The Art of Public Speaking
himself. It is a loss to every great man to take a public office in our
country. Bear this in mind, young man, that you cannot be made great by
a political election.
Another young man says, "I am going to be a great man in Philadelphia
some time." "Is that so? When are you going to be great?" "When there
comes another war! When we get into difficulty with Mexico, or England,
or Russia, or Japan, or with Spain again over Cuba, or with New Jersey,
I will march up to the cannon's mouth, and amid the glistening bayonets
I will tear down their flag from its staff, and I will come home with
stars on my shoulders, and hold every office in the gift of the
government, and I will be great." "No, you won't! No, you won't; that is
no evidence of true greatness, young man." But don't blame that young
man for thinking that way; that is the way he is taught in the high
school. That is the way history is taught in college. He is taught that
the men who held the office did all the fighting.
I remember we had a Peace Jubilee here in Philadelphia soon after the
Spanish war. Perhaps some of these visitors think we should not have had
it until now in Philadelphia, and as the great procession was going up
Broad street I was told that the tally-ho coach stopped right in front
of my house, and on the coach was Hobson, and all the people threw up
their hats and swung their handkerchiefs, and shouted "Hurrah for
Hobson!" I would have yelled too, because he deserves much more of his
country than he has ever received. But suppose I go into the High School
to-morrow and ask, "Boys, who sunk the Merrimac?" If they answer me
"Hobson," they tell me seven-eighths of a lie--seven-eighths of a lie,
because there were eight men who sunk the Merrimac. The other seven men,
by virtue of their position, were continually exposed to the Spanish
fire, while Hobson, as an officer, might reasonably be behind the
smoke-stack. Why, my friends, in this intelligent audience gathered here
to-night I do not believe I could find a single person that can name the
other seven men who were with Hobson. Why do we teach history in that
way? We ought to teach that however humble the station a man may occupy,
if he does his full duty in his place, he is just as much entitled to
the American people's honor as is a king upon a throne. We do teach it
as a mother did her little boy in New York when he said, "Mamma, what
great building is that?" "That is General Grant's tomb." "Who was
General Grant?" "He was the man who put down the rebellion." Is that the
way to teach history?
Do you think we would have gained a victory if it had depended on
General Grant alone? Oh, no. Then why is there a tomb on the Hudson at
all? Why, not simply because General Grant was personally a great man
himself, but that tomb is there because he was a representative man and
represented two hundred thousand men who went down to death for their
nation and many of them as great as General Grant. That is why that
beautiful tomb stands on the heights over the Hudson.
I remember an incident that will illustrate this, the only one that I
can give to-night. I am ashamed of it, but I don't dare leave it out. I
close my eyes now; I look back through the years to 1863; I can see my
native town in the Berkshire Hills, I can see that cattle-show ground
filled with people; I can see the church there and the town hall
crowded, and hear bands playing, and see flags flying and handkerchiefs
streaming--well do I recall at this moment that day. The people had
turned out to receive a company of soldiers, and that company came
marching up on the Common. They had served out one term in the Civil War
and had reenlisted, and they were being received by their native
townsmen. I was but a boy, but I was captain of that company, puffed out
with pride on that day--why, a cambric needle would have burst me all to
pieces. As I marched on the Common at the head of my company, there was
not a man more proud than I. We marched into the town hall and then they
seated my soldiers down in the center of the house and I took my place
down on the front seat, and then the town officers filed through the
great throng of people, who stood close and packed in that little hall.
They came up on the platform, formed a half circle around it, and the
mayor of the town, the "chairman of the Selectmen" in New England, took
his seat in the middle of that half circle. He was an old man, his hair
was gray; he never held an office before in his life. He thought that an
office was all he needed to be a truly great man, and when he came up he
adjusted his powerful spectacles and glanced calmly around the audience
with amazing dignity. Suddenly his eyes fell upon me, and then the good
old man came right forward and invited me to come up on the stand with
the town officers. Invited me up on the stand! No town officer ever took
notice of me before I went to war. Now, I should not say that. One town
officer was there who advised the teacher to "whale" me, but I mean no
"honorable mention." So I was invited up on the stand with the town
officers. I took my seat and let my sword fall on the floor, and folded
my arms across my breast and waited to be received. Napoleon the Fifth!
Pride goeth before destruction and a fall. When I had gotten my seat and
all became silent through the hall, the chairman of the Selectmen arose
and came forward with great dignity to the table, and we all supposed he
would introduce the Congregational minister, who was the only orator in
the town, and who would give the oration to the returning soldiers. But,
friends, you should have seen the surprise that ran over that audience
when they discovered that this old farmer was going to deliver that
oration himself. He had never made a speech in his life before, but he
fell into the same error that others have fallen into, he seemed to
think that the office would make him an orator. So he had written out a
speech and walked up and down the pasture until he had learned it by
heart and frightened the cattle, and he brought that manuscript with
him, and taking it from his pocket, he spread it carefully upon the
table. Then he adjusted his spectacles to be sure that he might see it,
and walked far back on the platform and then stepped forward like this.
