out of sight of the old landmarks. We are the oldest republic in the world (save those so small as to be negligible), but our years do not yet cover the span the Psalmist assigned to two human lives, while those of the monarchies and despotisms count by thousands. Other 148 republics, long since passed away, have lasted as long as we, and borne for their time as great a sway in the world. Be not deceived. Strong as this Republic is, it is not strong enough let us hope it will never be unjust enough to let either labor shut any of its children out of learning a trade or capital shut any of them out of going into trade. You cannot preserve the triumphant democracy and insure the American future unless you preserve the American citizen in his habit as he was, revering the law, respecting authority, and beyond that, still limited in his free. activities by no master below God. THE PHILIPPINE QUESTION. ALBERT .1. BEVERIDGE. From a speech delivered in the United States Senate, January 9, 1900. The question of our policy toward the Philippine Islands is deeper than any question of party politics ; deeper than any question of the isolated policy of our country even; deeper even than any question of constitutional power. It is elemental. It is racial. God has not been preparing the English-speaking and Teutonic peoples for a thousand years for nothing but vain and idle self-contemplation and self- admiration. No! He has made us the master organizers of the world to establish system where chaos reigns. He has given us the spirit of progress to overwhelm the forces of reaction throughout the earth. He has made us adepts in government that we may administer government among savage and senile peoples. Were it not for such a force as SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 149 this, the world would relapse into barbarism and might. And of all our race He has marked the American people as His chosen nation to finally lead in the regeneration of the world. This is the divine mission of America, and it holds for us all the profit, all the glory, all the happiness, possible to man. We are trustees of the world's progress, guardians of its righteous peace. The judgment of the Master is upon us : " Ye have been faithful over a few things ; I will make you ruler over many things." What shall history say of us? Shall it say that we renounced that holy trust, left the savage to his base con- dition, the wilderness to the reign of waste, deserted duty, abandoned glory, forgot our sordid profit even, because we feared our strength, and read the charter of our powers with the doubter's eye and the quibbler's mind ? Shall it say that, called by events to captain and command the proudest, ablest, purest race of history in history's noblest work, we declined that great commission ? Our fathers would not have had it so. No! They founded no paralytic govern- ment incapable of the simplest acts of administration. They planted no sluggard people, passive while the world's work calls them. They established no reactionary nation. They unfurled no retreating flag. That flag has never paused in its onward march. Who dares halt it now now, when history's largest events are carrying it forward ; now, when we are at last one people, strong enough for any task, great enough for any glory destiny can bestow ? How comes it that our first century closes with the process of consolidating the American people into a unit just accomplished, and quick upon the stroke of that great hour presses upon us our world opportunity, world 150 rntLic SPEAKING. duty, and world glory, which none but a people welded into an indivisible nation can achieve or perform '/ Blind indeed is he who sees not the hand of God in events so vast, so harmonious, so benign. Reactionary indeed is the mind that perceives not that this vital people is the strongest of the saving forces of the world ; that our place, therefore, is at the head of the constructing and redeeming nations of the earth ; and that to stand aside while events march on is a surrender of our interests, a betrayal of our duty as blind as it is base. Craven indeed is the heart that fears to perform a work so golden and so noble ; that dares not win a glory so immortal. Do you tell me that it will cost us money ? When did America ever measure duty by financial standards ? Do you tell me of the tremendous toil required to overcome the vast difficulties of our task ? What mighty work for the world, for humanity, even for ourselves, has ever been done with ease? Even our bread must we eat by the sweat of our faces. Why are we charged with power such as no people ever knew of if we are not to use it in a work such as no people ever wrought ? We will dispute the divine meaning of the fable of the talents. Do you remind me of the precious blood that must be shed, the lives that must be given, the broken hearts of loved ones for their slain ? And this is indeed a heavier price than all combined. And yet as a nation every historic duty we have done, every achievement we have accomplished, has been by the sacrifice of our noblest sons. Every holy memory that glorifies the flag is of those heroes who died that its onward march might not be stayed. It is the nation's dearest lives yielded for the flag that makes it dear to us ; it is the nation's SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 151 most precious blood poured out for it that makes it precious to us. That flag is woven of heroism and grief, of the bravery of men, and women's tears, of righteousness and battle, of sacrifice and anguish, of triumph and glory. It is these which make our flag a holy thing. Who would tear from that sacred banner the glorious legends of a single battle where it has waved on land or sea ? What son of a soldier of the flag whose father fell beneath it on any field would surrender that proud record for the heraldry of a king? In the cause of civilization, in the service of the Republic anywhere on earth, Americans consider wounds the noblest decorations man can win, and count the giving of their lives a glad and precious duty. Pray God that spirit never fails. Pray God time may never come when Mammon and the love of ease shall so debase our blood that we will fear to shed it for the flag and its imperial destiny. Pray God the time may never come when American heroism is but a legend like the story of the Cid, American faith in our mission and our might a dream dissolved, and the glory of our mighty race departed. And that time will never come. We will renew our youth at the fountain of new and glorious deeds. We will exalt our reverence for the flag by carrying it to a noble future as well as by remembering its ineffable past. Its immortality will not pass, because everywhere and always we will acknowledge and discharge the solemn responsibili- ties our sacred flag, in its deepest meaning, puts upon us. And so, with reverent hearts, where dwells the fear of God, the American people move forward to the future of their hope and the doing of His work. 152 rriiLK 8PXAKINO. OUR POLICY TOWARD THK PHILIPPINES. GEORGE F. HOAR. From a speech delivered in the United States Senate, May 2, 1900. A famous orator once imagined the nations of the world uniting to erect a column to Jurisprudence in some stately capital. Each country was to bring the name of its great jurist to be inscribed on the side of the column, with a sentence stating what he and his country through him had done toward establishing the reign of law in justice for the benefit of mankind. Rome said. " Here is Numa, who received the science of law from the nymph Egeria in the cavern and taught its message to his countrymen. Here is Justinian, who first reduced law to a code, made its precepts plain, so that all mankind could read it, and laid down the rules which should govern the dealing of man with man in every trans- action of life." France said, " Here is D'Aguesseau, the great chancellor, to whose judgment-seat pilgrims from afar were wont to repair to do him reverence." England said, " Here is Erskine, who made it safe for men to print the truth, no matter what tyrant might dislike to read it." Virginia said, " Here is Marshall, who breathed the vital principle into the Constitution, infused into it, instead of the letter that killeth, the spirit that maketh alive, and enabled it to keep state and nation each in its appointed bounds, as the stars abide in their courses." I have sometimes fancied that we might erect here in the SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 153 capital of the country a column to American Liberty which alone might rival in height the beautiful and simple shaft which we have erected to the fame of the Father of the Country. I can fancy each generation bringing its in- scription, which should recite its own contribution to the great structure of which the column should be but the symbol. The generation of the Puritan and the Pilgrim and the Huguenot claims the place of honor at the base : " I brought the torch of freedom across the sea. I cleared the forest. I subdued the savage and the wild beast. I laid in Christian liberty and law the foundations of empire." The next generation says : " What my fathers founded I builded. I left the seashore to penetrate the wilderness. 1 planted schools and colleges and courts and churches." Then comes the generation of the great colonial day: "I stood by the side of England on many a hard-fought field. I helped humble the power of France. I saw the lilies go down before the lion at Louisburg and Quebec. I carried the cross of St. George in triumph in Martinique and the Havana. I knew the stormy pathways of the ocean. I followed the whale from the Arctic to the Ant- arctic seas, among tumbling mountains of ice and under equinoctial heat, as the great English orator said, 'No sea not vexed by my fisheries ; no climate not witness to my toils.' " Then comes the generation of the Revolutionary time: " I encountered the power of England. I declared and won the independence of my country. I placed that decla- ration on the eternal principles of justice and righteousness which all mankind have read, and on which all mankind 154 I'l'BLIC SPEAKING. will one day stand. I affirmed the dignity of human nature and the right of the people to govern themselves. I devised the securities against popular haste and delusion which made that right secure. I created the Supreme Court and the Senate. For the first time in history I made the right of the people to govern themselves safe, and established institutions for that end which will endure forever." The next generation says : " I encountered England again. I vindicated the right of an American ship to sail the seas the wide world over without molestation. I made the American sailor as safe at the ends of the earth as my fathers had made the American farmer safe in his home. I proclaimed the Monroe doctrine in the face of the Holy Alliance, under which sixteen republics have joined the family of nations. I filled the Western Hemisphere with republics from the Lakes to Cape Horn, each controlling its own destiny in safety and in honor." Then comes the next generation: "I did the mighty deeds which in your younger years you saw and which your fathers told. I saved the Union. I put down the rebellion. I freed the slave. I made of every slave a free- man, and of every freeman a citizen, and of every citizen a voter." Then comes another who did the great work in peace, in which so many of you had an honorable share : " I kept the faith. I paid the debt. I brought in conciliation and peace instead of war. I secured in the practice of nations the great doctrine of expatriation. I devised the homestead system. I covered the prairie and the plain with happy homes and with mighty states. I crossed the continent and joined together the seas with my great railroads. I de- SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 155 clared the manufacturing independence of America, as my fathers affirmed its political independence. I built up our vast domestic commerce. I made my country the richest, freest, strongest, happiest people on the face of the earth." And now what have we to say ? What have we to say ? Are we to have a place in that honorable company ? Must we engrave on that column : " We repealed the Declaration of Independence. We changed the Monroe doctrine from a doctrine of eternal righteousness and justice, resting on the consent of the governed, to a doctrine of brutal selfish- ness, looking only to our own advantage. We crushed the only republic in Asia. We made war on the only Christian people in the East. We converted a war of glory to a war of shame. We vulgarized the American flag. We intro- duced perfidy into the practice of war. We inflicted torture on unarmed men to extort confession. We put children to death. We established reconcentrado camps. We devasted provinces. We baffled the aspirations of a people for liberty." No. Never! Never! Other and better counsels will yet prevail. The hours are long in the life of a great people. The irrevocable step is not yet taken. Let us at least have this to say : We too have kept the faith of the fathers. We took Cuba by the hand. We delivered her from her age-long bondage. We welcomed her to the family of nations. We set mankind an example never beheld before of moderation in victory. We led hesitating and halting Europe to the deliverance of their beleaguered ambassadors in China. We marched through a hostile country a country cruel and barbarous without anger or revenge. We returned benefit for injury and pity 156 PUBLIC SPEAK I XG. for cruelty. We made the name of America beloved in the East as in the West. We kept faith with the Philippine people. We kept faith with our own history. We kept our national honor unsullied. The flag which we received with- out a rent we handed down without a stain. AMERICA A WORLD REPUBLIC. ALBERT J. BEVERIIxJI . Extract from his speech opening the Republican campaign, delivered in the Auditorium at Chicago, September 25, 1900. " Westward the Star of Empire takes its Way." Not the star of kingly power, for kingdoms are everywhere dissolv- ing in the increasing rights of men; not the star of auto- cratic oppression, for civilization is brightening and the liberties of the people are broadening under every flag that floats. But the star of empire, as Washington used the word when he called this Republic an "empire"; as Jefferson understood it when he declared our form of government ideal for extending " our empire " ; as Marshall understood it, when he closed a noble period of an immortal constitutional opinion by naming the domain of the Ameri- can people " our empire." This is the " empire " of which the prophetic voice declared " Westward the Star of Empire takes its Way" the star of the empire of liberty and law, of commerce and communication, of social order and the Gospel of our Lord the star of the empire of the civilization of the world. Westward that star of empire takes its course. And to-day it illumines our path of duty across the Pacific into the islands and lands where Provi- SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 157 dence has called us. In that path the American government is marching forward, opposed at every step by those who deny the right of the Republic to plant the institutions of the flag where events have planted that flag itself. Fellow-Americans, this is no partisan conflict. It is no unprecedented struggle. It is the ever old and yet the ever new, because the ever elemental contest between the forces of growing nationality and those who resist it ; between the forces of extending dominion and those who oppose it; betweea the forces that are making us the master people of the world and those who think that our activities should be confined to this continent forever. It is the eternal duel between the forces of progress and reaction, of construction and disintegration, of growth and of decay. The opponents of expansion are and always have been sincere. But their sincerity did not make them right. Their earnestness, ability, courage, could not give them victory. They were struggling against the Fates. They were resisting the onward forces which were making of the American people the master nation of the world the forces that established us first as a separate politic body, then welded us into a national unit, indivisible; then extended our dominion from ocean to ocean over unexplored wildernesses ; and now in the ripeness of time fling our authority and unfurl our flag almost all around the globe. It is the " divine event" of American sovereignty among the governments of men for which these forces have been working since the Pilgrims landed on the red man's soil. Men patriotic, brave, and wise have sought to stay that tremendous purpose of destiny, but their opposition was as the finger of a babe against the resistless pour of the Gulf Stream's mighty 158 PUBLIC SPEAKI*<;. current. For God's hand was in it all. His plans were working out their glorious results. And just as futile is resistance to the continuance to-day of the eternal move- ment of the American people toward the mastery of the world. This is a destiny neither vague nor undesirable. It is definite, splendid, and holy. When nations shall war no more without the consent of the American Republic what American heart thrills not with pride at that prospect? And yet our interests are weaving themselves so rapidly around the world that that time is almost here. When governments stay the slaughter of human beings, because the American Republic demands it what American heart thrills not with pride at that prospect? And yet to-night there sits in Constantinople a sovereign who knows that that time is nearly here. When the commerce of the world on which the world's peace hangs, travelling every ocean highway of earth, shall pass beneath the guns of the great Republic what American heart thrills not at that prospect? Yet that time will be here before the second administration of the last American President of the nineteenth century and the first president of the twentieth century. When any changing of the map of earth requires a conference of the powers, and when, at any congress of the nations, the American Republic will preside as the most powerful of powers and most righteous of judges what American heart thrills not at that prospect ? And yet, that prospect is at hand, even as I speak. It is the high and holy destiny of the American people, and from that destiny the American bugles will never sound retreat. "Westward the Star of Kin] >ire takes its Way," SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 159 AMERICA AND INTERNATIONAL PEACE. THEODORE ROOSEVELT. Extract from a speech at the Lincoln Club Dinner, in New York City, February IS, 1899. No sensible man will advocate our plunging rashly into a course of international knight-errantry ; none will advocate our setting deliberately to work to build up a great colonial empire. But neither will any brave and patriotic man bid us shrink from doing our duty merely because this duty involves the certainty of strenuous effort and the possi- bility of danger. Some men of high reputation, from high motives, opposed the ratification of the treaty with Spain, just as they had previously opposed the war. The error was almost as great in one case as in the other and will be so adjudged by history. But back of the high motives of these men lay the two great impulses of sloth and fear ; and well it was for us that the administration and the Senate disregarded them. We should not lightly court danger and difficulty, but neither should we shirk from facing them, when in some way or other they must be met. We are a great nation and we are compelled, whether we will or not, to face the respon- sibilities that must be faced by all great nations. It is not in our power to avoid meeting them. All that we can decide is whether we shall meet them well or ill. There are social reformers who tell us that in the far distant future the neces- sity for fighting will be done away with, just as there are social reformers who tell us that in that long distant time the necessity for work or, at least, for painful, laborious 160 PUBLIC SPEAKI.\r:. work will be done away with. But just at present th? nation, like the individual, which is going to do anything in the world must face the fact, that in order to do it, it must work and may have to fight. And it is only thus that great deeds can be done, and the highest and purest form of hap- piness acquired. Remember that peace itself, that peace after which all men crave, is merely the realization in the present of what has been bought by strenuous effort in the past. Peace represents stored-up effort of our fathers or of ourselves in the past. It is not a means it is an end. You do not get peace by peace ; you get peace as the result of effort. If you strive to get it by peace, you will lose it, that is all. If we ever grow to regard peace as a permanent condition ; if we ever grow to feel that we can afford to let the keen, fearless, virile qualities of heart and mind and body be lost, then we will prepare the way for inevitable and shameful disaster in the future. Peace is of true value only as we use it in part to make ready to face with untroubled heart, with fearless front, whatever the future may have in store for us. The peace which breeds timidity and sloth is a curse and not a bless- ing. The law of worthy national life, like the law of worthy individual life, is, after all, fundamentally, the law of strife. It may be strife military, it may be strife civic ; but certain it is that only through strife, through labor, and painful effort, by grim energy and by resolute courage, we move on to better things. