Public Speaking: Principles and Practice Part 7

From "Lectures on Oratory" BY HENRY WARD BEECHER

How much squandering there is of the voice! How little there is of the advantage that may come from conversational tones! How seldom does a man dare to acquit himself with pathos and fervor! And the men are themselves mechanical and methodical in the bad way who are most afraid of the artificial training that is given in the schools, and who so often show by the fruit of their labor that the want of oratory is the want of education.

How remarkable is the sweetness of voice in the mother, in the father, in the household! The music of no chorded instruments brought together is, for sweetness, like the music of familiar affection when spoken by brother and sister, or by father and mother.

Conversation itself belongs to oratory. How many men there are who are weighty in argument, who have abundant resources, and who are almost boundless in their power at other times and in other places, but who, when in company among their kind, are exceedingly unapt in their methods. Having none of the secret instruments by which the elements of nature may be touched, having no skill and no power in this direction, they stand as machines before living, sensitive men. A man may be a master before an instrument; only the instrument is dead; and he has the living hand; and out of that dead instrument what wondrous harmony springs forth at his touch! And if you can electrify an audience by the power of a living man on dead things, how much more should that audience be electrified when the chords are living and the man is alive, and he knows how to touch them with divine inspiration!

THE TRAINING OF THE GENTLEMAN

From "Personal Power," by permission of, and by special arrangement with, Houghton Mifflin Company, authorized publishers of this author's works.

BY WILLIAM J. TUCKER

In this talk about the part which the college may take in the training of a gentleman, I have not dwelt, as you have noticed, upon forms or conventionalities. Every gentleman respects form. Respect for form can be taught, or at least inculcated, but not form itself. One comes to be at ease in society by going into society. Manners come by observation.

We imitate, we follow the better fashion of society, the better behavior of men. Good breeding consists first in the attention of others in our behalf to certain necessary details, then in our attention to them. We come in time to draw close and nice distinctions.

This little thing is right, that is not quite right. So we grow into the formal habits of a gentleman. "Good manners are made up of constant and petty sacrifices," says Emerson. It is well to keep this saying in mind as a qualification of another of his more familiar sayings: "Give me a thought, and my hands and legs and voice and face will all go right. It is only when mind and character slumber that the dress can be seen."

I like to see the well-bred man, to whom the details of social life have become a second nature. I like also to see the play of that first healthy instinct in a true man which scorns a mean act, which will not allow him to take part in the making of a mean custom, which for example, if he be a college fellow, will not suffer him to treat another fellow as a f.a.g. I am entirely sure that that man is a gentleman.

So then it is, in this world of books, of companionship, of sport, of struggle with some of us, of temptation also, and yet more of high incentives, we are all set to the task of coming out, and of helping one another to come out, as gentlemen. Do not miss, I beseech you, the greatness of the task. Do not miss its constancy. It is more than the incidental work of a college to train the efficient, the honorable, the unselfish man. A college-bred man must be able to show at all times and on all occasions the quality of his distinction.

MAKING THE POINT

BRUTUS TO THE ROMAN CITIZENS

From "Julius Caesar"

BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Be patient till the last.

Romans, countrymen, and lovers! hear me for my cause, and be silent, that you may hear: believe me for mine honor, and have respect to mine honor, that you may believe: censure me in your wisdom, and awake your senses, that you may the better judge. If there be any in this a.s.sembly, any dear friend of Caesar's, to him I say, that Brutus' love to Caesar was no less than his. If, then, that friend demand why Brutus rose against Caesar, this is my answer,--Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living, and die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live all free men? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him; as he was fortunate I rejoice at it; as he was valiant, I honor him: but, as he was ambitious, I slew him. There is tears for his love; joy for his fortune; honor for his valor; and death for his ambition. Who is here so base that would be a bondman? If any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so rude that would not be a Roman? If any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so vile that will not love his country? If any, speak; for him have I offended.

I have done no more to Caesar than you shall do to Brutus. The question of his death is enrolled in the Capitol; his glory not extenuated, wherein he was worthy; nor his offenses enforced, for which he suffered death. Here comes his body, mourned by Mark Antony: who, though he had no hand in his death, shall receive the benefit of his dying, a place in the commonwealth; as which of you shall not? With this I depart,-- that, as I slew my best lover for the good of Rome, I have the same dagger for myself, when it shall please my country to need my death.

THE PRECEPTS OF POLONIUS

From "Hamlet"

BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Yet here, Laertes! aboard, aboard, for shame!

The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail, And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee!

And these few precepts in thy memory See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportion'd thought his act.

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.

Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel; But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatch'd, unfledg'd comrade. Beware Of entrance to a quarrel, but, being in, Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee.

Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice; Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy; For the apparel oft proclaims the man, And they in France of the best rank and station Are most select and generous, chief in that.

Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.

This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Farewell; my blessing season this in thee!

