The Art of Public Speaking
mechanical task with the other. In youth Patrick Henry roamed the fields
and woods in solitude for days at a time unconsciously gathering
material and impressions for his later service as a speaker. Dr. Russell
H. Conwell, the man who, the late Charles A. Dana said, had addressed
more hearers than any living man, used to memorize long passages from
Milton while tending the boiling syrup-pans in the silent New England
woods at night. The modern employer would discharge a Webster of today
for inattention to duty, and doubtless he would be justified, and
Patrick Henry seemed only an idle chap even in those easy-going days;
but the truth remains: those who take in power and have the purpose to
use it efficiently will some day win to the place in which that
stored-up power will revolve great wheels of influence.
Napoleon said that quarter hours decide the destinies of nations. How
many quarter hours do we let drift by aimlessly! Robert Louis Stevenson
conserved _all_ his time; _every_ experience became capital for his
work--for capital may be defined as "the results of labor stored up to
assist future production." He continually tried to put into suitable
language the scenes and actions that were in evidence about him. Emerson
says: "Tomorrow will be like today. Life wastes itself whilst we are
preparing to live."
Why wait for a more convenient season for this broad, general
preparation? The fifteen minutes that we spend on the car could be
profitably turned into speech-capital.
Procure a cheap edition of modern speeches, and by cutting out a few
pages each day, and reading them during the idle minute here and there,
note how soon you can make yourself familiar with the world's best
speeches. If you do not wish to mutilate your book, take it with
you--most of the epoch-making books are now printed in small volumes.
The daily waste of natural gas in the Oklahoma fields is equal to ten
thousand tons of coal. Only about three per cent of the power of the
coal that enters the furnace ever diffuses itself from your electric
bulb as light--the other ninety-seven per cent is wasted. Yet these
wastes are no larger, nor more to be lamented than the tremendous waste
of time which, if conserved would increase the speaker's powers to their
_nth_ degree. Scientists are making three ears of corn grow where one
grew before; efficiency engineers are eliminating useless motions and
products from our factories: catch the spirit of the age and apply
efficiency to the use of the most valuable asset you possess--time. What
do you do mentally with the time you spend in dressing or in shaving?
Take some subject and concentrate your energies on it for a week by
utilizing just the spare moments that would otherwise be wasted. You
will be amazed at the result. One passage a day from the Book of Books,
one golden ingot from some master mind, one fully-possessed thought of
your own might thus be added to the treasury of your life. Do not waste
your time in ways that profit you nothing. Fill "the unforgiving minute"
with "sixty seconds' worth of distance run" and on the platform you will
be immeasurably the gainer.
Let no word of this, however, seem to decry the value of recreation.
Nothing is more vital to a worker than rest--yet nothing is so vitiating
to the shirker. Be sure that your recreation re-creates. A pause in the
midst of labors gathers strength for new effort. The mistake is to pause
too long, or to fill your pauses with ideas that make life flabby.
_Choosing a Subject_
Subject and materials tremendously influence each other.
"This arises from the fact that there are two distinct ways in which a
subject may be chosen: by arbitrary choice, or by development from
thought and reading.
"Arbitrary choice ... of one subject from among a number involves so
many important considerations that no speaker ever fails to appreciate
the tone of satisfaction in him who triumphantly announces: 'I have a
subject!'
"'Do give me a subject!' How often the weary school teacher hears that
cry. Then a list of themes is suggested, gone over, considered, and, in
most instances, rejected, because the teacher can know but imperfectly
what is in the pupil's mind. To suggest a subject in this way is like
trying to discover the street on which a lost child lives, by naming
over a number of streets until one strikes the little one's ear as
sounding familiar.
"Choice by development is a very different process. It does not ask,
What shall I say? It turns the mind in upon itself and asks, What do I
think? Thus, the subject may be said to choose itself, for in the
process of thought or of reading one theme rises into prominence and
becomes a living germ, soon to grow into the discourse. He who has not
learned to reflect is not really acquainted with his own thoughts;
hence, his thoughts are not productive. Habits of reading and reflection
will supply the speaker's mind with an abundance of subjects of which he
already knows something from the very reading and reflection which gave
birth to his theme. This is not a paradox, but sober truth.
"It must be already apparent that the choice of a subject by development
savors more of collection than of conscious selection. The subject
'pops into the mind.' ... In the intellect of the trained thinker it
concentrates--by a process which we have seen to be induction--the facts
and truths of which he has been reading and thinking. This is most often
a gradual process. The scattered ideas may be but vaguely connected at
first, but more and more they concentrate and take on a single form
until at length one strong idea seems to grasp the soul with
irresistible force, and to cry aloud, 'Arise, I am your _theme_!