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 161 A TALK ON BOOKSjf HENRY DRUMMOND. Adapted from an address delivered in New York City, with a quotation added from Richard Le Gallienne. To fall in love with a good book is to add a rich gift to life's experiences. It is to have a new influence pouring itself into our lives, a new teacher to inspire and refine us, a new friend to be by our side always, who, when life grows narrow and weary, will take us into his wider and calmer and higher world. Whether it be biography, introducing hs to some humble life made great by duty done ; or history, opening vistas into the movements and destinies of nations that have passed away ; or poetry, making music of all the common things around us, and filling the fields, and the skies, and the work of the city and the cottage, with eternal meaning whether it be these, or story-books, or religious books, or science, no one can become the friend of one good book without being made wiser and better. ^ would not presume to recommend such a book to you. The beauty of a friend is that we discover him. And we must each taste the books that are accessible to us for our- selves. Do not be disheartened at first if you like none of them. That is possibly their fault, not yours. But search and search till you find what you like. In amazingly cheap form almost all the best books are now to be had ; and I think every one owes it as a sacred duty to his mind to start a little library of his own. How much do we not do for our bodies ? How much thought and money do they not cost us ? And shall we not think a little, and pay a little, for 162 PUBLIC SPEAKING. the clothing and adorning of the imperishable mind ? This private library may begin, perhaps, with a single volume, and grow at the rate of one or two a year ; but these, well chosen and well mastered, will become such a fountain of strength and wisdom that each shall be glad to add to his store. A dozen books accumulated in this way may be better than a whole library. Do not be distressed if you do not like time-honored books, or classical works, or recommended books. Choose for yourself; plant yourself on your own instincts ; that which is natural for us, that which nourishes us and gives us appetite, is that which is right for us. We have all different minds, and we are all at different stages of growth. Some other day we may find food in the recom- mended book, though we should possibly starve on it to-day. The mind develops and changes, and the favorites of this year may one day cease to interest us. Nothing better, in- deed, can happen to u$ than to lose interest in a book we have often read ; for it means that it has done its work upon us, and brought us up to its level, and taught us all it had to teach. "Old Books to Read" "Old Friends to Trust" how can we estimate their value ? " Books ! those miraculous memories of high thoughts and golden moods ; those silver shells, tremulous with the won- derful secrets of ocean life ; those love-letters that pass from hand to hand of a thousand lovers that never, meet; those honeycombs of dreams ; those orchards of knowledge ; those still-beating hearts of the noble dead ; those mysterious sig- nals that beckon along the darksome pathways of the past; voices through which the myriad whisperings of the earth SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 163 find perfect speech; oracles through which its mysteries call like voices in moonlit woods ; prisms of beauty; urns stored with all the sweets of all the summers of time ; immortal nightingales that sing forever to the roses of life Books ! " THE MASTERPIECE OF GOD. ELBERT HUBBARI). Extract from an essay on Leonardo da Vinci in Volume X of ''Little Journeys," February, 1902. The human face is the masterpiece of God. A woman's smile may have in it more sublimity than a sunset ; more pathos than a battle-scarred landscape ; more warmth than the sun's bright rays ; more love than words can say. The human face is the masterpiece of God. The eyes reveal the soul, the mouth the flesh, the chin stands for purpose, the nose means will. But over and be- hind all is that fleeting Something we call "expression." This Something is not set or fixed; it is fluid as the ether, changeful as the clouds that move in mysterious majesty across the surface of a summer sky, subtle as the sob of rustling leaves, too faint at times for human ears, elusive as the ripples that play hide-and-seek over the bosom of a placid lake. And yet men have caught expression and held it captive. On the walls of the Louvre hangs the "Mona Lisa" of Leonardo da Vinci. This picture has been for four hundred years an exasperation and an inspiration to every portrait- painter who has put brush to palette. Well does Walter Pater call it "The Despair of Painters." The artist was 164 PUBLIC SPKAKI\<;. over fifty years of age when ho be<:an the work, and he was four years in completing the task. Completing, did I say? Leonardo's dying regret was that he had not completed this picture. And yet we might say of it, as Ruskiu said of Turner's work, "By no conceiv- able stretch of the imagination can we say where this picture can be bettered or improved upon." There is in the face all you can read into it and nothing more. It gives yon what you bring and nothing else. It is as silent as the lips of Memnon, as voiceless as the Sphinx. It suggests to you every joy that you have ever felt, every sorrow you have ever known, every triumph you have ever experienced. This woman is beautiful, just as all life is beautiful when we are in health. She has no quarrel with the world she loves and she is loved again. No vain longing fills her heart, no feverish unrest disturbs her dreams, for her no crouching fears haunt the passing hours that ineffable smile which plays around her mouth says plainly that life is good. And yet the circles about the eyes and the droop- ing lids hint of world-weariness and speak the message of Koheleth, and say, " Vanity of vanities, all is vanity." " La Gioconda " is infinitely wise, for she has lived. That supreme poise is only possible to one who knows. All the experiences and emotions of manifold existence have etched and moulded that form and face until the body has become the perfect instrument of the soul. Back of her stretches her life, a mysterious purple shadow. Do you not see the palaces turned to dust, the broken col- umns, the sunken treasures, the creeping mosses, and the rank ooze of fretted waters that have undermined cities and SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 16/5 turned kingdoms into desert seas? The galleys of pagan Greece have swung wide for her on the nnforgetting tide, for her soul dwelt in the body of Helen of Troy, and Pallas Athene has followed her ways and whispered to her even the secrets of the gods. Aye ! not only was she Helen, but she was Leda, the mother of Helen. Then she was St. Anne, mother of Mary ; and next she was Mary, visited by an angel in a dream, and followed by the wise men who had seen the Star in the East. The centuries, that are but thoughts, found her a Vestal Virgin in pagan Rome, when brutes were kings and lust stalked rampant through the streets. She was the bride of Christ and her fair frail body was flung to the wild beasts, and torn limb from limb while the multitude feasted on the sight. True to the central impulse of her soul the Dark Ages rightly called her Cecilia, and then St. Cecilia, mother of sacred music, and later she ministered to men as Melania, the Nun of Tagaste ; next as the daughter of William the Conqueror, the Sister of Charity who went through Italy, Spain, and France, and taught the women of the nunneries how to sew, to weave, to embroider, to illuminate books and make beauty, truth, and harmony manifest to human eyes. And so this Lady of the Beautiful Hands stood to Leonardo as the embodiment of a perpetual life ; moving in a con- stantly ascending scale, gathering wisdom, graciousness, love, even as he himself in this life met every experience half- way and counted it joy, knowing that experience is the germ of power. Life writes its history upon the face, so that all those who have had a like experience read and understand. The human face is the masterpiece of God. 166 PUBLIC SPEAKING. PUBLIC OPINION AND AGITATION. WENDELL PHILLIPS. An extract from his lecture on "Public Opinion." It is a singular fact that the freer a nation becomes, the more utterly democratic the form of its institutions, outside agitation the pressure of public opinion to direct political action becomes more and more necessary. In a country like ours, of absolute democratic equality, public opinion is not only omnipotent, it is omnipresent. There is no refuge from its tyranny ; there is no hiding from its reach ; and the result is that, if you take the old Greek lantern, and go about to seek among a hundred, you will find not one single American who really has not, or who does not fancy at least that he has, something to gain or lose in his ambition, his social life, or his business, from the good opinion and the votes of those about him. And the consequence is, that, instead of being a mass of individuals, each one fearlessly blurting out his own convictions, as a nation, compared with other nations, we are a mass of cowards. More than any other people, we are afraid of each other. If you were a caucus to-night, Democratic or Republican, and I were your orator, none of you could get beyond the necessary and timid limitations of party. You not only would not demand, you would not allow me to utter, one word of what you really thought and what I thought. You would demand of me and my value as a caucus speaker would depend entirely on the adroitness and the vigilance with which I met the demand that I should not utter one single word which would compromise the vote of next week. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 167 That is politics ; so with the press. Seemingly independent, and sometimes really so, the press can afford only to mount the cresting wave, not go beyond it. The editor might as well shoot his reader with a bullet as with a new idea. He must hit the exact line of the opinion of the day. This is the inevitable, the essential limitation of the press in a republican community. Our institutions, floating un- anchored on the shifting surface of popular opinion, cannot afford to hold back, or to draw forward, a hated question and compel a reluctant public to look at it and to consider it. Hence, as you see at once, the moment a large issue, twenty years ahead of its age, presents itself to the con- sideration of an empire or of a republic, just in proportion to the freedom of its institutions is the necessity of a plat- form outside of the press, of politics, and of its church whereon stand men with no candidate to elect, with no plan to carry, with no reputation to stake, with no object but the truth, no purpose but to tear the question open and let the light through it. So much in explanation of a word infinitely hated, agitation and agitators, but an element which the progress of modern government has developed more and more every day. Kepublics exist only on the tenure of being constantly agitated. The republic which sinks to sleep, trusting to constitutions and machinery, to politicians and statesmen, for the safety of its liberties, never will have any. We must live like our Puritan fathers, who always went to church and sat down to dinner, when the Indians were in the neigh- borhood, with their musket-lock on the one side and a drawn sword on the other. No, there is no Canaan in politics. As health lies in labor, and there is no royal road to it but 168 PUBLIC SPEAKING. through toil, so there is no republican road to safety but in constant distrust. u In distrust,'' said Demosthenes, an- the nerves of the mind." Let us see to it that these sentinel nerves are ever on the alert. If the Alps, piled in cold and still sublimity, be the emblem of Despotism, the ever rest- less ocean is ours, which, girt within the eternal laws of gravitation, is pure only because never still. THE TRIUMPH OF TRUTH. THOMAS CARLYI.K. Adapted from " Past and Present." In this God's world, with its wild, whirling eddies and mad, foam oceans, where men and nations perish as if-, without law, and judgment for an unjust thing is sternly delayed, dost thou think that there is therefore no justice ? It is what the fool hath said in his heart. It is what the wise, in all times, were wise because they denied and knew forever not to be. I tell thee again, there is nothing else but justice. One strong thing I find here below: the just thing, the true thing. My friend, if thou hadst all the artillery of Woohvjch trundling at thy back in support of an unjust thing, and infinite bonfires visibly waiting ahead of thee to blaze centu- ries long for the victory on behalf of it, I would advise thee to call halt, to fling down thy baton, and say, " In Heaven's name, no ! " Thy "success"? Poor devil, what will thy success amount to ? If the thing is unjust, thou hast not succeeded ; no, not though bonfires blazed from north to south, and bells SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 169 rang, and editors wrote leading articles, and the just things lay trampled out of sight, to all mortal eyes an abolished and annihilated thing. . . . For it is the right and noble alone that will have victory in this struggle ; the rest is wholly an obstruction, a post- ponement, a fearful iinperilrnent of the victory. Toward an eternal centre of right and nobleness, and of that only, is all confusion tending. We already know whither it is all tending ; what will have victory, what will have none ! The heaviest will reach the centre. The heaviest has its deflec- tions; its obstructions; nay, at times its reboundings, its resiliences, whereupon some blockhead shall be heard jubi- lating, " See, your heaviest ascends ! " but at all moments it is moving centreward, fast as is convenient for it ; sinking, sinking ; and, by laws older than the world, old as the Maker's first plan of the world, it has to arrive there. Await the issue. In all battles, if you await the issue, each fighter has prospered according to his right. His right and his might, at the close of the account, were one and the same. He has fought with all his might, and in exact pro- portion to all his right he has prevailed. His very death is no victory over him. He dies indeed ; but his work lives, very truly lives. Fight on, thou brave, true heart ; and falter not, through dark fortune and through bright. The cause thou fightest for, so far as it is true, no further, yet precisely so far, is very sure of victory. The falsehood alone of it will be con- quered, will be abolished, as it ought to be ; but the truth of it is part of Nature's own laws, cooperates with the world's eternal tendencies, and cannot be conquered. 170 PUBLIC SPEAKING. CHARACTER ESSENTIAL FOR A GREAT LAWYER. WENDELL PHILLIPS. Selected from his lecture on " Idols." It is a grave thing when a state puts a man among her jewels, the glitter of whose fame makes doubtful acts look heroic. The honors we grant mark how high we stand and they educate the future. The men we honor and the max- ims we lay down in measuring our favorites show the level and morals of the time. A name has been in every one's mouth of late, and men have exhausted language in trying to express their admiration and respect. The courts have covered the grave of Mr. Choate with eulogy. Let us see what is their idea of a great lawyer. We are told that " he worked hard," "he never neglected his client," "he flung over the discussions of the forum the grace of a rare scholarship." " No pressure or emergency ever stirred him to an unkind word." A ripe scholar, a profound lawyer, a faithful servant to his client, a gentleman. This is a good record, surely. May he sleep in peace. \Yliut he earned God grant he may have. But the bar that seeks to claim for such a one a place among great jurists must itself be weak indeed. Not one high moral trait specified ; not one patriotic act mentioned; not one patriotic service even claimed. Look at Mr. Webster's idea of what a lawyer should be in order to be called great, in the sketch he drew of Jeremiah Mason, and notice what stress he lays upon the religious and moral elevation and the glorious and high purposes which crown his life. Nothing of this now; nothing but incessant eulogy. But not a word of one SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 171 effort to lift the yoke of cruel or unequal legislation from the neck of its victim ; not one attempt to make the code 01 his country wiser, purer, better ; not one effort to bless his times or breathe a higher moral purpose into the com- munity. Not one blow struck for right or for liberty, while the battle of the' giants was going on about him ; not one patriotic act to stir the hearts of his idolaters ; not one pub- lic act of any kind whatever about whose merit friend or foe could even quarrel, unless when he scouted our great charter as a glittering generality, or jeered at the philan- thropy which tried to practise the Sermon on the Mount. When Cordus, the Roman senator, whom Tiberius mur- dered, was addressing his fellows, he began, "Fathers, they accuse me of illegal words ; plain proof that there are no illegal deeds with which to charge me." So with these eulogies. Words, nothing but words ; plain proof that there were no deeds to praise. Yet this is the model which Mas- sachusetts offers to the Pantheon of the great jurists of the world ! Suppose we stood in that lofty temple of jurisprudence, on either side of us the statues of the great lawyers of every state and clime, and let us see what part New Eng- land Puritan, educated, free New England would bear in the pageant. Rome points to a colossal figure and says, " That is Papin- 'ian, who, when the Emperor Caracella murdered his own brother, and ordered the lawyer to defend the deed, went cheerfully to death, rather than sully his lips with the atrocious plea; and that is Ulpian, who, aiding his prince to put the army below the law, was massacred at the foot of a weak but virtuous throne." 172 PUBLK SPEAKING. And France stretches forth JUT grateful hands, "That is D'Aguesseau, worthy, when he went to face an enraged king, of the farewell his wife addressed him. ;.. forget that you have a wife and children to ruin, and remember only that you have France to save/ " England says : " That is Coke, who flung the laurels of eighty years in the face of the first Stuart, in defence of the people. This is Selden, on every book of whose library you saw written the motto of which he lived worthy, 'IMoiv everything, liberty!' That is Mansfield, silver tongued, who proclaimed, ' Slaves cannot breathe in England ; if their lungs receive our air, that moment they are free.' " Then New England shouts, " This is Choate, who made it safe to murder, and of whose health thieves asked before they began to steal ! " JURY ADDRESS. DANIKI. NVF.ll-iTKR. An fjrtrnrtfmm At' speech in the \Vhit* Murder Trial. Gentlemen, this is a most extraordinary case. In some respects it has hardly a precedent anywhere, certainly none in our New England history. This bloody drama exhibited no suddenly excited, ungovernable rage. It was a cool, cal- culating, money-making murder. It was the weighing of money against life ; the counting out of so many pieces of silver against so many ounces of blood. An aged man, without an enemy in the world, in his own house and in his own bed, is made the victim of a butcherly murder for mere pay. Truly, here is a new SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 173 lesson for painters and poets. Whoever shall here- after draw the portrait of murder, let him not give it the grim visage of Moloch, the brow knitted by revenge, the face black with settled hate, and the bloodshot eye emitting livid fires of malice. Let him draw rather a decorous, smooth-faced, bloodless demon ; a picture in repose rather than in action ; not so much an example of human nature in its depravity and in its paroxyms of crime, as an infernal being, a fiend, in the ordinary display and development of his character. The circumstances now clearly in evidence spread out the whole scene before us. Deep sleep had fallen on the destined victim and on all beneath his roof. A healthful old man to whom sleep was sweet, the first sound slumbers of the night held him. in their soft but strong embrace. The assassin enters, through the window already prepared, into an unoccupied apartment. With noiseless foot he paces the lonely hall half lighted by the moon. He winds up the ascent of the stairs and reaches the door of the chamber. He enters and beholds his victim before him. The face of the innocent sleeper is turned from the murderer, and the beams of the moon, resting on the gray locks of the aged temples, show him where to strike. The fatal blow is given. With- out a struggle or a motion the victim passes from the repose of sleep to the repose of death. The murderer retreats, retraces his steps to the window, passes out through it as he came in, and escapes. He has done the deed. No eye has seen him, no ear has heard him, the secret is his own and it is safe. Ah ! Gentlemen, that was a dreadful mistake. Such a secret can be safe nowhere. The whole creation of God has 174 PUBLIC 8PEAKI.