The Art of Public Speaking
The next great step in memorizing is to _pick out the essentials of the
subject_, arrange them in order, and dwell upon them intently. Think
clearly of each essential, one after the other. _Thinking_ a thing--not
allowing the mind to wander to non-essentials--is really memorizing.
_Association of ideas_ is universally recognized as an essential in
memory work; indeed, whole systems of memory training have been founded
on this principle.
Many speakers memorize only the outlines of their addresses, filling in
the words at the moment of speaking. Some have found it helpful to
remember an outline by associating the different points with objects in
the room. Speaking on "Peace," you may wish to dwell on the cost the
cruelty, and the failure of war, and so lead to the justice of
arbitration. Before going on the platform if you will associate four
divisions of your outline with four objects in the room, this
association may help you to recall them. You may be prone to forget your
third point, but you remember that once when you were speaking the
electric lights failed, so arbitrarily the electric light globe will
help you to remember "failure." Such associations, being unique, tend to
stick in the mind. While recently speaking on the six kinds of
imagination the present writer formed them into an acrostic--_visual_,
_auditory_, _motor_, _gustatory_, _olfactory_, and _tactile_, furnished
the nonsense word _vamgot_, but the six points were easily remembered.
In the same way that children are taught to remember the spelling of
teasing words--_separate_ comes from _separ_--and as an automobile
driver remembers that two C's and then two H's lead him into Castor
Road, Cottman Street, Haynes Street and Henry Street, so important
points in your address may be fixed in mind by arbitrary symbols
invented by yourself. The very work of devising the scheme is a memory
action. The psychological process is simple: it is one of noting
intently the steps by which a fact, or a truth, or even a word, has come
to you. Take advantage of this tendency of the mind to remember by
association.
_Repetition_ is a powerful aid to memory. Thurlow Weed, the journalist
and political leader, was troubled because he so easily forgot the names
of persons he met from day to day. He corrected the weakness, relates
Professor William James, by forming the habit of attending carefully to
names he had heard during the day and then repeating them to his wife
every evening. Doubtless Mrs. Weed was heroically longsuffering, but the
device worked admirably.
After reading a passage you would remember, close the book, reflect, and
repeat the contents--aloud, if possible.
_Reading thoughtfully aloud_ has been found by many to be a helpful
memory practise.
_Write what you wish to remember._ This is simply one more way of
increasing the number and the strength of your mental impressions by
utilizing _all_ your avenues of impression. It will help to fix a speech
in your mind if you speak it aloud, listen to it, write it out, and look
at it intently. You have then impressed it on your mind by means of
vocal, auditory, muscular and visual impressions.
Some folk have peculiarly distinct auditory memories; they are able to
recall things heard much better than things seen. Others have the visual
memory; they are best able to recall sight-impressions. As you recall a
walk you have taken, are you able to remember better the sights or the
sounds? Find out what kinds of impressions your memory retains best, and
use them the most. To fix an idea in mind, use _every_ possible kind of
impression.
_Daily habit_ is a great memory cultivator. Learn a lesson from the
Marathon runner. Regular exercise, though never so little daily, will
strengthen your memory in a surprising measure. Try to describe in
detail the dress, looks and manner of the people you pass on the
street. Observe the room you are in, close your eyes, and describe its
contents. View closely the landscape, and write out a detailed
description of it. How much did you miss? Notice the contents of the
show windows on the street; how many features are you able to recall?
Continual practise in this feat may develop in you as remarkable
proficiency as it did in Robert Houdin and his son.
The daily memorizing of a beautiful passage in literature will not only
lend strength to the memory, but will store the mind with gems for
quotation. But whether by little or much add daily to your memory power
by practise.
_Memorize out of doors._ The buoyancy of the wood, the shore, or the
stormy night on deserted streets may freshen your mind as it does the
minds of countless others.
Lastly, _cast out fear_. Tell yourself that you _can_ and _will_ and
_do_ remember. By pure exercise of selfism assert your mastery. Be
obsessed with the fear of forgetting and you cannot remember. Practise
the reverse. Throw aside your manuscript crutches--you may tumble once
or twice, but what matters that, for you are going to learn to walk and
leap and run.
_Memorizing a Speech_
Now let us try to put into practise the foregoing suggestions. First,
reread this chapter, noting the nine ways by which memorizing may be
helped.
Then read over the following selection from Beecher, applying so many of
the suggestions as are practicable. Get the spirit of the selection
firmly in your mind. Make mental note of--write down, if you must--the
_succession_ of ideas. Now memorize the thought. Then memorize the
outline, the order in which the different ideas are expressed. Finally,
memorize the exact wording.