He must have studied the subject much, for he assumed an elocutionary
attitude; he rested heavily upon his left heel, slightly advanced the
right foot, threw back his shoulders, opened the organs of speech, and
advanced his right hand at an angle of forty-five. As he stood in that
elocutionary attitude this is just the way that speech went, this is it
precisely. Some of my friends have asked me if I do not exaggerate it,
but I could not exaggerate it. Impossible! This is the way it went;
although I am not here for the story but the lesson that is back of it:
"Fellow citizens." As soon as he heard his voice, his hand began to
shake like that, his knees began to tremble, and then he shook all over.
He coughed and choked and finally came around to look at his manuscript.
Then he began again: "Fellow citizens: We--are--we are--we are--we
are--We are very happy--we are very happy--we are very happy--to welcome
back to their native town these soldiers who have fought and bled--and
come back again to their native town. We are especially--we are
especially--we are especially--we are especially pleased to see with us
to-day this young hero (that meant me)--this young hero who in
imagination (friends, remember, he said "imagination," for if he had not
said that, I would not be egotistical enough to refer to it)--this young
hero who, in imagination, we have seen leading his troops--leading--we
have seen leading--we have seen leading his troops on to the deadly
breach. We have seen his shining--his shining--we have seen his
shining--we have seen his shining--his shining sword--flashing in the
sunlight as he shouted to his troops, 'Come on!'"
Oh, dear, dear, dear, dear! How little that good, old man knew about
war. If he had known anything about war, he ought to have known what any
soldier in this audience knows is true, that it is next to a crime for
an officer of infantry ever in time of danger to go ahead of his men. I,
with my shining sword flashing in the sunlight, shouting to my troops:
"Come on." I never did it. Do you suppose I would go ahead of my men to
be shot in the front by the enemy and in the back by my own men? That is
no place for an officer. The place for the officer is behind the private
soldier in actual fighting. How often, as a staff officer, I rode down
the line when the Rebel cry and yell was coming out of the woods,
sweeping along over the fields, and shouted, "Officers to the rear!
Officers to the rear!" and then every officer goes behind the line of
battle, and the higher the officer's rank, the farther behind he goes.
Not because he is any the less brave, but because the laws of war
require that to be done. If the general came up on the front line and
were killed you would lose your battle anyhow, because he has the plan
of the battle in his brain, and must be kept in comparative safety. I,
with my "shining sword flashing in the sunlight." Ah! There sat in the
hall that day men who had given that boy their last hard-tack, who had
carried him on their backs through deep rivers. But some were not there;
they had gone down to death for their country. The speaker mentioned
them, but they were but little noticed, and yet they had gone down to
death for their country, gone down for a cause they believed was right
and still believe was right, though I grant to the other side the same
that I ask for myself. Yet these men who had actually died for their
country were little noticed, and the hero of the hour was this boy. Why
was he the hero? Simply because that man fell into that same
foolishness. This boy was an officer, and those were only private
soldiers. I learned a lesson that I will never forget. Greatness
consists not in holding some office; greatness really consists in doing
some great deed with little means, in the accomplishment of vast
purposes from the private ranks of life; that is true greatness. He who
can give to this people better streets, better homes, better schools,
better churches, more religion, more of happiness, more of God, he that
can be a blessing to the community in which he lives to-night will be
great anywhere, but he who cannot be a blessing where he now lives will
never be great anywhere on the face of God's earth. "We live in deeds,
not years, in feeling, not in figures on a dial; in thoughts, not
breaths; we should count time by heart throbs, in the cause of right."
Bailey says: "He most lives who thinks most."
If you forget everything I have said to you, do not forget this, because
it contains more in two lines than all I have said. Bailey says: "He
most lives who thinks most, who feels the noblest, and who acts the
best."
_VICTOR HUGO_
HONORE DE BALZAC
Delivered at the Funeral of Balzac, August 20, 1850.
Gentlemen: The man who now goes down into this tomb is one of those to
whom public grief pays homage.
In one day all fictions have vanished. The eye is fixed not only on the
heads that reign, but on heads that think, and the whole country is
moved when one of those heads disappears. To-day we have a people in
black because of the death of the man of talent; a nation in mourning
for a man of genius.
Gentlemen, the name of Balzac will be mingled in the luminous trace our
epoch will leave across the future.
Balzac was one of that powerful generation of writers of the nineteenth
century who came after Napoleon, as the illustrious Pleiad of the
seventeenth century came after Richelieu,--as if in the development of