\'.. neither nook nor corner where the guilty can bestow it and say it is safe. A thousand eyes turn at once to explore every man, every thing, every circumstance, connected with the time and place ; a thousand ears catch every whisper ; a thousand excited minds intensely dwell on the scene, shed- ding all their light, and ready to kindle the slightest circum- stance into a blaze of discovery. Meantime the guilty soul cannot keep its own secret. It is false to itself; or, rather, it feels an irresistible impulse of conscience to be true to itself. It labors under its guilty possession and knows not what to do with it. The human heart was not made for the residence of such an inhabitant. The secret which the murderer possesses soon comes to possess him, and, like the evil spirits of which we read, it overcomes him and leads him whithersoever it will. He feels it beating at his heart, rising to his throat, and demanding disclosure. He thinks the whole world sees it in his face, reads it in his eyes, and almost hears its workings in the very silence of his thoughts. It has become his master. It betrays his discretion, it breaks down his courage, it conquers his prudence. When suspicions from without begin to embarrass him, and the net of circumstance to entangle him, the fatal secret struggles with still greater violence to burst forth. It must be con- fessed, it will be confessed ; there is no refuge from confes- sion but suicide, and suicide is confession. GeiitlfuuMi. your whole concern in this case should be to do your duty, and let consequences take care of themselves. You will receive the law from the court. Your verdict, it is true, may endanger the prisoner's life, but then it is to save other lives. If the prisoner's guilt has been shown and proved beyond all reasonable doubt, you will convict SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 175 him. If such reasonable doubt of guilt still remains, you will acquit him. You are the judges of the whole case You owe a duty to the public as well as to the prisoner at the bar. You cannot presume to be wiser than the law. Your duty is a plain, straightforward one. Doubtless we would all judge him in mercy. Toward him as an individual the law inculcates no hostility ; but toward him, if proven to be a murderer, the law, and the oaths you have taken, and public justice, demand that you do your duty. With consciences satisfied with the discharge of duty, no consequences can harm you. There is no evil that we cannot either face or fly from but the consciousness of duty disre- garded. A sense of duty pursues us ever. It is omnipres- ent like the Deity. If we take to ourselves the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, duty performed, or duty violated, is still with us, for our happiness or our misery. If we say the darkness shall cover us, in the darkness as in the light our obligations are yet with us. We cannot escape their power nor fly from their presence. They are with us in this life, will be with us at its close ; and in that scene of inconceivable solemnity, which lies yet farther onward, we shall still find ourselves surrounded by the consciousness of duty, to pain us wher- ever it has been violated, and to console us so far as God may have given us grace to perform it. 176 PUBLIC SPEAKING. THE GREAT CHARTER. U. M. ROSE. Extract from a paper on " The Rise of Constitutional Law," read before the Pennsylvania State Bar Association, June 25, 1901. No one can sura up the debt that we owe to the Ma^na < 'harta, the one great product of the Middle Ages. We look back with feelings of aversion and pity to that dark and troubled period; to its insane crusades, to its fanatical intolerance, to its pedantic and barren literature, to its scholastic disputes, to its cruelty, rapine, and bloodshed. But the genius that presides over human destiny never sleeps ; and it was precisely in that most sterile and unprom- ising age that the groundwork was laid for all that is valu- able in modern civilization. As an unborn forest sleeps unconsciously in an acorn cup, all the creations and all the potentialities of that civilization lay enfolded in the guar- anty of personal liberty and of the supremacy of the la\v that was secured at Runnymede. The various bills and peti- tions of right, and the Habeas Corpus Act, while they have given new sanctions to liberty, are but echoes of the Great Charter; and our Declaration of Independence is but the Magna Charta writ large, and expanded to meet the wants of a new generation of freemen, fighting the battle of life beneath other skies. Worth all the classics ! " Yes, the classics that have survived and the classics that have perished. Dear as might be to us the lost books of Livy, whose pictured page is torn just where its highest interest begins, or even some song of Homer, which, now lost in space, shall charm the SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 177 ear and bewitch the human heart no more, we could not exchange for them a single word of those uncouth but grand old sentences, which, having taken the wings of the morn- ing, have incorporated themselves with almost every system of laws in Christendom, and which still ring out in our American constitutions with a sound like that of the tram- pling of armed men, marching confidently up to battle ; words which for ages have stayed the hand of tyranny, and which have extended their protection over the infant sleeping in its cradle, over the lonely, the desolate, the sorrowful, and the oppressed. Uttered by unwilling lips, and believed by the wretch from whom it was extorted that it had scarcely an hour to live, the Magna Charta marks an epoch in the annals of mankind. It began a revolution that has never gone backward for a single moment ; and was the precursor of that civilization the dawn of which our eyes have looked upon with joy and pride, and whose full meridian splendor can be foreseen by God alone. TRAINING FOR THE LEGAL PROFESSION. EDWARD J. PHELP8. Extract from an address to the graduating class of the Boston University School of Law, June 5, 1879. The success of the lawyer in the long run, and the best run, and the only run that is worth regarding, is exactly commensurate with his absolute, unflexible, unqualified de- votion to the truth. The world has amused itself, and I suppose will continue to amuse itself, with a good deal of cheap wit on this subject. Many people think the lawyer 178 PUBLIC SPEAKING. has nothing to do with the truth ; that his business is to pervert it, to distort it, to evade it, to crown it with the thorns of all manner of technicalities, and to crucify it between two thieves. Well, that is very amusing, doubt- less; but it is a serious mistake. For your success, I repeat, will be in proportion to the extent to which you become, not only the students, but the champions, the advocates, the living examples, in all respects and particulars, of the truth. Another great requisite of the lawyer is that rare quality that may be called intellectual honesty. It is a mental and not a moral quality. Of course, it is one which involves high moral integrity. Hut those who are honest in inten- tions and purposes, merely, may fall far short of it. By " intellectual honesty " I mean the faculty of seeing things just as they are, unmoved by prejudice, or passion, or ex- citement, or clamor, seeing them, and reaching conclusions in regard to them, in a straightforward and direct way. That is the leading characteristic of every great lawyer or great judge that has ever lived, and the want of it is the reason the world has seen so many good lawyers and good judges and so few great ones. It is the rarest of qualities in its perfection, and the first to be recognized by mankind when it exists. Perhaps the most illustrious example there has ever been, among many illustrious examples of that quality, was Chief Justice Marshall that magistrate of all magistrates whose splendid judgments have entered, not only into the jurisprudence, but into the history and literature of our country. When the construction of the American Constitution was a thing of doubt ; when the Con- stitution itself its success, its practicability was ques- tioned; when men's minds were wrought up to the highest SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 179 pitch of political and personal excitement, those great judg- ments of Marshall and his compeers ended all dispute. No man went away cursing the court and resolved to renew the quarrel. The defeated side went away admitting that they had been mistaken. That illustrates the idea that I ad- vanced just now : that this quality, when it exists in a high degree, is universally recognized by mankind and commands immediate confidence. Finally, no lawyer can attain the highest rank in his pro- fession unless he is an effective speaker. Ideas, if they are to be expressed, and enforced, and maintained, require the means of expression. Advocacy, in its lawyer-like sense, in the sense that courts of justice and competent lawyers appreciate, means the power of clear and lucid statement, cogent, effective, effectual reasoning, pertinent illustration, felicitous presentation. What it does not mean, but what a great many people seem to think it does mean, is the everlasting talk of the men who have nothing to say. Certainly, the first requisite of the successful speaker is to have something to say. Until a man is furnished with ideas, there is no precedent justifying the opening of his mouth. If there is any nuisance more insufferable than all other insufferable nuisances, it is that advocate the terror of unhappy courts of justice who is popularly said to have the " gift of gab," that is, the faculty of talking when he has nothing to say. It is a faculty which, unlike the quality of unstrained mercy, curses " him that gives as well as him that receives." Still, it remains true, after all has been said, that the advocate who is going to be heard " when anvils ring and hammers beat," who is to be the champion of a great cause on a great occasion, must be furnished with 180 n r.Lic SPEAK r\(;. something besides legal knowledge. He wants language. Language is to the speaker what color is t<> the painter the vehicle. He wants the capacity of reasoning, of stating, of illustrating, of carrying the minds of his hearers with him. Now, that power may come by nature to some men, as Judge Dogberry thought reading and writing did ; but I never met such an instance. When you find a man possessing that gift, a man who is always going to be attended to when he speaks, and who is likely to be successful, on the right side at least, when he addresses an intelligent tribunal, you will find that he has somewhere and somehow filled and stored his mind with the culture of fine letters and literature. Rea- son, logic, and learning hew the way, but advocacy illumi- nates. It is a calcium light that points the way that reason hews out through the rocks, so that the wayfaring man may see it. GETTYSBURG ADDRESS. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. Delivered upon the occasion of the dedication of Gettysburg Cemetery. Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion of it as the final resting-place of those who have given their lives that that nation might live. SELECTIONS FQR PRACTICE. 181 It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot conse- crate, we cannot hallow, this ground. The brave men, liv- ing and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or to detract. The world will very little note, nor long remember, what we say here ; but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here, to the unfinished work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task re- maining before us; that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain ; that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. HENRY WATTER8ON. Extract from his oration on Lincoln, first delivered at the Auditorium, Chicago, February 12, 1895. From Ciesar to Bismarck and Gladstone the world has had its statesmen and its soldiers men who rose to emi- nence step by step, through a series of geometric progression, as it were, each advancement following in regular order one after the other, the whole obedient to well-established and well-understood laws of cause and effect. They were not vvhat we call " men of destiny." They were " men of the 182 1TKL1C SPEM<1\',. time/' They were men whose careers had a beginning, a middle, and an end, rounding off lives with histories, full, it may be, of interesting and exciting event, but compre- hensive and comprehensible, simple, clear, complete. The inspired ones are fewer. Whence their emanation, where and how they got their power, by what rule they lived, moved, and had their being, we know not. There is no explication to their lives. They rose from shadow, and they went in mist. We see them, feel them, but we know them not. They came, God's word upon their lips; they did their office, God's mantle about them ; and they van- ished, God's holy light between the world and them, leaving behind a memory, half mortal and half myth. From first to last they were the creations of some special Providence, baffling the wit of man to fathom, defeating the machina- tions of the world, the flesh, and the devil, until their work was done, then passing from the scene as mysteriously as they had come upon it. Tried by this standard, where shall we find an example so impressive as Abraham Lincoln, whose career might be chanted by a Greek chorus as at once the prelude and the epilogue of the most imperial theme of modern tim< Born as lowly as the Son of God, in a hovel; reared in penury, squalor, with no gleam of lighter fair surrounding; without graces, actual or acquired ; without name or fame or official training ; it was reserved for this strange being, late in life, to be snatched from obscurity, raised to supreme command at a supreme moment, and intrusted with the destiny of a nation. The great leaders of his party, the most experienced and accomplished public men of the day, were made to stand SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 183 aside ; were sent to the rear, whilst this fantastic figure was led by unseen hands to the front and given the reins of power. It is immaterial whether we were for him or against him, wholly immaterial. That, during four years, carrying with them such a weight of responsibility as the world never witnessed before, he filled the vast space allotted him in the eyes and actions of mankind, is to say that he was inspired of God, for. nowhere else could he have acquired the wisdom and the virtue. Where did Shakspeare get his genius ? Where did Mozart get his music ? Whose hand smote the lyre of the Scottish ploughman, and stayed the life of the German priest? God, and God alone ; and as surely as these were raised up by God, inspired by God, was Abraham Lincoln; and a thousand years hence, no drama, no tragedy, no epic poem will be filled with greater wonder, or be followed by man- kind with deeper feeling, than that which tells the story of his life and death. ROBERT E. LEE. JOHN W. DANIEL. Extract from an oration delivered at the unveiling of the recumbent figure of General Lee, at Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Virginia, June 28, 1883. In personal appearance General Lee was a man whom once to see was ever to remember. His figure was tall, erect, well proportioned, lithe, and graceful. A fine head, with broad, uplifted brows, and features boldly yet deli- cately chiselled, bore the aspect of one born to con < and. 184 PTJILIC SPEAKING. His whole countenance bespoke alike a powerful niind and an indomitable will, yet beamed with charity, benevolence, and gentleness. In his manners quiet reserve, unaffected courtesy, and native dignity made manifest the character of one who can only be described by the name of gentleman. Mounted in the field and at the head of his troops, a glimpse of Lee was an inspiration. His figure was as dis- tinctive as that of Napoleon. The black slouoh hat, the cavalry boots, the dark cape, the plain gray coat without an ornament but the three stars on the collar, the calm, victo- rious face, the splendid, manly figure on the gray war-horse, he looked every inch the true knight the grand, invin- cible champion of a great principle. The men who wrested victory from his little band stood wonder-stricken and abashed when they saw how few were those who dared oppose them, and generous admiration burst into spontaneous tribute to the splendid leader who bore defeat with the quiet resignation of a hero. The men who fought under him never revered or loved him more than on the day he sheathed his sword. Had he but said the word, they would have died for honor. It was because he said the word that they resolved to live for duty. Plato congratulated himself, first, that he was born a man ; second, that he had the happiness of being a Greek ; and third, that he was a contemporary of Sophocles. And in this audience to-day, and here and there the wide world over, is many an one who wore the gray, who rejoices that he was born a man to do a man's part for his suffering country ; that he had the glory of being a Confederate ; and who feels a justly proud and glowing consciousness in his when he says unto himself, "I was a follower of SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 185 Robert E. Lee. I was a soldier in the army of Northern Virginia." As president of Washington and Lee University, General Lee exhibited qualities not less worthy and heroic than those displayed on the broad and open theatre of conflict when the eyes of nations watched his every action. In the quiet walks of academic life, far removed from "war or battle's sound," came into view the towering grandeur, the massive splendor, and the loving kindness of his character. There he revealed in manifold gracious hospitalities, tender charities, and patient, worthy counsels, how deep and pure and inexhaustible were the fountains of his virtues. And loving hearts delight to recall, as loving lips will ever de- light to tell, the thousand little things he did which sent forth lines of light to irradiate the gloom of the conquered land and to lift up the hopes and cheer the works of his people. Come we then to-day in loyal love to sanctify our memo- ries, to purify our hopes, to make strong all good intent by communion with the spirit of him who, being dead, yet speaketh. Let us crown his tomb with the oak, the emblem of his strength, and with the laurel, the emblem of his glory. And as we seem to gaze once more on him we loved and hailed as Chief, the tranquil face is clothed with heaven's light, and the mute lips seem eloquent with the message that in life he spoke, "There is a true glory and a true honor ; the glory of duty done, the honor of the integrity of principle." 186 PUBLIC SPEAKING, STONEWALL JACKSON. MOSES D. HOOK. The day after the first battle of Manassas, and before the history of that victory had reached Lexington in authentic form, a crowd had gathered around the post-office, awaiting with intensest interest the opening of the mail. In its distribution the first letter was handed to the Rev. Dr. White. Recognizing at a glance the well-kno\vn super- scription, the doctor exclaimed to those around him, "Now we shall know all the facts." The letter was from General Jackson; but instead of a war bulletin, it was a simple note, inclosing a check for a colored Sunday-school, with an apology for his delay in not sending it before. Not a word about the conflict which had electrified a nation ! Not an allusion to the splendid part he had taken in it; not a reference to himself, beyond the fact that it had been to him a fatiguing day's service ! And yet that was the day ever memorable in his history, when he received the name of " Stonewall " Jackson. When his brigade of twenty-six hundred men had for hours withstood the iron tempest which broke upon it; when the Confederate right had been overwhelmed in the rush of resistless numbers, General Bee rode up to Jackson, and. with despairing bitterness, exclaimed, "General, they are beating us back ! " " Then," said Jackson, calm and curt, "we will give them the bayonet." Bee seemed to catch the inspiration of his determined will ; and galloping back to the broken fragments of his overtaxed command, exclaimed, "There is Jackson, standing like a stone wall. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 1ST Rally behind him, Virginians ! " From that time Jackson's was known as the Stonewall Brigade a name henceforth immortal, for the christening was baptized in the blood of its author; and that wall of brave - hearts was, on every battle-field, a steadfast bulwark of their country. In the state where all that is mortal of this great hero sleeps, there is a natural bridge of rock, whose massive arch, fashioned in grandeur by the hand of God, springs lightly toward the sky, spanning a chasm into whose awful depths the beholder looks down bewildered and awe-struck. But its grandeur is not diminished because tender vines clamber over its gigantic piers and sweet-scented flowers nestle in its crevices. Nor is the granite strength of Jackson's character weakened because in every throb of his heart there was a pulsation ineffably and exquisitely tender. The hum of bees, the fragrance of clover fields, the tender streaks of dawn, the dewy brightness of early spring, the mellow glories of matured autumn, all by turns charmed and tranquillized him. The eye that flashed amid the smoke of battle grew soft in contemplating the beauty of a flower. The ear that thrilled with the thunder of the cannonade drank in with innocent delight the song of birds and the prattle of children's voices. The voice whose sharp and ringing tones had so often uttered the command, " Give them the bayonet," called even from foreign tongues terms of endearment for those he loved ; and the man who filled two hemispheres with his fame was never so happy as when he was telling the colored children of his Sabbath-school the story of the Cross. Standing before this statue, as in the living presence of the man it represents; cordially indorsing, as we do, the 188 PrBLK' SPEAKING. principles of the political school in which he was trained, and in defence of which he died, and unable yet to think of our dead Confederacy without memories unutterably tender, I speak not for myself, but for the South, when I say it is our interest, our duty, and determination to maintain the Union, and to make every possible contribution to its pros- perity and glory, if all the states which compose it will unite in making it such a Union as our fathers framed, and enthroning above it the Constitution in its old supremacy. If ever these states are welded together in one great, frater- nal, and enduring Union, with one heart pulsating through the entire frame, as the tides throb through the bosom of the sea, it will be when they all stand on the same level, with such a jealous regard for one another's rights, that when the interests or honor of one are assailed, all the rest, feeling the wound, will kindle with just resentment at the outrage. But if that cannot be, then I trust the day will lit \ T dawn when the Southern people will add degradation to defeat, and hypocrisy to subjugation, by professing a love for the Union which denies to one of their states a single right accorded to Massachusetts or New York. To such a Union we will never be heartily loyal while that bronze hand grasps the sword, while yonder river chants the requiem of the sixteen thousand Confederate dead who sleep on the hills of THE SOLDIER'S LAST SALUTE. HORACE PORTER. On the morning of Decoration Day, 1885, the Grand Army of the Republic, the veterans in the vicinity of New York ^ELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 189 City who had served under General Grant, rose earlier than was their wont, spent more time than usual in unfurling their old battle-flags, and in burnishing the medals of honor which decorated their breasts ; for they had resolved on that day to march by the house of their dying commander, and give him one last marching salute. Outside that house the street was filled with marching men and martial music. Inside that house the old chief lay on a bed of anguish, the pallor of death already begin- ning to overspread his illustrious features. / The hand which had seized the surrendered swords of countless thousands was scarcely able to return the pressure of a friendly grasp y the voice which had cheered on to triumphant victory the legions of American manhood was no longer able to call for the cooling draught which slaked the thirst of a fevered tongue/ And prostrate upon that bed of suffering lay the form which in the new world had ridden at the head of con- quering columns; in the old world had_-marched through the palaces of crowned heads with the descendants of a line of kings rising and standing uncovered in his presence. His ear caught the sound of the movement of marching men. The bands were playing the grand strains which had mingled with the echo of his guns at Vicksburg, playing the same quicksteps to which his men had sped in hot haste in pursuit of Lee through Virginia ; and then came the steady, measured, swinging step of war-trained men, which seemed to shake the earth./ He understood it all then. It was the tread of his old veterans. He seized his crutch and dragged himself painfully and slowly to the window. As he saw those old battle-nags dipping to him in salute, he once more drew himself into the position of a soldier; and as he gazed 190 PUBLIC SPEAKI\<:. upon those banners, bullet-ridden and battle-stained, many of them but a remnant of their former selves, there kindled in his eyes the flames which had lighted them at Chatta-^ uooga^in the Wilderuess/aniidst the glories of Appomattoxj and as those veterans bared their heads to that May morn- ing's breeze, and looked for the last time with upturned eyes on their old chief, cheeks which had been bronzed by south- ern suns and begrimed with powder were now bathed in tears of manly grief. And thenlthey saw the rising hand which had so often pointed out to them the path of victory. He raised it slowly and- feebly to his head in acknowledgment of their salutations. The last of the column passed. The hand fell heavily by his side. It was the soldier's last salute. THE DEATH OF GARFIELD. .JAMES O. BLAINK. Extract from a speech delivered in Congress, February S6, 1889. On the morning of Saturday, July 2, 1881, President Garfield was a contented and happy man not in an ordi- nary degree, but joyfully, almost boyishly happy. And surely, if happiness can ever come from the honors or tri- umphs of this world, on that quiet July morning Garfield may well have been a happy man. No foreboding of evil haunted him; no premonition of danger clouded his sky. One moment he stood erect, strong, confident in the years stretching peacefully out before him ; the next he lay wounded, bleeding, helpless, doomed to weary weeks of tor- ture, to silence, and the grave. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 191 Great in life, he was surpassingly great in death. For no cause, in the very frenzy of wantonness and wickedness, by the red hand of murder, he was thrust from the full tide oi this world's interests, from its hopes, its aspirations, its victories, into the visible presence of death and he did not quail. Not alone for 'the one short moment in which, stunned and dazed, he could give up life, hardly aware of its relinquishment, but through days of deadly languor, through weeks of agony that was not less agony because silently borne, with clear sight and calm courage, he looked into his open grave. As the end drew near, his early craving for the sea re- turned. The stately mansion of power had become to him the wearisome hospital of pain, and he begged to be taken from its prison walls, from its oppressive, stifling air, from its homelessness and its hopelessness. Gently, silently, the love of a great people bore the pale sufferer to the longed- for healing of the sea, to live or to die, as God should will, within sight of its heaving billows, within sound of its manifold voices. With wan, fevered face tenderly lifted to the cooling breeze, he looked out wistfully upon the ocean's changing wonders : on its far sails, whitening in the morn- ing light ; on its restless waves, rolling shoreward to break and die beneath the noonday sun; 011 the red clouds of evening, arching low to the horizon ; on the serene and shining pathway of the stars. Let us think that his dying eyes read a mystic meaning which only the rapt and parting soul may know. Let us believe that in the silence of the receding world he heard the great waves breaking on a farther shore, and felt already upon his wasted brow the breath of the eternal morning. 192 PUBLIC SPEAKL\r;. WILLIAM McKIXLEY. JOHN HAY. Eftrartfroma eulogy delivered at the official exercises commemorative of President McKinley. For the third time the Congress of the United States are assembled to commemorate the life and death of a Presi- dent slain by the hand of an assassin. The attention of the future historian will be attracted to the features which reappear with startling sameness in all three of these awful crimes: the uselessness, the utter lack of consequence of the act; the obscurity, the insignificance of the criminal; the blamelessness so far as in our sphere of existence the best of men may be held blameless of the victim. Not one of our murdered presidents had an enemy in the world; they were all of such preeminent purity of life that no pre- text could be given for the attack of passional crime ; they were all men of democratic instincts who could never have offended the most jealous advocates of equality ; they were of kindly and generous nature, to whom wrong or injustice was impossible ; of moderate fortune, whose slender means nobody could envy. They were men of austere virtue, of tender heart, of eminent abilities, which they had devoted with single minds to the good of the Republic. If ever men walked before God and man without blame, it was these three rulers of our people. The only temptation to attack their lives offered was their gentle radiance to eyes hating the light, that was offence enough. In a mood of high hope, of generous expectation, President McKinley went to Buffalo, and there, on the threshold of SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 193 eternity, he delivered that memorable speech, worthy for its loftiness of tone, its blameless morality, its breadth of view, to be regarded as his testament to the nation. Through all his pride of country and his joy of its success runs the note of solemn warning, as in Kipling's noble hymn, "Lest we for- get." Nothing I might say could give such a picture of the President's mind and character. His years of apprentice- ship had been served. He stood that day past master of the art of statesmanship. He had nothing more to ask of the people. He owed them nothing but truth and faithful ser- vice. His mind and heart were purged of the temptations which beset all men engaged in the struggle to survive. In view of the revelation of his nature vouchsafed to us that day, and the fate which impended over him, we can only say in deep affection and solemn awe, " Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Even for that vision he was not unworthy. He had not long to wait. The next day sped the bolt of doom, and for a week after in an agony of dread broken by illusive glimpses of hope that our prayers might be answered the nation waited for the end. Nothing in the glorious life that we saw gradually waning was more admi- rable and exemplary than its close. The gentle humanity of his words when he saw his assailant in danger of surnmary vengeance, " Don't let them hurt him " ; his chivalrous care that the news should be broken gently to his wife ; the fine courtesy with which he apologized for the damage which his death would bring to the great exhibition; and the heroic resignation of his final words, "It is God's way; His will, not ours, be done," were all the instinctive ex- pressions of a nature so lofty and so pure that pride in its 194 PUBLIC SPEAKI\<, nobility at once softened and enhanced the nation's sense of loss. The obvious elements which enter into the fame of a pub- lic man are few and by no means recondite. The man who fills a great station in a period of change, who leads his country successfully through a time of crisis ; who, by his power of persuading and controlling others, has been able to command the best thought of his age, so as to leave his country in a moral or material condition in advance of where he found it such a man's position in history is secure. If, in addition to this, his written or spoken words possess the subtle quality which carry them far and lodge them in men's hearts; and, more than all, if his utterances and actions, while informed with a lofty morality, are yet tinged with the glow of human sympathy, the fame of such a man will shine like a beacon through the mists of ages an object of reverence, of imitation, and of love. It should be to us an occasion of solemn pride that in the three great crises of our history such a man was not denied us. The moral value to a nation of a renown such as Wash- ington's and Lincoln's and McKinley's is beyond all compu- tation. No loftier ideal can be held up to the emulation of ingenuous youth. With such examples we cannot be wholly ignoble. Grateful as we may be for what they did, let us l>e still more grateful for what they were. While our daily being, our public policies, still feel the influence of their work, let us pray that in our spirits their lives may be volu- ble, calling us upward and onward. There is not one of us but feels prouder of his native land because the august figure of Washington presided over its beginnings; no one but vows it a tenderer love because SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 195 Lincoln poured out his blood for it ; no one but must feel his devotion for his country renewed and kindled when he remembers how McKiuley loved, revered, and served it, showed in his life how a citizen should live, and in his last hour taught us how a gentleman could die. THE NEW SOUTH. HENRY W. GRADY. Extract from the speech that first brought him national fame as an orator. Delivered at a dinner of the New England Society, New York City, December 26, 1886. " There was a South of slavery and secession that South is dead. There is a South of union and freedom that South, thank God, is living, breaching, growing every hour." These words, delivered from the immortal lips of Benjamin H. Hill, at Tammany Hall, in 1866, true then, and truer now, I shall make my text to-night. Dr. Talmage has drawn for you, with a master hand, the picture of your returning armies. He has told you how, in the pomp and circumstance of war, they came back to you, marching with proud and victorious tread, reading their glory in a nation's eyes ! Will you bear with me while I tell you of another army that sought its home at the close of the late war? An army that marched home in defeat and not in victory in pathos and not in splendor, but in glory that equalled yours, and to hearts as loving as ever welcomed heroes home. Let me picture to you the foot- sore Confederate soldier, as, buttoning up in his faded gray jacket the parole which was to bear testimony to his children 196 PUBLIC HPEAKIM;. of his fidelity and faith, he turned his face southward from Appomattox in April, 1865 ! Think of him as ragged, half- starved, heavy-hearted, enfeebled by want and wounds; having fought to exhaustion, he surrenders his gun, wrings the hand of his comrade in silence, and, lifting his tear- stained and pallid face for the last time to the graves that dot the old Virginia hills, pulls his gray cap over his brow, and begins the slow and painful journey. What does he find? let me ask you who went to your homes eager to find, in the welcome you had justly earned, full payment for four years' sacrifice what does he find when, having fol- lowed the battle-stained cross against overwhelming odds, dreading death not half so much as surrender, he reaches the home he left so prosperous and beautiful ? He finds his house in ruins, his farm devastated, his slaves free, his stock killed, his barn empty, his trade destroyed, his money worth- less; his social system, feudal in its magnificence, swept away; his people without law or legal status; his comrades slain, and the burdens of others heavy on his shoulders. Crushed by defeat, his very traditions gone ; without money, credit, employment, material training; and besides all this, confronted with the gravest problem that ever met human intelligence the establishing of a status for the vast body of his liberated slaves. What does he do this hero in gray with a heart of gold ? Does he sit down in sullenness and despair? Not for a day. Surely God, who had stripped him of his prosperity, inspired him in his adversity. As ruin was never before so overwhelming, never was restoration swifter. The soldier stepped from the trenches into the furrow ; horses that had charged Federal guns marched before the plough ; and fields SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 197 that ran red with human blood in April were green with harvest in June. But what is the sura of our work ? We have found that in the general summary the free negro counts for more than he did as a slave. We have planted the schoolhouse on the hilltop and made it free to white and black. We have sowed towns and cities in the place of theories and put business above politics. The new South is enamoured of her new work. Her soul is stirred with the breath of a new life. The light of a grander day is falling fair on her face. She is thrilling with the consciousness of a growing power and prosperity. As she stands upright, full statured, and equal among the people of the earth, breathing the keen air and looking out upon the expanding horizon, she understands that her emancipa- tion came because, in the inscrutable wisdom of God, her honest purpose was crossed and her brave armies beaten. This is said in no spirit of time-serving or apology. The South has nothing for which to apologize. The South has nothing to take back. In my native town of Athens is a monument that crowns its central hills a plain white shaft. Deep cut into its shining side is a name dear to me above the names of men, that of a brave and simple man who died in a brave and simple faith. Not for all the glories of New England from Plymouth Rock all the way would I exchange the heritage he left me in his soldier's death. To the feet of that shaft I shall send my children's children to reverence him who ennobled their name with his heroic blood. But, speaking from the shadow of that memory, which I honor as I do nothing else on earth, I say that the cause in which he suffered and for which he gave 198 rrnLic SPEAK i.\< r . his life was adjudged by higher and fuller wisdom than his or mine, and I am glad that the omniscient God held the balance of battle in his almighty hand, and that human slavery was swept forever from American soil the Ameri- can Union saved from the wreck of the war. This message comes to you from hallowed ground, doubly hallowed by the fallen heroes who wore the gray and by those who wore the blue. Now what answer has New England to this message ? Will she permit the prejudice of war to remain in the hearts of the conquerors when it has died in the hearts of the conquered? Will she transmit this prejudice to the next generation, that in their hearts, which never felt the generous ardor of conflict, it may per- petuate itself ? Will she make the last words of your great chieftain " Let us have peace " a delusion or an inspira- tion? Will she withhold, save in strained courtesy, the hand which, straight from his soldier's heart, Grant offered to Lee at Appomattox? If she does, the South, never abject in asking for comradeship, must accept with dignity its refusal; but if she does not if she accepts with frank- ness and sincerity this message of good-will and friendship, then will the prophecy of Webster, delivered in this very Society forty years ago, amid tremendous applause, be veri- fied in its fullest and final sense, when he said, " Standing hand to hand and clasping hands, we should remain united as we have for sixty years, citizens of the same country, members of the same government, united all, united now, and united forever." SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 199 THE MINUTE MAN OF THE REVOLUTION. GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. Extract from an oration delivered at the centennial celebration of Con- cord Fight, Concord, Massachusetts, April 10, 1876. ^Orations and Addresses," copyright, 1894, by Harper and Brothers. The Minute Man of the Revolution ! And who was he ? He was the old, the middle-aged, and the young. He was the husband and the father, who left his plough in the fur- row and his hammer on the bench, and marched to die or be free. He was the son and lover, the plain, shy youth of the singing school and the village choir, whose heart beat to arms for his country, and who felt, though he could not say with the old English cavalier : " I could not love thee, dear, so much, Loved I not honor more." He was the man who was willing to pour out his life's blood for a principle. Intrenched in his own honesty, the king's gold could not buy him ; enthroned in the love of his fellow-citizens, the king's writ could not take him ; and when, on the morning of Lexington, the king's troops marched to seize him, his sublime faith saw, beyond the clouds of the moment, the rising sun of the America we behold, and, careless of himself, mindful only of his coun- try, he exultingly exclaimed, "Oh, what a glorious morn- ing!" And then amid the flashing hills, the ringing woods, the flaming roads, he smote with terror the haughty British column, and sent it shrinking, bleeding, wavering, and reel- ing through the streets of the village, panic-stricken and broken. 200 PUBLIC SPEAKING. Him we gratefully recall to-day ; him we commit in his immortal youth to the reverence of our children. And here amid these peaceful fields, here in the heart of Middlesex County, of Lexington and Concord and Bunker Hill, stand fast, Son of Liberty, as the minute-men stood at the old North Bridge. But should we or our descendants, false to justice or humanity, betray in any way their cause, spring into life as a hundred years ago, take one more step, de- scend, and lead us, as God led you in saving America, to save the hopes of man. No hostile fleet for many a year has vexed the waters of our coast; nor is any army but our own ever likely to tread our soil. Not such are our enemies to-day. They do not come, proudly stepping to the drum beat, their bayonets flashing in the morning sun. But wherever party spirit shall strain the ancient guarantees of freedom ; or bigotry and ignorance shall lay their fatal hands on education ; or the arrogance of caste shall strike at equal rights ; or cor- ruption shall poison the very springs of national life, there, Minute Man of Liberty, are your Lexington Green and Concord Bridge. And as you love your country and your kind, and would have your children rise up and call you blessed, spare not the enemy. Over the hills, out of the earth, down from the clouds, pour in resistless might. Fire from every rock and tree, from door and window, from hearthstone and chamber. Hang upon his flank from morn to sunset, and so, through a land blazing with indignation, hurl the hordes of ignorance and corruption and injustice back back in utter defeat and ruin. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 201 HAPPINESS AND LIBERTY. ROBERT G. INGERSOLL. It is not necessary to be rich in order to be happy. The laugh of a child will brighten the gloom of the darkest day. Strike with the hand of fire, O weird musician, upon the hurpstring with Apollo's golden hair. Fill the vast cathe- clnil aisles with symphonies sweet and dim. Blow, bugles, blow until your silvery notes do touch and kiss the moonlit waves and charm the lovers wandering 'neath the vine-clad hills; but know that your sweetest strains are but discords all compared with childhood's happy laugh. Oh, rippling river of laughter, thou art the blessed boundary line between man and beast, and each wayward wave of thine doth catch and drown some fitful fiend of care ! Do not tell me you have got to be rich. We have a false standard of these things in the United States. We think that a man must be great, that he must be famous, that he must be wealthy. That is all a mistake. It is not neces- sary to be rich, to be great, to be famous, to be powerful, in order to be happy. The happy man is the free man. Happiness is the legal tender of the soul. Joy is wealth. Liberty is joj. A little while ago I stood by the grave of the old Napoleon a magnificent tomb of gilt and gold, fit almost for a dead deity and gazed upon the sarcophagus of black Egyptian marble, where rest at last the ashes of that rest- less man. -I leaned over the balustrade and thought about the career of the greatest soldier of the modern world. I saw him walking upon the banks of the Seine, contem- -"- ri'BLIC SPAMA'/.V'/. plating suicide. I saw him at Toulon I saw him putting down the mob in the streets of Paris I saw him at the head of the army of Italy I saw him crossing the bridge of Lodi with the tricolor in his hand I saw him in Egypt in the shadow of the pyramids I saw him conquer the Alps and mingle the eagles of France with the eagles of the crags. I saw him at Marengo at Ulm and Auster- litz. I saw him in Russia, where the infantry of the snow and the cavalry of the wild blast scattered his legions like winter's withered leaves. I saw him at Leipsic in defeat and disaster driven by a million bayonets back upon Paris clutched like a wild beast banished to Elba. I saw him escape and retake an empire by the force of his genius. I saw him upon tin* frightful field of Waterloo, where Chance and Fate combined to wreck the fortunes of their former king. And I saw him at St. Helena, with his hands crossed behind him, gazing out upon the sad and solemn sea, I thought of all the orphans and widows he had made of the tears that had been shed for his glory, and of the 9nly woman who ever loved him, pushed from his heart by the ruthless hand of ambition. And I said I would rather have been a French peasant and worn wooden shoes; I would rather have lived in a hut with the vines growing over the door and the grapes growing purple in the kisses of the autumn sun, with my loving wife knitting by my side as the day died out the sky ; yes, I would rather have been that man and gone down to the tongueless silence of the dream- less dust, than to have been that imperial impersonation of force and murder known as Napoleon the Great.