Henceforth, until you transmute me by the alchemy of your inward fire
into vital speech, you shall know no rest!' Happy, then, is that
speaker, for he has found a subject that grips him.
"Of course, experienced speakers use both methods of selection. Even a
reading and reflective man is sometimes compelled to hunt for a theme
from Dan to Beersheba, and then the task of gathering materials becomes
a serious one. But even in such a case there is a sense in which the
selection comes by development, because no careful speaker settles upon
a theme which does not represent at least some matured thought."[10]
_Deciding on the Subject Matter_
Even when your theme has been chosen for you by someone else, there
remains to you a considerable field for choice of subject matter. The
same considerations, in fact, that would govern you in choosing a theme
must guide in the selection of the material. Ask yourself--or someone
else--such questions as these:
What is the precise nature of the occasion? How large an audience may be
expected? From what walks of life do they come? What is their probable
attitude toward the theme? Who else will speak? Do I speak first, last,
or where, on the program? What are the other speakers going to talk
about? What is the nature of the auditorium? Is there a desk? Could the
subject be more effectively handled if somewhat modified? Precisely how
much time am I to fill?
It is evident that many speech-misfits of subject, speaker, occasion and
place are due to failure to ask just such pertinent questions. _What_
should be said, by _whom_, and _in what circumstances_, constitute
ninety per cent of efficiency in public address. No matter who asks you,
refuse to be a square peg in a round hole.
_Questions of Proportion_
Proportion in a speech is attained by a nice adjustment of time. How
fully you may treat your subject it is not always for you to say. Let
ten minutes mean neither nine nor eleven--though better nine than
eleven, at all events. You wouldn't steal a man's watch; no more should
you steal the time of the succeeding speaker, or that of the audience.
There is no need to overstep time-limits if you make your preparation
adequate and divide your subject so as to give each thought its due
proportion of attention--and no more. Blessed is the man that maketh
short speeches, for he shall be invited to speak again.
Another matter of prime importance is, what part of your address
demands the most emphasis. This once decided, you will know where to
place that pivotal section so as to give it the greatest strategic
value, and what degree of preparation must be given to that central
thought so that the vital part may not be submerged by non-essentials.
Many a speaker has awakened to find that he has burnt up eight minutes
of a ten-minute speech in merely getting up steam. That is like spending
eighty percent of your building-money on the vestibule of the house.
The same sense of proportion must tell you to stop precisely when you
are through--and it is to be hoped that you will discover the arrival of
that period before your audience does.
_Tapping Original Sources_
The surest way to give life to speech-material is to gather your facts
at first hand. Your words come with the weight of authority when you can
say, "I have examined the employment rolls of every mill in this
district and find that thirty-two per cent of the children employed are
under the legal age." No citation of authorities can equal that. You
must adopt the methods of the reporter and find out the facts underlying
your argument or appeal. To do so may prove laborious, but it should not
be irksome, for the great world of fact teems with interest, and over
and above all is the sense of power that will come to you from original
investigation. To see and feel the facts you are discussing will react
upon you much more powerfully than if you were to secure the facts at
second hand.
Live an active life among people who are doing worth-while things, keep
eyes and ears and mind and heart open to absorb truth, and then tell of
the things you know, as if you know them. The world will listen, for the
world loves nothing so much as real life.
_How to Use a Library_
Unsuspected treasures lie in the smallest library. Even when the owner
has read every last page of his books it is only in rare instances that
he has full indexes to all of them, either in his mind or on paper, so
as to make available the vast number of varied subjects touched upon or
treated in volumes whose titles would never suggest such topics.
For this reason it is a good thing to take an odd hour now and then to
browse. Take down one volume after another and look over its table of
contents and its index. (It is a reproach to any author of a serious
book not to have provided a full index, with cross references.) Then
glance over the pages, making notes, mental or physical, of material
that looks interesting and usable. Most libraries contain volumes that
the owner is "going to read some day." A familiarity with even the
contents of such books on your own shelves will enable you to refer to
them when you want help. Writings read long ago should be treated in the
same way--in every chapter some surprise lurks to delight you.
In looking up a subject do not be discouraged if you do not find it
indexed or outlined in the table of contents--you are pretty sure to
discover some material under a related title.
Suppose you set to work somewhat in this way to gather references on
"Thinking:" First you look over your book titles, and there is
Schaeffer's "Thinking and Learning to Think." Near it is Kramer's "Talks
to Students on the Art of Study"--that seems likely to provide some
material, and it does. Naturally you think next of your book on
psychology, and there is help there. If you have a volume on the human
intellect you will have already turned to it. Suddenly you remember your
encyclopedia and your dictionary of quotations--and now material fairly
rains upon you; the problem is what _not_ to use. In the encyclopedia