THE HIGH STANDARD

From the Lord Rector's address, University of Edinburgh, 1882

BY LORD ROSEBERY

Let us win in the compet.i.tion of international well-being and prosperity. Let us have a finer, better educated, better lodged, and better nourished race than exists elsewhere; better schools, better universities, better tribunals, ay, and better churches. In one phrase, let our standard be higher, not in the jargon of the Education Department, but in the acknowledgment of mankind. The standard of mankind is not so exalted but that a n.o.bler can be imagined and attained. The dream of him who loved Scotland best would lie not so much in the direction of antiquarian revival, as in the hope that his country might be pointed out as one that in spite of rocks, and rigor, and poverty, could yet teach the world by precept and example, could lead the van and point the moral, where greater nations and fairer states had failed. Those who believe the Scots to be so eminently vain a race, will say that already we are in our opinion the tenth legion of civilization. Well, vanity is a centipede with corns on every foot: I will not tread where the ground is most dangerous. But if we are not foremost, we may at any rate become so. Our fathers have declared unto us what was done in their days and in the old time before them: we know that we come of a strenuous stock. Do you remember the words that young Carlyle wrote to his brother nine years after he had left this University as a student, forty-three years before he returned as its Rector?--

"I say, Jack, thou and I must never falter. Work, my boy, work unweariedly. I swear that all the thousand miseries of this hard fight, and ill-health, the most terrific of them all, shall never chain us down. By the river Styx it shall not! Two fellows from a nameless spot in Annandale shall yet show the world the pluck that is in Carlyles."

Let that be your spirit to-day. You are citizens of no mean city, members of no common state, heirs of no supine empire. You will many of you exercise influence over your fellow men: some will study and interpret our laws, and so become a power; others will again be in a position to solace and exalt, as destined to be doctors and clergymen, and so the physical and spiritual comforters of mankind. Make the best of these opportunities. Raise your country, raise your University, raise yourselves.

ON TAXING THE COLONIES

Delivered in the House of Commons, March, 1775

BY EDMUND BURKE

Reflect, sirs, that when you have fixed a quota of taxation for every colony, you have not provided for prompt and punctual payment. You must make new Boston Port Bills, new restraining laws, new acts for dragging men to England for trial. You must send out new fleets, new armies. All is to begin again. From this day forward the empire is never to know an hour's tranquillity. An intestine fire will be kept alive in the bowels of the colonies, which one time or other must consume this whole empire.

Instead of a standing revenue, you will therefore have a perpetual quarrel. Indeed, the n.o.ble lord who proposed this project seems himself to be of that opinion. His project was rather designed for breaking the union of the colonies than for establishing a revenue. But whatever his views may be, as I propose the peace and union of the colonies as the very foundation of my plan, it cannot accord with one whose foundation is perpetual discord.

Compare the two. This I offer to give you is plain and simple; the other full of perplexed and intricate mazes. This is mild; that harsh.

This is found by experience effectual for its purposes; the other is a new project. This is universal; the other calculated for certain colonies only. This is immediate in its conciliatory operation; the other remote, contingent, full of hazard. Mine is what becomes the dignity of a ruling people--gratuitous, unconditional, and not held out as a matter of bargain and sale. I have done my duty in proposing it to you. I have indeed tried you by a long discourse; but this is the misfortune of those to whose influence nothing will be conceded, and who must win every inch of their ground by argument. You have heard me with goodness. May you decide with wisdom!

JUSTIFYING THE PRESIDENT

From a speech in the Senate, 1900

By JOHN C. SPOONER

Some one asked the other day why the President did not bring about a cessation of hostilities. Upon what basis could he have brought about a cessation of hostilities? Should he have asked Aguinaldo for an armistice? If so, upon what basis should he have requested it? What should he say to him? "Please stop this fighting"? "What for,"

Aguinaldo would say; "do you propose to retire?" "No." "Do you propose to grant us independence?" "No, not now." "Well, why, then, an armistice?" The President would doubtless be expected to reply: "Some distinguished gentlemen in the United States, members of the United States Senate, and others, have discovered a doubt about our right to be here at all, some question whether we have acquired the Philippines, some question as to whether we have correctly read the Declaration of Independence; and I want an armistice until we can consult and determine finally whether we have acquired the Philippines or not, whether we are violating the Declaration of Independence or not, whether we are trampling upon the Const.i.tution or not." That is practically the proposition.

No, Mr. President, men may say in criticism of the President what they choose. He has been grossly insulted in this chamber, and it appears upon the record. He has gone his way patiently, exercising the utmost forbearance, all his acts characterized by a desire to do precisely what the Congress had placed upon him by its ratification of the treaty and its increase of the army. He has done it in a way to impress upon the Filipinos, so far as language and action could do it, his desire, and the desire of our people, to do them good, to give them the largest possible measure of liberty.

BRITAIN AND AMERICA