- N". it is not necessary to be great to be happy. It is not necessary to be rich to be generous. It is not necessary to SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 203 be powerful to be just. When the world is ree, this ques- tion will be settled. A new creed will be written. In that creed there will be but qn word, "Liberty." O Liberty, float not forever in the far horizon, remain not forever in the dream of the enthusiast, dwell not forever in the song of the poet, but come and make thy home among the children of men. -*\ know not what thoughts, what discoveries, what inventions may leap from the brain of man ; I know not what garments of glory may be woven by the years to come ; I cannot dream of the victories to be won upon the field of thought. But I do know that coming from the infinite sea of the future there shall never touch this bank and shoal of time, a richer gift, a rarer blessing, than Liberty. REVOLUTIONS. WENDELL PHILLIPS. An extract from his lecture on "Public Opinion." Whenever you meet a dozen earnest men pledged to a new idea, you meet the beginning of a new revolution. Revolutions are not made; they come. A revolution is as natural a growth as an oak. It comes out of the past ; its foundations are laid far back. The child feels; he grows into a man, and thinks ; another, perhaps, speaks ; and the world acts out the thought. And this is the history of modern society. Men undervalue great reform movements because they imagine you can always put your finger on some illustrious moment in history and say, "Here com- menced the great change which has come over the nation." Not so. The beginning of a great change is like the -'"4 PUBLIC SPEAK I Y',. rising of the Mississippi. You must stoop and gather away the pebbles to find it. But soon it swells broader ami broader ; bears on its bosom the navies of a mighty repub- lic; forms the gulf and divides a continent. There is a story of Napoleon which illustrates my mean- ing. We are apt to trace the control of France to some noted victory; to the tinle when he encamj>ed in the Tui- . or when he dissolved the assembly by the stamp of his foot. He reigned in fact when his hand first felt the helm of the vessel of state, and that was far back of the time when he had conquered Italy, or his name had lu-ni echoed over two continents. It was on the day five hundred irresolute men \\ viv met in the assembly which called itself, and pretended to be, the government of France. They heard that the mob of Paris were coming next morning, thirty thousand strong, to turn them, as was usual in those days, out of doors. And where did this seemingly power go for its support and refuge ? They sent Tallien to seek out a boy lieutenant the shadow of an officer so thin and pallid that when he was placed on the stand before them, the president of the assembly, fearful, if the fate of France rested on the shrunken form, the ashen cheek, before him, that all hope was gone, asked, " Young man, can you protect the assembly?" The stern lip of the Corsican boy parted only to say, " I always do what I undertake." Then and there Napoleon ascended his throne; and the next day from the steps of the St. Roche thundered forth the cannon which taught the mob of Paris, for the first lime. that it had a master. That was the commencement of the empire. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 205 THE NEW SOUTH AND THE RACE PROBLEM. HENRY \V. GRADY. Extract from an address before the Boston Mercantile Association, 1889. Whatever the future may hold for the negroes, whether they plod along in the servitude from which they have never been lifted since the Cyrenian was laid hold upon by the Roman soldiers and made to bear the cross of the faint- ing Christ whether they find homes again in Africa, and thus hasten the prophecy of the Psalmist who said, " And suddenly Ethiopia shall hold out her hands unto God" whether, forever dislocated and separate, they remain a weak people beset by a stronger or whether in this miraculous Republic they break through the caste of twenty centuries and, belying universal history, reach the full stat- ure of citizenship and in peace maintain it, we shall give them uttermost justice and abiding friendship. And whatever we may do, into whatever seeming estrange- ment we may be driven, nothing shall disturb the love we bear this Republic, or mitigate our consecration to its ser- vice. I stand here to profess no new loyalty. When General Lee, whose heart was the temple of our hopes and whose arm was clothed with our strength, renewed his allegiance to this government at Appomattox, he spoke from a heart too great to be false, and he spoke for every honest man from Maryland to Texas. From that day to this, Hamilcar has nowhere in the South sworn young Hannibal to hatred and revenge, but everywhere to loyalty and to love. Witness the veteran standing at the base of the Confederate 206 PUBLIC SPEAEI\<;. monument, above the graves of his comrades, his empty sl''vi- tossing in the April wind, adjuring the young men about him to serve as honest and loyal citizens the govern- ment against which their fathers fought. This message, delivered from that sacred presence, has gone home to the hearts of my fellows. And I declare here, if physical courage be always equal to human aspiration, that they would die, if need be, to restore this Republic their fathers fought to dissolve! Such is this question as we see it, such is the temper in which we approach it, such the progress made. What do we ask of you? First, patience; second, confidence; third, sympathy; fourth, loyalty to the Republic for there is sectionalism in loyalty as in estrangement. This hour little needs the loyalty that is loyal to one section, while it holds the other in enduring suspicion and estrange- ment. Give us the broad and perfect loyalty that loves and trusts Georgia alike with Massachusetts that "knows no South, no North, no East, no West," but endears with equal and patriotic love every foot of our soil, every state of our Union. A mighty duty and a mighty inspiration impels every one of us to lose in patriotic consecration whatever estranges, whatever divides. We are Americans, and we fight for human liberty! The uplifting force of the American idea is under every throne on earth. France, Brazil these are our victories. To redeem the earth from kingcraft and oppression this is our mission! And we shall not fail. God has sown in our soil the seed of his millennial harvest, and He will not apply the sickle to the ripening crop until His full and perfect day has come. Our history has SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 207 been a constant and expanding miracle from Plymouth Rock and Jamestown all the way aye, even from the hour when from the voiceless and trackless ocean a new world rose to the sight of the inspired sailor. As we approach the fourth centennial of that stupendous day, when the old world will come to marvel and to learn, amid our gathered pleas- ures let us resolve to crown the miracles of our past with the spectacle of a Republic compact, united, indissoluble in the bonds of love serene and resplendent at the summit of human achievement and earthly glory blazing out the path and making clear the way up which all the nations of the earth must come in God's appointed time! ENGLAND AND THE AMERICAN COLONIES. KDMUND BURKE. Extract from the peroration of Burke' s speech on " Conciliation with the Colonies," delivered in the House of Commons, March 2, 1775. My hold of the colonies is in the close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from simi- lar privileges, and equal protection. These are ties, which, though light as air, yet are as strong as links of iron. Let the colonists always keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your government, they will cling and grap- ple to you, and no force under heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance. But let it be once under- stood that your government may be one thing, and their privileges another, that these two things may exist without any mutual relation, the cement is gone, the cohesion 208 rniLir >/'/;. I/C/.NV;. is loosened ; and everything hastens to decay and dissolu- tion. As long as you have the wisdom to keep the sovereign authority of this country as the sanctuary of liberty, wherever that chosen race the sons of England worship freedom, they will turn their faces toward you. The more they multiply, the more friends you will have; the more ardently they love liberty, the more perfect will be their obedience. Slavery they can have anywhere ; it is a weed that grows in every soil. But until you become lost to all feeling of your true interest and your natural dignity, free- dom they can have from none but you. This is the com- modity of price, of which you have the monopoly. This is the true Act of Navigation, which binds to you the com- merce of the colonies, and, through them, secures to you the wealth of the world. It is the spirit of the English constitution, which, infused through the mighty n in- vades, feeds, unites, invigorates, vivifies every part of the empire, even down to the minutest member. Is it not the same virtue which does everything for us here in England ? Do you imagine that it is the Land-tax Act which raises your revenue ? that it is the annual vote in the Committee of Supply which gives you your army? or that it is the Mutiny Bill which inspires it with bravery and discipline ? No ! surely no ! It is the love of the people ; it is their attachment to their government, from the sense of the deep stake they have in such a glorious institution, which gives you your army and your navy, and infuses into both that liberal obedience without which your army would be a base rabble, and your navy nothing but rotten timber SELECTIONS FOE PRACTICE. 209 A MESSAGE TO GARCIA. ELBERT HUBBARD. Extract from an article in the " Philistine" for March, 1899. When war broke out between Spain and the United States^ it \\;is very necessary to communicate quickly with the leader of the Insurgents. Garcia was somewhere in the mountain fastnesses of Cuba no one knew where. No mail or tele- graph message could reach him. The President must secure his cooperation, and quickly. What to do ! Some one said to the President, " There's a fellow by the name of Rowan will find Garcia for you if anybody can." Rowan was sent for and given a letter to be delivered to Garcia. How " the fellow by the name of Rowan " took the letter, sealed it up in an oilskin pouch, strapped it over his heart, in four days landed by night off the coast of Cuba from an open boat, disappeared into the jungle, and in three weeks came out on the other side of the island, having trav- ersed a hostile country on foot, and delivered his letter to Garcia, are things I have no special desire now to tell in detail. The point I wish to make is this : McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia; Rowan took the letter and did not ask, " Where is he at ? " By the Eternal ! there is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze and the statue placed in every college of the land. It is not book-learning young men need, nor instruction about this and that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate 210 PUBLIC SPEAKING. their energies ; do the thing " Carry a message to Garcia!" General Garcia is dead now, but there are other Garcias. No man who has endeavored to carry out an enterprise win TO many hands were needed, but has been well-nigh appalled at times by the imbecility of the average man the inability or unwillingness to concentrate on a thing and do it. Slip-shod assistance, foolish inattention, dowdy in- difference, and half-hearted work seem the rule; and no man succeeds, unless by hook or crook, or threat, he forces or bribes other men to assist him ; or mayhap, God in His goodness performs a miracle, and sends him an angel of light for an assistant. And this incapacity for independent action, this moral stupidity, this infirmity of the will, this unwillingness to cheerfully catch hold and lift, are the things that put pure socialism so far into the future. If men will not act for themselves, what will they do when the benefit of their effort is for all? My heart goes out to the man who does his work when the " boss " is away, as well as when he is at home. And the man, who, when given a letter for Garcia, quietly takes the missive, without asking any idiotic questions, and with no lurking intention of chucking it into the nearest sewer, or of doing aught else but deliver it, never gets " laid off," nor has to go on a strike for higher wages. Civilization is one long anxious search for just such individuals. Anything such a man asks shall be granted ; his kind is so rare that no employer can afford to let him go. He is wanted in every city, town, and village in every office, shop, store, and factory. The world cries out for such ; he is needed, SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 211 and needed badly the man who can carry a message to Garcia. COLUMBUS. CHAUNCEY M. DEPEW. God always has in training some commanding genius for the control of great crises in the affairs of nations and peoples. The number of these leaders is less than the cen- turies, but their lives are the history of human progress. Though Caesar, and Charlemagne, and Hildebrand, and Luther, and William the Conqueror, and Oliver Cromwell, and all the epoch-makers prepared Europe for the event, and contributed to the result, the lights which illumine our firmament to-day are Columbus the discoverer, Washington the founder, and Lincoln the saviour. It was a happy omen of the position which woman was to hold in America that the only person who comprehended the majestic scope of his plans and the invincible quality of his genius, was the able and gracious Queen of Castile. Isabella alone of all the dignitaries of that age shares with Columbus the honors of his great achievement. She arrayed her kingdom and her private fortune behind the enthusiasm of this mystic mariner, and posterity pays hom- age to her wisdom and faith. The overthrow of the Mahometan power in Spain would have been a forgotten scene in one of the innumerable acts in the grand drama of history, had not Isabella conferred immortality upon herself, her husband, and their dual crown, by her recognition of Columbus. The devout spirit of the queen and the high purpose of the explorer inspired 2\'2 prinjr SPXAXIIIQ. the voyage, subdued the mutinous crew, and prevailed over th- racing storms. They covered with divine radiance of religion and humanity the degrading search for gold and the horrors of its quest, which tilled the first century of conquest with every form of lust and greed. The mighty soul of the great admiral was undaunted by tlif ingratitude of princes and the hostility of the people, ly imprisonment and neglect. He died as he was securing the means and preparing a campaign for the rescue of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem from the infidel. He did not know, what time has revealed, that, while the mission of the ades of Godfrey of Bouillon and Richard of the Lion Heart was a bloody and fruitless romance, the discovery of America was the salvation of the world. The one was the symbol, the other the spirit ; the one death, the other life. The tomb of the Saviour was a narrow and empty vault, precious only for its memories of the supreme tragedy of the centuries; but the new continent was to be the home and temple of the living God. All hail, Columbus, discoverer, dreamer, hero, and apostle ! We here, of every race and country, recognize the horizon which bounded his vision and the infinite scope of his genius. The voice of gratitude and praise for all the bless- ings which have been showered upon mankind by adventure is limited to no language, but is uttered in every tongue. Neither marble nor brass can fitly form his statue. Con- tinents are his monuments, and innumerable millions, past, present, and to come, who enjoy in their liberties and their happiness the fruits of his faith, will reverently guard and preserve, from century to century, his name and fame. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 213 THE PILGRIMS. EDWARD KVERETT. From the dark portals of the Star Chamber and in the stern text of the Acts of Uniformity the Pilgrims received a commission more important than any that ever bore the royal seal. Their banishment to Holland was fortunate ; the decline of their little company in the strange land was fortunate ; the difficulties which they experienced in getting the royal consent to banish themselves to this wilderness were fortunate ; all the tears and heart-breakings of that ever memorable parting at Delfshaven had the happiest influence on the rising destinies of New England. These rough touches of fortune brushed off the light, uncertain, selfish spirits ; they made it a grave, solemn, self-denying expedition. They cast a broad shadow of thought and seriousness over the cause ; and if this sometimes deepened into severity and bitterness, can we rind no apology for such a human weakness? Their trials of wandering and exile, of the ocean, the winter, the wilderness, and the savage foe, were the final assurance of success. They kept far away from the enter- prise all patrician softness, all hereditary claims to pre- eminence. No effeminate nobility crowded into the dark and austere ranks of the Pilgrims; no Carr or Vipers? desired to lead on the ill-provided band of despised Puri- tans ; no well-endowed clergy were anxious to quit their cathedrals and set up a pompous hierarchy in the frozen wilderness ; no craving governors were on the alert to be sent over to our cheerless El Dorados of ice and snow : 214 PUBLIC SPEAKING. no; they could not say they had encouraged, patronized, or helped the Pilgrims; they could not afterwards fairly pretend to reap where they had not strown. And as our fathers reared this broad and solid fabric unaided, barely tolerated, it did not fall when the favor, which had always been withholden, was changed into wrath ; when the arm, which had never supported, was raised to destroy. Shut now the volume of history, and tell me, on any principle of human probability, what shall be the fate of this handful of adventurers. Tell me, man of military science, in how many months were they all swept off by the thirty savage tribes enumerated within the early limits of New England ? Tell me, politician, how long did this shadow of a colony, on which your conventions and treaties had not smiled, languish on the distant coast ? Student of history, compare for me the baffled projects, the deserted settlements, the abandoned adventures of other times, and find the parallel of this. Was it the winter's storm, beat- ing upon the houseless heads of women and children ? V it disease ? Was it the tomahawk ? Was it the deep malady of a blighted hope, a ruined enterprise, and a broken heart aching in its last moments at the recollection of the loved and left beyond the sea? Was it some or all of these united that hurried this forsaken company to their melancholy fate ? And is it possible that neither of these causes, that not all combined, were able to blast this bud of hope ? Is it possible that from a beginning so feeble, so frail, so worthy not so much of admiration as of pity, there has gone forth a progress so steady, a growth so wonderful, a reality so important, a promise, yet to be fulfilled, so glorious ? SELECTIONS FOK PRACTICE. 215 TRIBUTE TO LINCOLN. EMILIO CASTELAR. The Puritans are the patriarchs of liberty ; they opened a new world on the earth ; they opened a new path for the human conscience ; they created a new society. Yet, when England tried to subdue them and they conquered, the Re- public triumphed and slavery remained. Washington could emancipate only his own slaves. Franklin said that the Virginians could not invoke the name of God, retaining slavery. Jay said that all the prayers America sent up to heaven for the preservation of liberty while slavery contin- ued were mere blasphemies. Mason mourned over the pay- ment his descendants must make for this great crime of their fathers. Jefferson traced the line where the black wave of slavery should be stayed. Nevertheless, slavery increased continually. I beg that you will pause a moment to consider the man who cleansed this terrible stain which obscured the stars of the American banner. I beg that you will pause a moment, for his immor- tal name has been invoked for the perpetuation of slavery. Ah ! the past century has not, the century to come will not have, a figure so grand, because as evil disappears so disap- pears heroism also. I have often contemplated and described his life. Born in a cabin of Kentucky, of parents who could hardly read ; born a new Moses in the solitude of the desert, where are forged all great and obstinate thoughts, monotonous like the desert, and, like the desert, sublime; growing up among those primeval forests, which, with their fragrance, send a 210 cloud of incense, and, with their murmurs, a cloud of prayers to heaven; a boatman at eight years in the impetuous cur- rent of the Ohio, and at seventeen in the vast and tranquil waters of the Mississippi ; later, a woodman, with axe and arm felling the immemorial trees, to open a way to unex- plored regions for his tribe of wandering workers ; reading no other book than the Bible, the book of great sorrows and great hopes, dictated often by prophets to the sound of fet- ters they dragged through Nineveh and Babylon ; a child of Nature, in a word, by one of those miracles only comprehen- sible among free peoples, he fought for the country, and was raised by his fellow-citizens to the Congress at Washington, and by the nation to the presidency of the Republic ; and when the evil grew more virulent, when those states were dissolved, when the slaveholders uttered their war-cry and the slaves their groans of despair the wood-cutter, the boatman, the son of the great West, the descendant of Quakers, humblest of the humble before his consciem -P. greatest of the great before history, ascends the Capitol, the greatest moral height of our time, and strong and serene with his conscience and his thought, before him a vet- eran army, hostile Europe behind him, England favoring the South, France encouraging reaction in Mexico, in his hands the riven country, he arms two millions of men, gathers a half million of horses, sends his artillery twelve hundred miles in a week, from the banks of the Potomac to the shores of Tennessee; tights more than six hundred battles; renews before Richmond the deeds of Alexander, of Caesar ; and, after having emancipated three million slaves, that nothing might be wanting, he dies in the very moment of victory like Christ, like Socrates, like all redeemers, at SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 217 the foot of his work. His work! Sublime achievement! over which humanity shall eternally shed its tears, and God his benedictions ! THE LAW, INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY, AND THE MOB SPIRIT. JOHN WOODWARD. From an address at the Chautauqua Assembly, August 15, 190S. The common business and callings of life, the ordinary trades and pursuits which are innocent in themselves, and have been followed in all communities from time im- memorial, must be free in this countiy to all alike upon the same terms. The right to pursue them without let or hinderance, except that which is applied to all persons of the same age, sex, and condition, is a distinguishing privi- lege of citizens of the United States, and an essential element of that freedom which they claim as their birth- right. This language was used to define the Constitutional limi- tations upon the Legislature, but it is equally applicable to the limitations which must, in a healthful condition of society, apply to individuals