No, when you have done all this, with the most faithful attention to
directions, you will not find memorizing easy, unless you have
previously trained your memory, or it is naturally retentive. Only by
constant practise will memory become strong and only by continually
observing these same principles will it remain strong. You will,
however, have made a beginning, and that is no mean matter.
_THE REIGN OF THE COMMON PEOPLE_
I do not suppose that if you were to go and look upon the
experiment of self-government in America you would have a very
high opinion of it. I have not either, if I just look upon the
surface of things. Why, men will say: "It stands to reason that
60,000,000 ignorant of law, ignorant of constitutional history,
ignorant of jurisprudence, of finance, and taxes and tariffs and
forms of currency--60,000,000 people that never studied these
things--are not fit to rule." Your diplomacy is as complicated
as ours, and it is the most complicated on earth, for all things
grow in complexity as they develop toward a higher condition.
What fitness is there in these people? Well, it is not democracy
merely; it is a representative democracy. Our people do not vote
in mass for anything; they pick out captains of thought, they
pick out the men that do know, and they send them to the
Legislature to think for them, and then the people afterward
ratify or disallow them.
But when you come to the Legislature I am bound to confess that
the thing does not look very much more cheering on the outside.
Do they really select the best men? Yes; in times of danger they
do very generally, but in ordinary time, "kissing goes by
favor." You know what the duty of a regular Republican-Democratic
legislator is. It is to get back again next winter. His second
duty is what? His second duty is to put himself under that
extraordinary providence that takes care of legislators'
salaries. The old miracle of the prophet and the meal and the
oil is outdone immeasurably in our days, for they go there poor
one year, and go home rich; in four years they become
moneylenders, all by a trust in that gracious providence that
takes care of legislators' salaries. Their next duty after
that is to serve the party that sent them up, and then, if there
is anything left of them, it belongs to the commonwealth.
Someone has said very wisely, that if a man traveling wishes to
relish his dinner he had better not go into the kitchen to see
where it is cooked; if a man wishes to respect and obey the law,
he had better not go to the Legislature to see where that is
cooked.
--HENRY WARD BEECHER.
From a lecture delivered in Exeter Hall, London, 1886, when making
his last tour of Great Britain.
_In Case of Trouble_
But what are you to do if, notwithstanding all your efforts, you should
forget your points, and your mind, for the minute, becomes blank? This
is a deplorable condition that sometimes arises and must be dealt with.
Obviously, you can sit down and admit defeat. Such a consummation is
devoutly to be shunned.
Walking slowly across the platform may give you time to grip yourself,
compose your thoughts, and stave off disaster. Perhaps the surest and
most practical method is to begin a new sentence with your last
important word. This is not advocated as a method of composing a
speech--it is merely an extreme measure which may save you in tight
circumstances. It is like the fire department--the less you must use it
the better. If this method is followed very long you are likely to find
yourself talking about plum pudding or Chinese Gordon in the most
unexpected manner, so of course you will get back to your lines the
earliest moment that your feet have hit the platform.
Let us see how this plan works--obviously, your extemporized words will
lack somewhat of polish, but in such a pass crudity is better than
failure.
Now you have come to a dead wall after saying: "Joan of Arc fought for
liberty." By this method you might get something like this:
"Liberty is a sacred privilege for which mankind always had to fight.
These struggles [Platitude--but push on] fill the pages of history.
History records the gradual triumph of the serf over the lord, the slave
over the master. The master has continually tried to usurp unlimited
powers. Power during the medieval ages accrued to the owner of the land
with a spear and a strong castle; but the strong castle and spear were
of little avail after the discovery of gunpowder. Gunpowder was the
greatest boon that liberty had ever known."
Thus far you have linked one idea with another rather obviously, but you
are getting your second wind now and may venture to relax your grip on
the too-evident chain; and so you say:
"With gunpowder the humblest serf in all the land could put an end to
the life of the tyrannical baron behind the castle walls. The struggle
for liberty, with gunpowder as its aid, wrecked empires, and built up a
new era for all mankind."
In a moment more you have gotten back to your outline and the day is
saved.
Practising exercises like the above will not only fortify you against
the death of your speech when your memory misses fire, but it will also
provide an excellent training for fluency in speaking. _Stock up with
ideas._
QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES
1. Pick out and state briefly the nine helps to memorizing suggested in
this chapter.
2. Report on whatever success you may have had with any of the plans for
memory culture suggested in this chapter. Have any been less successful
than others?
3. Freely criticise any of the suggested methods.
4. Give an original example of memory by association of ideas.
5. List in order the chief ideas of any speech in this volume.
6. Repeat them from memory.
7. Expand them into a speech, using your own words.
8. Illustrate practically what would you do, if in the midst of a speech
on Progress, your memory failed you and you stopped suddenly on the
following sentence: "The last century saw marvelous progress in varied
lines of activity."