and associations of every char- acter. The individual has a right to " pursue any lawful business or vocation in any manner not inconsistent with the equal rights of others," and this right is not increased or diminished by the fact that he becomes a member of a manufacturers' association, a labor organization, or any other voluntary society. The manufacturer, whether he be an individual or a cor- 218 PUBLIC 8PXAKINO. poration, has a right to conduct his business, to control his property, in any manner not inconsistent with the equal rights of others. He has a right to employ such help as he chooses, being responsible to his other employees for any neglect in the choice of competent fellow-laborers, and society owes him the duty and the obligation of protecting him in this right against all unlawful efforts at coercion. On the other hand the laborer, whether he belongs to an organization or is but a humble covenanter in the great system, has the absolute right to contract for his services with whomsoever he pleases, and the right to contract carries with it the right to determine the rate of compensa- tion and all of the terms and conditions of the employment except such as may be regulated under the police powers of the State, and which enter, of necessity, into every contract. Having these rights, these being the rights which we have mutually covenanted to protect, it is the duty of the State to insist that they shall not be encroached upon, either by individuals or organized bodies of individuals, under any pretext whatever. " The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish government," says Washington, "presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established government." In what I have said I am not to be understood as con- demning the labor organization as such, or the manufac- turers' association, or any combination of individuals for their own ends. On the whole I am rather disposed to look upon the labor organization as the logical result of combination in capitalization, and upon both as the results of our economic system, and my criticism is rather of the inertness of the State and Nation, which has caused to be SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 219 regarded with too much of indifference the tendency on the part of individuals, corporations, and associations to dis- regard the fundamental rights of man and to assume, in disregard of law, to adjust by force and intimidation their own controversies. The rights of the laboring man are not safe when he may be coerced into refusing that employment which is essential to his " life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," and the welfare of the State and Nation demands that there shall be no compulsion exercised over the individual by any com- bination of men under any pretext, except such as is pre-. scribed by the laws of the land. There is a broad field for organized effort in a perfectly legitimate and lawful way, among manufacturers, employers, and employees ; and when any organization, no matter by what name it is called, goes beyond the limits marked by the law, it is the duty of good citizens, acting through the channels of the law, to assert themselves in the protection of the rights of those who are being encroached upon. There is no other safety, there is no other way in which we can maintain that justice which " gives to each member of the community his due, without favor or affection." INSIGHT AND FORESIGHT. From the Outlook. June 27, 1903. There are two forms of knowledge which the college can do but little to furnish, but which you must acquire if you are to succeed in life. Perhaps we should rather say, two 220 rriiLic SPEAKIXG. forms of capacity : one is represented by the word Insight, the other by the word Foresight. If you are to deal successfully with men, you must under- stand them. You must know their nature, and the motives which control them. If you are to live peaceably with them, you must know how to avoid needless friction. If you are to lead them, you must know how to win their confidence, esteem, respect. To do this you must enter into their lives, see things as they see them, get their point of view, be able to put yourself in their place. You must be able to do this .not only for right-thinking, right-willing, and reasonable I men ; you must be able to do it for wrong-thinking, preju- Idiced, and unreasonable men, for with such men you^will have to do in your life. The other knowledge or capacity which you must acquire is Foresight. "There's a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will." We must understand what He is doing, to what end He is shaping our generation. \\V are like men upon the deck of an ocean steamer. We can walk forward or backward, or not walk at all ; but we are borne on toward a distant point by forces which transcend our understanding, and which we can do little to direct. The currents which control our lives are almost wholly beyond our control, and we succeed in life only as we under- stand what those currents are and whither they are carrying us. We fail in life, however sagacious, strong, talented, and learned, if we set ourselves against those life-currents, endeavoring to thwart them, or if we live in ignorance of them, as though they did not exist. You must under- stand the currents of this age if you are to live successfully in it. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 221 The individualism of the middle of the nineteenth century belongs to the past. Ruthless and unlimited competition is passing away. No human forces are strong enough to restore it. We are living in the age of combination and co- operation. The man who endeavors to prevent combination, whether of capital or of labor, swims against a resistless tide. He walks from the bow to the stem of a steamer which is steadily carrying him in the direction opposite to that in which he thinks he is walking. The wise leader of industry will neither ignore the competition of the past nor attempt to resist the tendency to cooperation and combina- tion in the present. He will endeavor to see how, out of the competition of the past, to construct a combination and cooperation which will preserve the virtues and values of individualism, and secure also the virtues and values of a true, free, cooperative fellowship. The tendency toward combination is as apparent in gov- ernment as it is in industry. It is a part of the great move- ment toward universal brotherhood which can be guided, but cannot be thwarted. The separate and jealous provinces of Italy are united in one Italian kingdom. The hostile Ger- man States are united in one German Empire. Egypt, India, Australia, have become parts of the great British Empire. The frantic endeavor for the dissolution of the American commonwealth in the interests of political individualism failed. In lieu of it, the American flag floats not only over all the former American commonwealth, but, in spite of the protests of the timid, carries American sovereignty across the ocean to Hawaii and the Philippines. Commerce beckons American enterprise to enter the East, a thousand miles nearer our coast than to the British Isles, and opportunity PUBLIC SPEAKING. I* -mauds of us a courage and a wisdom equal to the exigen- cies of the new day which dawns with the new century. To resist the tendency toward what men miscall imperialism is a hopeless task ; to guide the tendency so that wherever the American flag carries with it American sovereignty, it shall also carry with it liberty, justice, and good will, is tin- problem which the God of nations calls on you to solve. In religion the supreme and final authority has passed, for substantially all Protestant denominations, from the Church, and is passing, despite the hopeless resistance of many, from the Bible. The minister of the future must learn that the secret of authority is God in the individual conscience, and that the authority both of the Church and of the Bible is due to the fact that they have both inter- preted that voice to human souls. He who would succeed in the religious development of his age must not live in the nineteenth century, still less in the sixteenth. He must live in the twentieth century, and must show men how to use both the Church and the Bible in interpreting that voice of God in the soul of man which is the secret of all authority social, political, and religious. You may not agree with this interpretation of the life- currents of this twentieth century. We briefly describe them, not for the purpose of making you see life as we see it, but for the purpose of inducing you to turn your faces toward the future and see for yourselves whither those life-currents are guiding you. The knowledge of the past will not give you success in the present, unless out of that past you learn lessons to guide you toward the future to which God is bringing the children of men. All that you have learned of history and literature, of science and of art, SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 223 in your college course will serve to enrich your life and that of your fellow-men, will serve to give you real influence over them and real leadership in your age, only as, to the scholarship which the college has conferred upon you, you add by your own individual study of life and men these two vital qualities, Insight and Foresight an understand- ing of men, and some comprehension of the future toward which you must guide both them and yourself. THE TRUE SPIRIT FOR INDEPENDENCE DAY. YANCEY LEWIS. An address delivered at the University of Texas, March 2, 1903. We honor ourselves by celebrating this day. We prove that we are not insensible to a heroic chapter in human his- tory, nor lacking in gratitude to those by whose calm wis- dom and supreme fortitude we have been blessed. But we do not, we cannot, add aught of honor to those who made this day memorable. High above our feeble tribute, their works do honor them ; and their works endure. They endure in the thrilling story which shall not only inspire us and our successors after us, but shall strengthen the hearts of men who, in distant times and under other skies, shall strike for freedom. They endure in the wise policies by which the administration of justice is simplified, the rights of woman- hood enlarged, the rights of the family and the home safe- guarded. They endure in this University, reared by courage joined with wisdom, broad-based upon a people's will, conse- crated to the education, without price, of all those, whether 224 PUBLIC SPEAKI\<,. low-born or powerful, who aspire to be free of the shackles of. ignorance and to walk in the glorious light of knowledge. They endure in this great commonwealth, marked out by area, by climatic condition, by physical environment, and by the indwelling spirit of its people, for empire in this huge leviathan among the States, not yet articulate, not yet having the unity of its highest purpose, nor wrought to its best hope, but destined ultimately, in my view, to speak with the strongest and most individual voice of all our States, and to be the most potent and controlling factor in our civilization. If, then, we cannot honor the dead, how shall we make the observance of this day acceptable to them and serviceable to ourselves ? The loud acclaim, the patriotic song, the studied oration, the deep-throated cannon's roar these may be an empty pageantry, an idle hour's diversion. How shall we make them vital and significant? Shall I tell you? By laying hold of the virtues of those who, on this day, declared their independence, by imbuing ourselves with their thoughts, by moving ourselves with their motives, by consecrating our- selves to their firm purposes and their high resolves, by declaring this day our independence of all low motive or sordid desire or narrow view or ancient prejudice or hoary error ; by avowing this day that the ends we aim at shall be " our country's, our God's, and truth's." Is there needed incentive to this obligation ? Let me ask you : of those millions who during the ages have lived, la- bored, and died upon the earth, who have helped its progress or added to its freedom ? I answer : those few, the immor- tals, whose names the world will not let die, who in some supreme juncture did, in the face of God and men, proclaim SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 225 their independence. In geography, Columbus ; in theology, Luther; in astronomy, Galileo; in government, Hampden and Washington; in religion, that strange divine Man of Galilee, gentlest and tenderest, most heroic and most inde- pendent of those who have walked upon earth. Is there need of this quality of independence now ? Always, every- where there is need of it. The earth's prayer well might be : " God, give us independent men." Never was there greater need of it than now. In our cities corruption enters into league with vice, takes with equal facility the name of either of the great parties, and boldly essays to rule. A race problem of appalling magnitude hangs over one section of our country, and beclouds the judgment of the other sec- tions. Stupendous combinations of capital, vast armies of laborers, moved, marshalled, and directed like troops in the field, reverse old economic laws, present new and strange problems in our polity, and seem equally to threaten the rights and independence of the individual man. In our social life still goes on the world-old struggle between the material and the spiritual elements of our existence. Still is felt the invitation and the strong temptation, still is seen the fierce endeavor to put matter above mind, money above man- hood, social position above social virtues, gain above knowl- edge, gold above God. Let us, then, my friends, students of the University, on each recurring anniversary of this day, here in this Univer- sity of Texas, whose site was dedicated by the founders of the republic, and whose muniments of title are such act of dedication, the declaration of independence this day read, and the result at San Jaointo, let us in this Un : varsity strike hands with the ancient and goodly fellowship of Uni- 226 PUBLIC SPEAKING. versity men of all time : with Stephen Langton, graduate of the University of Paris, and leader in the movement which wrung from John the Great Charter whose guaranties still are vital in all our institutions, and whose phrases still ring in the ears of freemen like the marching of armed men to battle ; with Hampden, son of Oxford, who gave his life to save the liberties which the Great Charter granted; with John Hancock and his majority of University men who signed our American declaration of independence; with Rusk and his majority of college men who put their names to the declaration read to-day let us strike hands with them and pledge ourselves, as University men and Texans, to love the truth and seek it, to learn the right and do it, and, in all emergencies, however wealth may tempt or pop- ular applause allure, to be sole rulers of our own free speech, masters of our own untrammelled thoughts, captains of our own unfettered souls. In this spirit, to these ends, may we worthily celebrate this day. SOCIAL LIFE IN THE OLD SOUTH. THOMAS NELSON PAGE. Truly it was a charming life, the social life in the Old South. There was a vast waste ; but it was not loss. Every one had food, every one had raiment, every one had peace. There was not wealth in the base sense in which we know it and strive for it and trample down others for it now. But there was wealth in the good old sense in which the litany of our fathers used it. There was weal. There was the best of SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 227 all wealth : there was content, and " a quiet mind is richer than a crown." We have gained something by the change. The South under her new conditions will grow rich, will wax fat; nevertheless we have lost much. How much only those who knew it can estimate; to them it was inestimable. That the social life of the Old South had its faults, I am far from denying. What civilization has not? But its virtues far outweighed them ; its graces were never equalled. For all its faults, it was, I believe, the purest, sweetest life ever lived. It has been claimed that it was non-productive, that it fostered sterility. Only ignorance or folly could imike the assertion. It largely contributed to produce this nation ; it led its armies and its navies ; it established this government so firmly that not even it could overthrow it ; it opened up the great West ; it added Louisiana and Texas, and more than trebled our territory; it Christianized the negro race in a little over two centuries, impressed upon it regard for order, and gave it the only civilization it has ever possessed since the dawn of history. It has maintained the supremacy of the Caucasian race, upon which all civilization seems now to depend. It produced a people whose heroic fight against the forces of the world has enriched the annals of the human race a people whose fortitude in defeat has been even more splendid than their valor in war. It made men noble, gentle, and brave, and women tender, and pure, and true. It may have fallen short in material develop- ment in its narrower sense, but it abounded in spiritual de- velopment ; it made the domestic virtues as common as light and air, and filled homes with purity and peace. It has passed from the earth, but it has left its benignant 228 PUBLIC SPEAKI\<:. influence behind it to sweeten and sustain its children. The ivory palaces have been destroyed, but myrrh. ;il<>cs. ;unl cassia still breathe amid their dismantled ruins. THE NEGRO QUESTION. THOMAS NELSON PACK. Professor James Bryce, in a recent paper on the negro question, arrives at the only reasonable conclusion : that the negro be let alone and the solution of the problem be left to the course of events. Friendship for the negro demands this. It has become the fashion of late for certain negro leaders to talk, in conventions held outside of the South, of fighting for their rights. For their own sake and that of their race, let them take it out in talking. A single outbreak would settle the question. To us of the South it appears that a proper race pride is one of the strongest securities of our nation. No people can become great without it. With- out it no people can remain great. We propose to stand upon it. Meantime, the negro is here, and something must be done. In the first place, let us have all the light that can be thrown on the subject. Form an organization to consider and deal with the subject, not in the spirit of narrowness or temper, but in the spirit of philosophic deliberation, such as becomes a great people discussing a great question which concerns not only their present but their future position among the nations. We shall then get at the right of the matter. Let us do our utmost to eliminate from the question the complication of its political features. Get politics out of it, SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 229 and the problem will be more than half solved. Senator Hampton stated not long ago, in a paper contributed by him, I think, to the North American Review, that, to get the negro out of politics, he would gladly give up the representation based on his vote. Could anything throw a stronger light on the apprehension with which the negro in politics is regarded at the South ? There never was any question more befogged with dema- gogism than that of manhood suffrage. Let us apply our- selves to securing some more reasonable and better basis for the suffrage. Let us establish such a proper qualification as a condition to the possession of the elective franchise as shall leave the ballot only to those who have intelligence enough to use it as an instrument to secure good government rather than to destroy it. In taking this step we have to plant ourselves on a broader principle than that of a race qualification. It is not merely the negro, it is ignorance and venality which we want to disfranchise. If we can dis- franchise these, we need not fear the voter, whatever the color. At present it is not the negro who is disfranchised, but the white. We dare not divide. Having limited him in a franchise which he has not in a generation learned to use, continue to teach him. It is from the educated negro, that is, the negro who is more en- lightened than the general body of his race, that order must come. The ignorance, venality, and superstition of the average negro are dangerous to us. Education will divide them and will uplift them. They may learn in time that if they wish to rise, they must look to the essential qualities of good citizenship. In this way alone can the race, or any part of the race, look for ultimate salvation. 230 PUBLIC SPEAKING. It has appeared to some that the South has not done its full duty by the negro. Perfection is, without doubt, a standard above humanity ; but, at least, we of the South can say that we have done much for him ; if we have not ad- mitted him to social equality, it has been under an instinct stronger than reason, and in obedience to a law higher than is on the statute-books : the law of self-preservation. Sla- very, whatever its demerits, was not in its time the unmiti- gated evil it is fancied to have been. Its time has passed. No power could compel the South to have it back. But to the negro it was salvation. It found him a savage and a cannibal, and in two hundred years gave seven millions of his race a civilization, the only civilization it has had since the dawn of history. We have educated him ; we have aided him ; we have sus- tained him in all right directions. We are ready to continue our aid; but we will not be dominated by him. When we shall be, it is our settled conviction that we shall deserve the degradation into which we shall have sunk. WEBSTER AS AN ORATOR. HENRY CABOT LODGE. Extract from an address delivered in Washington, January 18, on the occasion of the unveiling of a statue of Daniel Webster. Eminent as a legislator, still more distinguished as a law- yer, Daniel Webster was supreme as an orator. There was no need for him to put pebbles in his mouth to cure stam- mering, or to rehearse his speeches on the seashore in con- flict with the noise of the waves. He had from the hand of SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 231 nature all the graces of person and presence, of voice and delivery, which the most exacting critic could demand, and these natural gifts were trained, enhanced, and perfected by years of practice in the senate, the court room, and before the people. In what he said he always had distinction rarest of qualities and he had also the great manner, -just as Milton has it in verse. To lucid statement, to that sim- plicity in discussion which modern times demand for prac- tical questions, to nervous force, he added, at his best, wealth of imagery, richness of diction, humor, and pathos, all combined with the power of soaring on easy wing to the loftiest flights of eloquence. Above all, he had that high and excellent seriousness which Aristotle sets down as one of the supreme virtues of poetry, and without which neither oratory nor poetry can attain supremacy. It was not merely that as a statesman he saw the misery and degradation which would come from the breaking of the I'n ion as well as the progressive disintegration which was sure to follow, but the very thought of it came home to him with the sharpness of a personal grief which was almost agonizing. When, in the seventh of March speech, he cried out, " What states are to secede ? What is to remain American ? What am I to be ? " a political opponent said the tone of the last question made him shudder as if some dire calamity was at hand. The greatness of the United States rilled his mind. He had not the length of days accorded to Lord Bathhurst, but the angel of dreams had unrolled to him the future, and the vision was ever before his eyes. This passionate love of his country, this dream of her future, inspired his greatest efforts^ were even the chief 232 PUBLIC SPEAKING. cause at the end of his life of his readiness to make sacri- fices of principle which would only have helped forward what he dreaded most, but which he believed would save that for which he cared most deeply, j In a period when great forces were at work, which in their inevitable conflict threatened the existence of the union of the states, Webster stands out above all others as the champion, as the very embodiment, of the national life and the national faith. / .Mere than any other man of that time he called forth the sentiment more potent than all reasonings which saved the nation. It was a great work, greatly done, with all the resources of a powerful intellect and with an eloquence rarely heard among men. We may put aside all his other achievements, all his other claims to remembrance, and in- scribe alone upon the base of his statue the words uttered in the senate, " Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable." That single sentence recalls all the noble speeches which breathed only the greatness of the country and the prophetic vision which looked with undaz- zled gaze into a still greater future. No other words are wanted for a man who so represented and so expressed the faith and hopes of a nation. His statue needs no other explanation so long as the nation he served and the Union he loved shall last. SELECTIONS FOB PRACTICE. 238 DEMOCRACY AND EDUCATION. NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER. From an address delivered before the National Educational Associa- tion, at Buffalo, N. T., July 7, 1896. The public education of a great democratic people has other aims to fulfil than the extension of scientific knowl- edge or the development of literary culture. It must pre- pare for intelligent citizenship. More than a century ago, I'.urke wrote that "the generality of people are fifty years, at least, behindhand in their politics. There are but very few who are capable of comparing and digesting what passes before their eyes at different times and occasions, so as to form the whole into a distinct system." This is the warning of one of the greatest of publicists, that a thoroughly instructed and competent public opinion on political mat- ters is difficult to attain. Yet, unless we are to surrender the very principle on which democracy rests, we must struggle to attain it. Something may be accomplished by precept, something by direct instruction, much by example. The words "politics" and "politician" must be rescued from the low esteem into which they have fallen, and restored to their ancient and honorable meaning. It is safe to say that the framers of our Constitution never foresaw that the time would come when thousands of intelligent men and women would regard "politics" as beneath them, and when a cynical unwillingness to participate in the choice of persons and policies would develop among the people. The difficulties of democracy are the opportunities of PUBLIC SPEAKING. education. If our education be sound, if it lay due em- phasis on individual responsibility for social and political progress, if it counteract the anarchistic tendencies that grow out of selfishness and greed, if it promote a patriotism that reaches farther than militant jingoism and gunboats, then we may cease to have any doubts as to the perpetuity and integrity of our institutions. But I am profoundly convinced that the greatest educational need of our time, in higher and lower schools alike, is a fuller appreciation on the part of the teachers of what human institutions really mean and what tremendous moral issues and princi- ples they involve. The ethics of individual life must be traced to its roots in the ethics of the social whole. The family, property, the common law, the state, and the church are all involved. These, and their products, taken to- gether, constitute civilization and mark it off from barba- rism. Inheritor of a glorious past, each generation is a trustee for posterity. To preserve, protect, and transmit its inheritance unimpaired is its highest duty. To accom- plish this is not the task of a few, but the duty of all. That democracy alone will be triumphant which has both intelligence and character. To develop them among the whole people is the task of education in a democracy. V. then, by vainglorious boasting, not by self-satisfied indiffer- ence, not by selfish and indolent withdrawal from participa- tion in the interests and government of the community, but rather by the enthusiasm, born of intense conviction, that finds the happiness of each in the good of all, will our edu- cational ideals be satisfied and our free government be placed beyond the reach of the forces of dissolution and decay. SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 235 WEALTH AND DEMOCRACY. LYMAN ABBOTT. Despite the fact that wealth has never been so diffused, and the comforts wealth brings never so broadcast, as in America to-day, the thoughtful student of our national life must cer- tainly recognize that the concentration of wealth is America's greatest peril, and a more equable distribution of wealth its greatest need. That cannot be counted either a Christian or a democratic state of society in which one per cent of the people own one-half of all the wealth, and the other half is very unequally distributed among the other ninety-nine per cent of owners, in which there are a few millionnaires at one pole of society who cannot possibly spend their income, and many men and women at the other pole of society who have little or no income to spend. If Adam were created six thousand years ago, had lived until this time, and had succeeded in laying up one hundred dollars a day for every working day of the six thousand years of his life, he would not, without interest, have made as much money in six thousand years as the elder Cornelius Vanderbilt is said to have made in a lifetime. Jay Gould started in life with a mouse-trap ; at the end of twenty-five years he unrolled certificates to the amount of a hundred million dollars. He made four million dollars on the average each year, that is to say, if we count three hundred days to the year, over thirteen thousand dollars a day ; and the statisticians tell us that the average wages of unskilled labor in this country is less than one dollar a day, and of skilled working men not over four dollars a day as a maximum. In view of 236 PUBLIC SPEAKI.\<;. such inequalities as this, one need not be radical to believe with James Russell Lowell in "giving to the hands, not so large a share as to the brain, but a larger share than hitherto in the wealth they must combine to produce." The economic problem of our age is how to secure the bene- fits of organization in producing wealth without incurring the evils of concentration in the possession and enjoyment of it. This is certainly not to be promoted by a blind distribution of the acquisitions of one class among the insatiable of an- other; nor by laws limiting the products of industry, or denying to the industrious the rewards of their toil. But there are other methods open to the consideration of the American student. He will remember that unjust systems of taxation have favored the few at the expense of the many, and lie will question whether we have yet found a system of taxation absolutely just and equal. He will remember that in America, by our abolition of the right of primogeniture, we have limited the power of the " dead hand " ; and he will question whether we may not still further limit the right of men whose wealth has been largely dependent upon the com- munity, to control absolutely the disposition of that wealth in the community after they are dead. He will see that leg- islation has operated to discourage gambling and encourage productive industry, and he will ask whether further legisla- tion in the same direction may not be both wise and desir- able. He will remember that war has always cast its heavi.->t burdens on the poor, and he will question whether some inmv economical method of solving international difficulties can- not be discovered than the expensive and inefficient method of brute force. He will remember that, partly due to legis- lative influences, partly to influences purely social and in- SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 237 dustrial, the interest on capital has diminished and the wages of labor have increased, and he will ask himself the question whether this method of equalization of profits has reached its consummation. In short, he will believe that, as the effect of Christianity has been the diffusion of religious and intellectual life and of political power, so it has been, and is yet to be, the diffusion of wealth and its attendant comforts; and he will not be afraid to ask himself what can be done to promote still further that progress toward popular prosperity which Christ both promised and prophe- sied in His sermon at Nazareth. For that this democratizing process is a distinctive charac- teristic of modern life can hardly be doubted. Art has never surjr.issed that of Phidias, but modern inventions put beauty into the homes of the humblest working-man. We still go back to Homer and to Aeschylus for literature, but the print- ing-press and the common school put the best literature within the reach of the poorer people. Modern education is universal. Temples do not outshine those of Jerusalem, Ephesus, Rome, but there is a church in every village. There are no saints who in spiritual vision and consecrated life transcend the Apostle Paul, but into the slums of every modern city apostles with the Pauline spirit are carrying the message of God's love for man and of man's love for his fel- low-men. The process begun in Galilee, however, is not yet completed, and will not be until political economy learns and teaches the doctrine of distribution as well as of accumula- tion ; until fools cease to hoard and wise men learn to scat- ter ; until every " boss " is dismissed, and every ring broken ; until our systems of public education recognize the truth that to think is more than to know, and to be is more than to 238 Pl'HLIC SPE.\KL\<,. think ; until, in the words of the ancient prophet, " every valley is filled, and every mountain is brought low." GOVERNMENT BY PUBLIC OPINION. ARTHUR TWINING HADLEY. Kstrnrt from an address delivered at the Charter Day Efcrciscs f the University of California, March 23, 1901. The question is often asked, what constitutes the essen- tial mark of a gentleman, as distinct from the accidents of birth and of clothes, of manners and of speech. I believe it is to be found in the readiness to accept trusts, even when they are personally disadvantageous, the readiness to subordinate a man's own convenience and desires to a social code. The code may be a good one or a bad one ; but it is an authority which the gentleman accepts of his own free will, without waiting for any one to compel him to accept it. To the extent that he does this, he not only proves himself a gentleman, but proves himself capable of self-government. In this sense I believe that the great body of the American people are gentlemen ; and that this is the best guarantee for the permanence of our system of self- government amid the increasing difficulties with which it has to deal. There is much which is as yet defective in our com- mercial and political code of honor. But the fundamental fault is in the code and not in the man ; and therefore the task of the reformer is no insuperable one. The thing that makes democracy practicable is a willing- ness, on the part of the mass of the people, to submit to self-imposed authority without waiting for the policeman SELECTIONS FOB PRACTICE. 239 to enforce it. The cause of democracy was the distribu- tion of fighting power, which formerly had been confined to one class. The possibility of maintaining democracy is due to the fact that the readiness to accept self- imposed burdens has gone hand in hand with the distri- bution of power. The danger of democracy lies in the adoption of a false code of honor, which tolerates and approves the pursuit of self-interest in lines where it must prove ultimately destructive to the community. If our men of influence can see these dangers in time to submit to self- imposed restrictions, they can preserve their freedom from legislative interference, and our republic can remain as it now is, a self-governing body. If they do not see it in time, the demands for the extension of legislative machinery and police activity will so far restrict our personal liberty that democratic freedom will exist only in name, and we shall have a social order where the form of an occasional election is but a decent veil to disguise struggles for the tyranny of one class over another. It is for the young men who are coming on the field of political life to-day to guard against this danger. Our col- lege students have lived in communities which have their historic traditions and their collective aspirations ; each of which is in a true sense a body politic, with its public spirit and its public sentiment. It is for them to carry into the larger world of business and of legislation the spirit which will subordinate personal convenience to collective honor. Let them cease to appeal exclusively to self-inter- est, either in their own judgment or in the judgment of others. For a political leader who has not only fixed standards of right, but a belief in the capacity of the people 240 PUBLIC >//:. I A' ING. to accept those standards, the times are always Calhoun and Clay and Webster and Lincoln differed in their judgments and in their conclusions. But it was char- acteristic of them all that they made their final appeal, not to the narrow interests of any class, but to what they be- lieved to be broad principles of public opinion and public morality. It was in the spirit of these men that our repub- lic gained its growth during the century that is past : it is for us, their sons, to see that the same spirit is applied to the yet larger problems of the century which is to come. THE LAW OF SERVICE. I.YMAN ABBOTT. There are a variety of ways in which men add to the world's wealth, that is, to its life, physical, intellectual, moral. In the natural order, the first thing is to get out of the earth what the earth contains for the service of man. This is the work of the agriculturist, the miner, the lumber- man. These men are making available to the community the reservoired resources of the globe. But one cannot ad- vantag^ously eat raw wjjeat, nor live in trees, nor use iron (in the ore) for tools, nor comfortably wear the skins of ani- mals. The wheat must be turned into bread, the trees builded into houses, the iron fashioned into tools, the wool spun and^woven into garments. Thus the second thing is to turn what the earth gives us into forms useful for our ser- vice. This is a mechanic art. In one region there is plenty of food, in another none ; in one, forest, in another timber- less plains and valleys ; in one the iron mine, in another the SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 241 millstream or the coal which furnishes power for the fac- tory. The food must be transported from the Western prai- rie to the Eastern city ; the timber from the Michigan forest to the Illinois farm; the iron or copper from the shores of Lake Superior to the furnaces of Pennsylvania. Thus comes into play the JJijrd great service to the community, transportation. China and India suffer great famines, unknown in America, chiefly because they are not equipped with great railroad corporations to carry supplies from the regions where food is abundant to the regions wjhich are famine-stricken. When these supplies are brought to the communities who need them, there must be individuals to carry this work of distribution further. These are called middlemen. It is ponular in certain quarters to condemn the middlemen, but they are essential to public well-being. ^TTfiodern waterworks gather the water into reservoirs, send 'it by means of great mains throughout the city, from which again it is distributed in smaller and still smaller pipes, until it reaches the rooms in the private houses, where it can be drawn by opening a faucet, so commerce takes na- t^u-e's supplies, carries them to great centres of population, where retail trade takes them up, distributing them to indi- vidual households. The middleman is the faucet, without which the water would never be available in the home. We have, however, other needs than material ones. Men will sicken, there must be skilled physicians ; men will not understand their right relations to one another, there must be lawyers to counsel them ; there are criminals, and there must be governors, soldiers, policemen, to protect. There must be teachers to instruct, preachers and poets to in- spire, artists and authors and musicians to minister to the 242 PUBLIC SPEAKING. ji-stlietic and literary taste. There will be homes, and there must be wives and mothers who are not turning the spin- ning-wheel, nor driving the loom, nor ploughing the field, nor adding to the material wealth by their industry, but who are adding to spiritual wealth by their patience, their fidel- ity, and their love. In all this work, hand and brain must cooperate. Labor is not all hand labor. An American humorist has said, with great truth, " In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat bread, but some men sweat outside and some men inside." The brain has need of the hand, and the hand of the brain. Both are entitled to their share of the world's products, but this one fundamental truth remains: the world has just so much as we put into it; no more. If we do not by our consecrated use of hand, or head, or heart, by our personal activity or our wise direction of the activity of others, by our serving or by our suffering, endeavor t> add to the world's wealth material, intellectual, or spirit- ual at least as much as we have taken out of it, we belong in the category of the beggars, the thieves, and the gamblers. The first principle, then, is respect for labor and respect for each other's labor ; respect by the man who works with his brain, for the man who works with his hand, and re- spect by the man who works with his hand for the man who works with his brain njutu^al respect. When we ha've thoroughly learned this one fundamental principle, that to destroy is not honorable and to produce is, that the glory of the nation lies in it?productioii, that the glory of life lies in adding to the wealth of life its material, its intellectual, its spiritual wealth, we shall have learned one great un- derlying lesson. Until we have learned this, all other learn- ing is in vain, for this is the foundation. The greatest of SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 243 all is the servant of all. We believe this in the church : the minister is the servant of the congregation. We believe it in politics : the President is the servant of the people. We shall not get to the Christian basis of industry until we come to recognize in industry, also, that there is no independence, and that the greatest, and the richest, and the strongest, is great only as he is the servant of the weak and poor. JOHN MARSHALL. HENRY CABOT LODGE. From an address delivered before the Bar Associations of Illinois and Chicago, February 4-> 1901. The monumental decisions of Chief Justice Marshall, handed down during thirty-five years of judicial life, are more than a monument of legal reasoning, more than a masterly exposition of the Constitution, for they embody the well-considered policy of a great statesman. They are the work of a man who saw that the future of the United States hinged upon the one question whether the national should prevail over the separatist principle, whether the nation was to be predominant over the states whether, indeed, there was to be a nation at all. Through all the issues which rose and fell during these thirty-five years, through all the excitements of the passing day, through Louisiana acquisitions and the relations with France and England, through embargoes and war and Missouri com- promises, and all the bitter, absorbing passions which they aroused, the Chief Justice in his court went steadily for- ward dealing with that one underlying question beside 244 mil. ic >//;. i /V'/.Y', which all others were insignificant. Slowly hut surely he did his work. He made men understand that a tribunal existed before which states could be forced to plead, by which state laws could be annulled, and which was created by the Constitution. He took the dry clauses of that Con- stitution and breathed into them the breath of life. Know- ing well the instinct of human nature to magnify its own possessions, an instinct more potent than party feeling, he had pointed out and developed for presidents and con- gresses the powers given them by the Constitution from which they derived their own existence. Whether these presidents and congresses were Federalist or Democratic, they were all human and would be certain, therefore, to use sooner or later the powers disclosed to them. That which Hamilton, in the bitterness of defeat, had called "a frail and worthless fabric," Marshall converted into a mighty in- strument of government. The Constitution, which began as an agreement between conflicting states, Marshall, con- tinuing the work of Washington and Hamilton, transformed into a charter of national life. When his own life closed his work was done a nation had been made. Before he died he heard this great fact declared with unrivalled eloquence by Webster. It was reserved to another genera- tion to put Marshall's work to the last and awful test of war, and to behold it come forth from that dark ordeal, triumphant and supreme. What of the man who did all this ? The statesman we know, the great lawyer, the profound jurist, the original thinker, the unrivalled reasoner. All this is there in his decisions and in his public life, carved deep in the history of the times. But of the man himself we know little; in SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 245 proportion to his greatness and the part he played, we know nothing. He was a silent man, doing his great work in the world and saying nothing of himself, to a degree quite un- known to any of the heroes of Carlyle, who preached the doctrine of silence so strenuously in many volumes. Mar- shall seems to have destroyed all his own papers ; certainly none of consequence are known to exist now. He wrote but few letters, if we may judge from the voluminous collection of the time, where, if we except those addressed to Judge Story, lately published, he is less represented than any of the other leaders of that period. Brief memories by some of his contemporaries, scattered letters, stray recollections and fugitive descriptions, are all that we have to help us to see ;in (I know the man John Marshall. Yet his personality is so strong that from these fragments and from the study of his public life it stands forth to all who look with under- standing and sympathy. A great intellect; a clear sight which was never dimmed, but which always recognized facts and scorned delusions ; a powerful will ; a courage, moral, mental, and physical, which nothing could daunt, all these things lie upon the surface. Deeper down we dis- cern a directness of mind, a purity and strength of charac- ter, a kind heart, an abundant humor, and a simplicity and modesty which move our admiration as beyond the bounds of eulogy. He was a very great man. The proofs of his greatness lie all about us, in our history, our law, our con- stitutional development, our public thought. But there is one witness to his greatness of soul which seems to me to outweigh all the others. He had been a soldier and lawyer and statesman ; he had been an envoy to France, a member of Congress, Secretary of State, and Chief Justice. He did 246 PUBLIC SPEAKING. a great work, and no one knew better than he how great i had been. Then when he came to die he wrote his own epitaph, and all he asked to have recorded was his name, the date of his birth, the date of his marriage, and the date of his death. What a noble pride and what a tine simplicity are there ! In the presence of such a spirit, at the close of such a life, almost anything that can be said would seem tawdry and unworthy. His devoted friend, Judge Story, wished to have inscribed upon Marshall's tomb the words, "Expounder of the Constitution." Even this is something too much and also far too little. He is one of that small group of men who have founded states. He is a nation- maker, a state-builder. His monument is in the history of the United States, and his name is written upon the Con- stitution of his country. EVENTS ARE TEMPORAL, PRINCIPLES ETERNAL. NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER. The Introduction to a speech at the Fortieth Annual Convocation oj the University of the State of New York, June SO, It was my good fortune to hear one of General Garfield's most eloquent speeches. From the gallery of a great hall I looked down upon a scene where ambition, envy, and patriot- ism were all struggling for expression in the national con- vention of a powerful political party. A candidate for President of the United States was to be chosen. The walls had trembled at the mighty cheers that thousands of strong, eager men had given for the leaders of their choice. Finally, um id perfect silence, General Garfield rose in his place SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 247 among the representatives of Ohio and made his way to the platform to put before the convention the name of the man whom he preferred above all others for President of the United States. He had been greatly moved by the tempest of cheering and applause which had greeted two of the names already in nomination, and he sought to lead the con- vention away from the passionate feeling of the moment to a more sober and substantial standard of judgment. With solemnity and deliberation, General Garfield opened his speech with these sentences : " I have witnessed the extraordinary scenes of this con- vention with deep solicitude. Nothing touches my heart more quickly than a tribute of honor to a great and noble character ; but as I sat in my seat and witnessed this demon- stration, this assemblage seemed to me a human ocean in tempest. I have seen the sea lashed into fury and tossed into spray, and its grandeur moves the soul of the dullest man; but I remember that it is not the billows, but the calin level of the sea, from which all heights and depths are measured. " When the storm has passed and the hour of calm settles on the ocean, when the sunlight bathes its peaceful surface, then the astronomer and surveyor take the level from which they measure all terrestrial heights and depths. " Not here, in this brilliant circle where one hundred and fifty thousand men and women are gathered, is the destiny of the republic to be decreed for the next four years, not here, where I see the enthusiastic faces of seven hundred and fifty-six delegates, waiting to cast their lots into the urn and determine the choice of the republic, but by four mill- ions of Republican firesides, where the thoughtful voters, PUBLIC SPEAK IX < . with wives and children about them, with the calm thoughts in>piivd by love of home and country, with the history !' the past, the hopes of the future, and reverence for the great men who have adorned and blessed our nation in days gone by, burning in their hearts there God prepares the verdict which will determine the wisdom of our work to-night." Often in listening to debates and discussions of matters far removed from things political, this counsel of Garfield's has recurred to me. It seems to be so easy, in education as elsewhere, to yield to the pressure of momentary feeling or temporary expediency and to lose sight of the deep, under- lying principles which should, and in the long run must, control our action and our policies, that we need constant reminders of what those principles are. THE PURITANS AND TWENTIETH CENTURY PROBLEMS. ARTHUR TWIXIN., II AIU.KY. From an address delivered before the Xew England Society York City, December 22, 1900. By nine persons out of ten, the Puritans of the seven- teenth century are remembered chiefly for the pattern of their clothes or the phraseology of their creeds ; and even the tenth man, who really goes below the surface, often lays wrong emphasis on the different parts of their activity, ami fails to understand the true reason of their power. He thinks of the Puritan not so much for what he did as for what he refused to do and forbade others to do; as one who SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 249 held himself aloof from the joys of life and apart from the sympathies of humanity. Not in such restrictions and refusals was the strength of the Puritan character founded. Not by any such negative virtue did he conquer the world. The true Puritan was in- tensely human a man who " ate when he was hungry and drank when lie was thirsty ; loved his friends and hated his enemies." If he submitted to self-imposed hardships, and practised abstention where others allowed themselves lati- tude, it was not because he had less range of interest than his fellows, but because he had more range. He did these things as a means to an end. His thoughts went beyond the limits of the single day or the single island. He was a man who considered power as more than possession, princi- ples as better than acquirements, public duty as paramount to personal allegiance. He regarded himself as part of a universe under God's government. For the joy of taking his place in that government, he steeled himself to a temper which spared not his own body nor that of others. His life, with all its powers, was held in trust. To the fulfilment of this trust he subordinated all considerations of personal pleasure. Men are always divided more or less clearly into two types, those who recognize this character of life as a trust, and those who fail to recognize it. It was because England had men of the former type that her subsequent progress as a free nation has been realized. It was the Puritan who, by subjecting his power and his love of life to self-imposed restraints, made freedom possible in two hemispheres. Once more we are to come to a similar parting of the ways. The close of the nineteenth century has witnessed 260 PUBLIC SPEAKING an expansion of the geographical boundaries of men's inter- ests comparable only to that which came three hundred years earlier, in the days of Queen Elizabeth. It is for the next generation to decide how these new fields shall be occupied. Shall it be to gratify ambition, commercial and political ? or shall it be to exercise a trust which has been tfivi'ii us for the advancement of the human race? Shall we enter upon our new possessions in the spirit of the ad- venturer, or in the spirit of the Puritan? The conflict between these two views will be the really important issue in the complex maze of international relations during the half century which is to come. The outcome of this con- flict is likely to determine the course of the world's history for ages thereafter. Now, it is not in international politics and in problems of colonization alone that this issue is arising between those who regard the world as a field for pleasure and those who regard it as a place for the exercise of a trust. The develop- ment of modern industry has placed the alternative even more sharply before us in the ordering of our life at home. The day is past when the automatic action of self-interest could be trusted to regulate prices, or when a few simple principles of commercial law, if properly applied, secured the exercise of justice in matters of trade. The growth of large industries and of large fortunes enables those who use them rightly to do the public much better service than was possible in ages previous. It also permits those who use them wrongly to render the public correspondingly greater injury. No system of legislation is likely to meet this difficulty. The outcome depends on the character of the people. Is our business to be dominated by the spirit SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 251 of the adventurer, or by the spirit of the Puritan ? Shall we regard wealth as a means of enjoyment and commer- cial power, as a plaything to be used in the game of per- sonal ambition ? or shall we treat the fortunes which come into our hands as a trust to be exercised for the benefit of the people, rigidly abstaining from its abuse ourselves, and unsparingly refusing to associate with others who abuse it ? No American has a right to claim a share in the glory of the Pilgrim Fathers if he has any doubt concerning his answer. Let us throw ourselves, heart and soul, on that side of the industrial question which proves us worthy of Puritan ancestry, the side which regards wealth as a trust, to be used in behalf of the whole people and in the furtherance of the purposes of God's government. THE SYMMETRY OF LIFE. PHILLIPS BROOKS. Extract from an Address to Young Afen. There are three directions or dimensions of human life to which we may fitly give these three names, Length and Breadth and Height. The Length of a life, in this meaning of it, is, of course, not its duration. It is the rather the reaching on and out of a man, in the line of activity and thought and self-development, which is indicated and proph- esied by the character which is natural within him, by the special ambitions which spring up out of his special powers. It is the push of a life forward to its own personal ends and ambitions. The Breadth of a life, on the other hand, is its outreach laterally, if we may say so. It is the constantly 252 PUBLIC SPEAKING. diffusive tendency which is always drawing a man outward into sympathy with other men. And the Height of a life is its upward reach towards God ; its sense of childhood ; its consciousness of a Divine Life over it with which it tries to live in love, communion and obedience. These are the three dimensions of a life, its length and breadth and height, without the due development of all of which no life becomes complete. The life which has only length, only intensity of ambition, is narrow. The life that has length and breadth, intense ambition and broad humanity, is thin ; it is like a great, flat plain, of which one wearies, and which sooner or later wearies of itself. The life which to its length and breadth adds height, which to its personal ambition and sympathy with men, adds the love and obe- dience of God, completes itself into the cube of the eternal city and is the life complete. Think for a moment of the life of the great apostle, the manly, many-sided Paul. "I press toward the mark for the prize of my high calling," he writes to the Philippians. That is the length of life for him. " I will gladly spend and be spent for you," he writes to the Corinthians. There is the breadth of life for him. " God hath raised us up and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus," he writes to the Ephesians. There is the height of life for him. You can add nothing to these three dimensions when you try to account to yourself for the impression of completeness which comes to you out of his simple, lofty story. We need not stop with him. Look at the Lord of Paul. See how in Christ the same symmetrical manhood shines yet more complete. See what intense ambition to complete SELECTIONS FOR PRACTICE. 253 His work, what tender sympathy with every struggling brother by His side, and at the same time what a perpetual dependence on His Father, is in Him. "For this cause came I into the world." " For their sakes I sanctify myself." " Now, O Father, glorify Thou me. 7 ' Leave either of those out and you have not the perfect Christ, not the entire sym- metry of manhood. If we try to gather into shape some picture of what the perfect man of heaven is to be, still we must keep the sym- metry of these his three dimensions. It must be that for- ever before each glorified spirit in the other life there shall be set one goal of peculiar ambition, his goal, after which he is peculiarly to strive, the struggle after which is to make his eternal life to be forever different from every other among all the hosts of heaven. And yet it must be that as each soul strives towards his own attainment he shall be knit for- ever into closer and closer union with all the other countless souls which are striving after theirs. And the inspiring po\\ ! of it all, the source of all the energy and all the love, must then be clear beyond all doubt ; the ceaseless flood of light forever pouring forth from the self-living God to fill and feed the open lives of His redeemed who lived by him. There is the symmetry of manhood perfect. There, in re- deemed and glorified human nature, is the true heavenly Jerusalem. I hope that we are all striving and praying now that we may come to some such symmetrical completeness. This is the glory of a young man's life. Do not dare to live with- out some clear intention toward which your living shall be bent. Mean to do something with all your might. Do not add act to act and day to day in perfect thoughtlessness, 25 1 PUBLIC SPEAKIXfi. never asking yourself whither the growing line is leading. Hut at the same time do not dare to be so absorbed in your own life, so wrapped up in listening to the sound of your own hurrying heels, that all this vast pathetic music, made up of the mingled joy and sorrow of your fellow-men, shall not find out your heart and claim it and make you rejoice to give yourself for them. And yet, all the while, keep the upward windows open. Do not dare to think that a child of God can worthily work out his career or worthily serve God's other children unless he does both in the love and fear of God their Father. Be sure that ambition and charity will both grow mean unless they are both inspired and exalted by religion. Energy, love, and faith, those make the perfect man. And Christ, who is the perfectness of all of them, gives them all three to any young man who, at the very out- set of his life, gives up himself to Him. INDEX. [Numerals refer to pages. Names of authors are in small capitals. Titles of selections are in italic.] ABBOTT, LYMAN, 8, 60, 2:35, 240. Address, atmosphere of, 100; mas- tery of, 14; paragraphs of, 10; perspective of, 9; preparation of, 9-16; selection of, 9; theme of, 10. Alamo and the New South, The, 138. America, 55. America and International Peace, 159. America a World Republic, 156. American University and American Citizenship, The, 140. Articulation, exercises in, 32-35. Bearing- toward audience, 115. BEECH KK, 72. BEVERIDQE, ALBERT J., 148, 156. BLAINE, JAMES G., 190. />'"< A-*, .1 Tulk on, 161. Breathing:, 20; exercises in deep breathing, 23. BROOKS, PHILLIPS, 251. BRYANT, 82. BURKE, EDMUND, 63, 207. BUTLER, NICHOLAS MURRAY, 233, 246. CARLYLE, THOMAS, 36, 75, 168. Carriage, 114-118. CASTELAR, EMILIO, 215. Character 'Essential for a Great Lawyer, 170. Charter, The Great, 176. CHATHAM, 63. Christian Citizenship, 143. CICERO, 4, 38, 99. Circumflexes, the, 68-70; defini- tion, 68; usage, 69. Climax, 94. Columbus, 211. Compass of voice, 37. Contervnti&m, 11. Conversation, the basis of the best public speaking, 7, 131. CORSON, HIRAM, 5, 54, 127, 128. CURTIS, GEORGE WILLIAM, 11, 52, 63, 69, 82, 84, 100, 199. DANIEL, JOHN W., 183. Delivery, preparation of an ad- dress for, 9-16; style of, 131- 133. Democracy and Education, 233. DEMOSTHENES, 67. DEPEW, CHAUNCEY M., 60, 211. DOWDEN, EDWARD, 136. DRUMMOND, HENRY, 161. Earnestness, 102-109 ; essentials of, 102; not to depend upon the occasion, 104; relation of, to tech- nique, 107 ; the expression of char- acter, 108; the gauge of success, 102. Earnestness, physical, see Phys- ical Earnestness and Gesture. EMERSON, RALPH WALDO, 50, 09, 108, 109. Emphasis, 45-58; faults of, 54; importance of, 48 ; pause-empha- sis, 45; rules of, 49-54; stress- emphasis, 46; time-emphasis, 46. 255 256 INDEX. Emphasizing, ways of, 45. England "/"/ the American Colo- nies, 207. Enunciation, 2J-HU; distinct, 29,; faults in, 30; need of exaggerated, 30. are Temporal, Principles t-.'-rnal, 246. EVERETT, EDWARD, 36, 213. Fallacies relative to teaching pub- lic speaking, 2-5. Force, 88; general suggestions re- garding, 88-93. FRYK, 50. Garcia, A Message to, 209. Garfield, The Death of, 190. Gesture, 118; calisthenics prepara- tory to, 120; cautions on, 125-130; classification of, 122; emphatic, IL'-J. 129; general principles of. r_'4 : locative, 123: mechanics of, 121; suggestive, 122. Gettysburg Address, 180. GLADSTONE, 1. GOUQH, JOHN B., 66. Government by Public Opinion, 238. GRADY, HENRY W., 12, 92, 93, 101, 138, 195, 205. GRAVES, JOHN TEMPLE, 63, 61. GRIMKE, 68. HADLEY, ARTHUR TWINING, 238, 248. Happiness and Liberty, 201. HAY, JOHN, 1. HIGGINSON, THOMAS WENT WORTH, 1, 39, 132. HOAR, GEORGE F., 17, 152. HOGE, MOSES D., 186. Home and the Republic, The, 12. HUBBARD, ELBERT, 163, 209. 1 1, ]}>< ndence Day, The True Spirit for, 223. Inflection, 59-78; definition and classification, 59 ; falling, (X), CA. 67. 68; faults of, 75-78; general law of, 59; general law of, applications of the, 60-68; rising, 62-63, 64, 65 67,68. INGERSOLL, ROBERT G., 201. Insight and Foresight, L'l'.t. Jackson, Stonewall, 186. JOHNSON, HERRICK, 12!t. JONES, SIR WILLIAM, 64. Jury Address, 172. Key, 37-H ; definition of, 37 : exor- cises in, 42; high, 40; middl. . .,7. KIPLING, RUDYARD, 56. Law, Individual Liberty, and the M"f> Spirit, The, 217. Law of Service, The, 240. Lee, Robert E., 183. LEWIS, YANCEY, 223. :.x, ABRAHAM, 36, 180. Lincoln, Abraham. 1M. Lincoln, Tribute to, L'ir>. LODGE, HENRY CABOT, 230, 243. LONGFELLOW, 50, 84. MACAULAY, 66, 70. McKin />'!>, WiMnin, 192. Marshall, John, I Masterpiece of God, TV/ Message to Garcia, A, -"'.'. Minute Man of the Revolution, The. 190. Modulation, 41. Negro Question, The, 228. "Outlook," The, selection from, Jl'.i. PAGE, THOMAS NELSON, 226, 228. PARKHURST, CHARLBS II., 143. PENN, WILLIAM, 60. PHELPS, EDWARD J., 177. Philippine Question, The, 148. Philippines, Our Policy toward thr, 152. PHILLIPS, WENDELL, 53, 91, {;. !''>, 170, Li:;. Phrasing:, 85 ; faults of, 86. ! Physical Earnestness, 1 1 1 - 1 : y ; defined, 111; the expression of. 113-118. See Gesture. INDEX. 257 Pilgrims, The, 213. PORTER, HORACE, 188. Practice, necessity of, 135-137. Preparation of an address, 9. Pronunciation, 26-28; faults of, '_'>: importance of correct, 26; tests of good, 27. Public Opinion and Agitation, 166. Public Speaking, basis of , 9; de- tined, 7 ; method of, 8; tests of, 7. Puritans and Twentieth Century Problems, The, 248. Rate, 79; admonitions as to, 79-84; exercises for acquiring slow, 81. Reading: aloud, 135. Recessional, The, 56. REID, WHITKLAW, 145. Revolutions, 203. KIH.SKVELT, THEODORE, 159. r. M., 176. SALISBURY, 1. SHAKESPEARE, 35, 70, 76. SHKPPARD, NATHAN, 111. Slides, the, 71-74; definition, 71; usage, 72. Soldier's Last Salute, The, 188. Sources of Our National Strength, 145. South, The Neio, 195. South, The New, and the Race Prob- lem, 205. South, The Old, Social Life in, 226. SOUTHS Y, 23. Speech, how effected, 19. Stage-fright, 134. Style of delivery, 131. Symmetry of Life, The, 251. TALMAGE, 60. Time, 79-87; definition, 79. Tone, pure, 22. Tone-color, 98-101. Training for the Legal Profession, 177. Transition, 86. Triumph of Truth, The, 168. Vocal organs, exercises for, 24. Voice, the, 17-25 ; adaptation of, to room, 39; culture, 17. Volume, 95. WATTERSON, HENRY, 181. Wealth and Democracy, 235. WEBSTER, DANIEL, 3, 54, 61, 172. Webster as an Orator, 230. WHITTIER, 72. WILSON, WOODROW, 140. WOODWARD, JOHN, 217. Word-coloring, 99. ENGLISH. The Academy Series of English Classics. THE works selected for this series are such as have gained a conspicuous and enduring place in literature ; nothing is ad- mitted either trivial in character or ephemeral in interest Each volume is edited by a teacher of reputation, whose name is a guaranty of sound and judicious annotation. It is the aim of the Notes to furnish assistance only where it is absolutely needed, and, in general, to permit the author to \>e his own interpreter. All the essays and speeches in the series (excepting Webster's Reply to Hayne) are printed without abridgment. 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